How To Develop a Content Marketing Plan in 7 Steps

When drafting a content marketing plan, you’ll review your business goals and potential customers’ needs to decide what to upload over the next few months. By following this strategy, you’ll be able to create a consistent brand image and build a community around your product.

Read on to discover how to create a content marketing strategy from scratch, from understanding your audience to setting measurable goals. 

What’s a Content Marketing Plan?

A content marketing plan is an outline of your business’s advertising goals. While writing one, you’ll research your target audience, decide what type of content to post, and plan a timeline for your uploads. 

After implementing the plan, it’s essential to track how well your posts perform. Metrics like shares, likes, and comments can show you whether your followers are responding well to these uploads. If not, it’s time to rework your strategy to engage your audience fully.

Why Having a Content Marketing Plan Matters

A digital content plan is essential for anyone selling their products online. Here’s how it helps:

• Stay organized — A clear plan keeps you on track and helps you create and share content without stress.
• Target the right audience — Understanding your potential customers helps you create content that resonates with them.
• Improve your return on investment — An effective plan helps you use resources wisely and measure what’s working so you get more value from your content.
• Create cohesive messaging — Following a strategy creates a unified message across all platforms, establishing a consistent brand image customers can trust. 

Without a content marketing plan, businesses may risk posting inconsistently, missing out on trending topics, or failing to connect with their audience.Essential Components of a Content Marketing PlanSeveral key elements drive a solid content creation strategy. Here’s what to include:

• A mission statement describes why your business creates content and what you want to achieve with it. 
• Brand guidelines define how your posts should look and sound to ensure consistency across platforms. 
• Audience personas are profiles of your ideal customers. Knowing who you're creating content for helps you tailor your message to them.
• Content types list the posts you'll focus on, such as blogs, videos, or podcasts.
• Key performance indicators (KPIs) are metrics that help you track your progress and see what’s working. For instance, website visits, social shares, and purchases are common benchmarks to monitor.

‍How To Create a Content Marketing Plan: 7 Steps

‍Developing a content marketing plan might seem like a big task, but breaking it down into these seven steps can make it easier to handle. Here’s how to get started.

1. Define Your Goals and KPIs

Start by identifying your goals, like raising brand awareness, driving traffic to your website, or generating more leads. Once your objectives are clear, pick a few KPIs to help you track your progress.

For example, if you want to raise brand awareness, monitor social media metrics like reach, impressions, and engagement rates. These insights will help you gauge how well people respond to your content online.

2. Know Your Target Audience

To connect with potential customers, you need to understand their needs and demographics. Ask yourself the following questions to define your ideal follower: 

• What’s their age, gender, and location?
• What problems are they trying to solve?
• Where do they spend time online?

With this information, you can create a detailed audience persona and design all your content with them in mind. Ultimately, the purpose of this exercise is to understand how your product or service can help people and use that information to create compelling ads. 

3. Audit Existing Content

Before creating anything new, look at your existing uploads to see what performed well and what didn’t. This helps you avoid repeating yourself and gives you ideas on improving or building on what’s already been successful. It can also give you insight into topics or formats that are missing from your content strategy.

The easiest way to audit your social channels is by using analytics tools. Many platforms have these features built in, but you can also use third-party tools to check your KPIs. 

4. Select Content Types and Channels

Once you decide which content resonates most with your potential customers, focus on producing more of it. For example, if followers tend to repost your humorous short-form clips, hire a comedy writer to generate more funny ads. 

Share new posts on platforms where your viewers are most active. You should already have access to this information from your target audience analysis. Popular social media options for marketing include YouTube, Instagram, and Facebook.

5. Build a Content Calendar

A content calendar outlines when and where to publish your posts. It helps maintain consistency and allows you to plan around important dates, like product launches, holidays, or special events. By scheduling ahead, you avoid scrambling for content ideas at the last minute.

6. Measure and Optimize

After uploading, track your posts’ performance using platform-specific or third-party analytics tools. Monitor actions like website visits, social shares, or purchases to see what’s working. If something performs well, replicate it — if not, tweak your approach for better results.

7. Use Automation to Your Advantage

While content marketing plans are essential for selling goods online, they’re also a challenging part of content creation. Thankfully, Captions’ Social Studio helps you organize, schedule, and strategize content with AI. Our platform also uploads social media posts automatically so you’re always on top of things. 

Make the Most Out of Your Marketing Plan With Captions

A well-executed plan is the backbone of any successful marketing campaign. By defining clear goals, understanding your audience, and selecting the right content types and channels, you can ensure your efforts align with your goals. 

To do this successfully, you’ll need the support of a platform like Captions. Our Marketing Video Maker analyzes your product pages and generates custom social media videos tailored to your brand. After creating these posts, use Social Studio to schedule and upload videos to your accounts automatically. 

Improve your brand’s presence with Captions.

FAQ

What’s Content Strategy? 

Content strategy refers to the process of planning and managing ads to reach business goals. It involves defining your target audience, deciding what content to create, and tracking how well your uploads perform.

What Are the 3 C's of Content Marketing?

The 3 C's of content marketing are best practices that help you create a clear advertising strategy. They include: 

• Customer — Understand your audience’s needs, preferences, and challenges to create content that resonates with them.
• Content — Create content that provides value, addresses your followers' interests, and solves problems.
• Channel — Choose the right platforms to ensure your uploads reach your audience where they’re most active.

What Are the Stages of Content Production?Producing successful content requires the following steps:

• Idea generation — Brainstorm topics to explore.
• Planning — Outline the structure and key messaging.
• Creation — Write or design the content.
• Editing — Refine and polish the material for clarity and quality.
• Publishing — Post on the appropriate platforms.
• Monitoring — Track performance and adjust your strategy as needed.