Trust and loyalty are essential to a good relationship with your clients and community. To accomplish a trustworthy brand, you need buyers to find value in your company—not just in your products or services, but the company’s purpose.

In today's COVID market, it’s tougher than ever to have in-person interactions with customers. If you've not already done so, you’ll need to start shifting your relationship-building efforts. And if you've never heard of it before, the best way to build loyalty and trust from a distance is to use content marketing.

Huh, content marketing?

So you might be asking yourself: What is Content Marketing? Content marketing is a strategic approach to creating and delivering valuable, relevant content (ie: information) to your customers on a regular basis. Think of this as sharing the what, why, and how that makes your business AWESOME! Typical content marketing takes many forms and is delivered through a wide range of platforms. Content marketing requires communicating with your clients and prospects with relevant and timely messaging. This increases the opportunity to engage, excite, educate, and delight your customers in order to build those lasting, trusting relationships.

The approach has many benefits:

Engage current customers and attract new ones: First, updating content on a regular basis provides your current customers an opportunity to engage and learn. But it also allows for potential customers to find you and learn to trust your capabilities then encourages them to give your brand a shot.
Prove your worth and value: Customers don’t just come to you for the products you sell. They’re looking for value, whether in the form of entertainment, education, or expertise. Content marketing allows you to demonstrate why you're the best at what you do and deliver consistent value.
Build stronger relationships: Providing useful information helps build better relationships with your customers. By making them feel like an insider of your organization your brand is strengthened in the eyes of your customer. Sharing your knowledge shows clients and prospects that you are also committed to their success.

Content marketing is not about completing transactions. It’s not an ad that will close a sale or entice a customer to purchase right away. Turning your content into ads might turn people off or seem pushy, content marketing offers something interesting to the audience. Positioning your brand as an expert or an inspiration.

You might be asking what kinds of content to produce. Depending on your audience and market you can create anything from blog posts to videos, eBooks, and infographics. Any type of useful, creative content can be incorporated into a content marketing plan.

For example, if you run a clothing boutique, you might create short videos giving styling suggestions for TikTok or YouTube. If your business creates floral designs you might create a lookbook to showcase the types and styles of creations you make. Regardless of what you create, it should inspire, teach, and engage your customers.

Does it really build trust and loyalty?

Absolutely, how you use content marketing strategies to build trust and loyalty depends on your customers and business. There are a few ways you can approach it.

Authenticity: One of the most important things to remember about content marketing is that all your content—whether it’s a video series, webinar, or photos—should be authentic to your brand. Stick to the same messages, style, and voice you use in other aspects of marketing. You want your content to feel familiar and approachable.
Storytelling: A good story pulls you in. Storytelling is a great way to build emotional connections with your audience. Tell your brand’s story and history or even the story of a customer who found success by using your products and services. This is also a great way to showcase awards and achievements. Tell a story about what you did to be amazing!
Do Good & Be Kind: In today's environment, it is expected that businesses give back to the community. Don't hide your good deeds. Showcase how your brand supports a particular cause or volunteer for a local organization it's good content for both organizations. Tell customers how and why you choose to support these organizations. Done correctly, this type of content can build trust and loyalty by proving to the audience that you’re dedicated to more than just making money.
Be Real: More and more customers are interested in learning about the faces behind their favorite brands. Content marketing gives you the perfect opportunity to humanize your brand by showing off the people behind your operations. For example, you could create employee spotlights or share photos of company events.
Create Interaction: The best content is that which allows customers to actually engage and interact with your brand. Try to incorporate interactive content into your marketing plan to open up a two-way conversation. Fun things like quizzes work well on social media, while webinars and workshops allow a smaller segment of your audience to get even more value from your company.

Give your customers what they need

You don’t want to make content just for the sake of making content. The most important aspect of content marketing is ensuring that you create and deliver content that’s tailored to your audience. Rather than pushing information and ads on customers to drive what you need and want, give them what they need and want. Doing this will show your customers that you have value to offer and will build more trust and loyalty.

The content for every brand will be different, but to narrow down on the focus your content should have, ask yourself:

Do my customers have specific challenges that my brand can offer solutions to?
What do I do that my audience would like to know more about?
Are there causes, topics, or information that my audience cares about?
What knowledge can I teach customers that will add value to their lives or businesses?

We pay more attention to content that’s tailored to our specific interests. By focusing your content marketing strategy around what your customers truly want, they’ll learn that your brand offers immense value. Continue using different types of content to nourish and strengthen the relationships you have with your customers; trust and loyalty are sure to follow, at which point you’ve created a customer for life.

Located in the creative Crossroads Arts District, AlphaGraphics Kansas City is a certified Women-Owned business that specializes in helping Kansas City businesses solve marketing problems. The printing company’s production specialties include custom digital color and large format printing.

For further information about AlphaGraphics Kansas City and their capabilities, contact the AGKC team at 816-842-4200 or visit their website, AlphaGraphics KC.

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