It might seem like stating the obvious to herald the importance of content marketing to PR professionals. Let's face it – content really is the bread and butter of the PR industry.
However, with digital and social continuing to grow, it's becoming increasingly important for the PR industry to utilise all the tools available to it in order to maximise online content, making it work harder, and delivering greater ROI. Rapid advances in technology over the last seven years means that PRs can easily maximise their outreach, in a targeted manner, by incorporating online assets such as content discovery platforms into their strategy.
Content marketing is fast becoming one of the key facets of modern day marketing, and with its focus on compelling, genuinely interesting content, there's little wonder that PRs welcome its growing status. In fact, data tells us that in much the same way that PR is built on an understanding of what audiences want to read, and less on a direct sales hook, it is often the case that content written by PRs performs better compared to that produced by other departments or marketing agencies.
Content discovery is not just focused on the owned media that you might write for a blog or news page, but also on getting the most value out of earned media – or coverage. According to a recent survey by tech blog network NetShelter Technology Media conducted in 2013, 85% of technology consumers said that articles, reviews, blogs and videos by experts were the most influential online media when considering a tech purchase.
Maximising this content is key – after all, creating or securing great coverage can be hard work, so it's important for it to have a big impact once it has been published. The reality is that in a crowded online space it is not always easy to ensure that the relevant people actually read your hard-fought for coverage. Equally of concern is what happens when it slips off the homepage and becomes buried online.
Content discovery provides at least part of the answer to this dilemma, as these specialist platforms (with content at their hearts) can keep directing targeted audiences to your content wins and ensure that your latest news piece or long-tail feature keeps being found and read.
Outbrain, for example, uses personalised links to recommend content across a network of more than 100,000 sites, including over 300 plus premium publishers worldwide. Content owners (PRs in this case) can pay on a cost-per-click basis to have their content pushed out across Outbrain's network and publishers receive increased engagement and a new revenue stream as a result – it's a win-win situation. This gives a potential opportunity to increase clicks and click-through rates to the content, not to mention opportunities to 'share' and 'like' via social media, and ultimately increase ROI.
In the way of a tangible example, British Airways used Outbrain's content discovery platform to maximise a series of reviews around the launch of its boarding app. Targeting highly relevant audiences, in this case technology savvy business travellers, BA was able to drive relevant users to its earned media content and ultimately increase downloads. AOL also saw success by partnering with Outbrain. Isobel Sita-Lumsden, marketing director at AOL UK utilises Outbrain as a "quick, flexible, low cost traffic driver".
Industry measurement continues to be a hot topic of debate and traditional AVE is no longer widely accepted, presenting an opening for these kinds of tangible metrics. Content discovery platforms work as an extension to a PR strategy by prolonging the shelf life of editorial pieces, driving eye balls to owned content and maximising coverage. Most PR pros are used to working within the restrictions of a tight budget, but these kinds of content marketing services work to turbocharge PR assets and allow PR firms to make a small, but significant inroad into marketing budgets that so often dwarf communications spend.
Just as PR has long been about sharing news and stories with relevant users, content discovery helps people discover the most interesting, relevant and trusted content wherever they are and when they are actively looking for something new and interesting to explore. It therefore seems inevitable that content marketing strategies will become an integral asset to PR strategies in the future.
This content first appeared at PRCA.org.uk and was republished here with their permission.
This content is brought to you by Outbrain, sponsors of the Guardian's digital content hub.