Content Marketing Institute Expands 8 How-To Guides for B2B and B2C Marketers

CLEVELAND, July 17, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- The Content Marketing Institute announces the release of updated How-To Guides on their website, detailing a best practices framework for creating, managing and promoting B2B and B2C content. 

The expanded collection of eight guides explores critical steps marketers can follow to maximize a content strategy.

"While there are no 'silver bullets' or one-size-fits-all plans that apply to every organization, there are some core, common elements across successful content marketing programs," says Joe Pulizzi, executive director of Content Marketing Institute. "Our how-to guides look at the seven building blocks we've identified as key to any content marketing strategy."

The free resources, including references to numerous articles, checklists, videos and templates, are available here.

The eight guides include:

Getting Started: Content Marketing 101 begins
Plan: Build fundamentals of your plan
Audience: Understand your core audiences
Story: Tell your brand story
Channels: Determine your distribution channels
Process: Manage your team and tools
Conversation: Create your content and listen
Measurement: Prove the effectiveness of your program

A closer look:

The Getting Started guide describes content marketing as the delivery of information that makes your buyer more intelligent. Content Marketing delivers consistent, ongoing valuable information to buyers with the end goal of being rewarded with their business and loyalty. Other Getting Started highlights include:

• How the world's biggest brands like P&G, Microsoft as well as and small businesses use content marketing
• Eight different content marketing tactics that some marketers use to achieve desired results for their marketing goals.

The Story guide notes that corporate storytelling is not meant for selling; it's a way to build relationships with your customers and produce a community of evangelists over time. Story highlights include:

• A Brand Hero's Journey Chart with suggestions on how to develop a structure for a content marketing initiative
• Tips on identifying "what your passions are" and how your story "serves as the foundation for all your future" content development

In the Measurement guide, marketers are get advice for challenging end game of the content framework. The guide notes that it's important to remember that, like any strategy, there will be times that aren't as successful as others. Marketers should use metrics to recognize those failures, learn and adapt. Measurement highlights include:

• Determining what metrics to focus on right out of the gate
• A video segment with a roundtable of top industry experts

About the Content Marketing Institute:

The Content Marketing Institute (CMI) is the leading global content marketing education and training organization. CMI teaches enterprise brands how to attract and retain customers through compelling, multi-channel storytelling. CMI's Content Marketing World event, the largest content marketing-focused event, will be held in Cleveland, Ohio, USA, September 9-12, 2013. CMI also produces the quarterly magazine Chief Content Officer, and provides strategic consulting and content marketing research for some of the best-known brands in the world. CMI is a division of Z Squared Media, a 2012 Inc. 500 company.

Release: http://bit.ly/CMIGuides 

SOURCE Content Marketing Institute