Let’s clear at the beginning what is not content marketing. It is not a tactic/one-time campaign or channel.
It is about:
- consistently putting relevant and valuable content in front of the right people at the right moment;
- the creation and participation in meaningful conversations and development of relationships.
- It happens before and after a sale.
- It is about the customer, not you.
All signs show that we should take content marketing really serious in 2019.
The Content Marketing Institute‘s latest B2C report found that 56% of B2C marketers who increased spending over the last 12 months did so in the area of content creation.
The very same report found that 88% of B2C marketers surveyed say they’re concerned with creating content that builds loyalty with existing clients or customers.
It is not a new discovery that our customers prefer getting to know a golf tourism destination, a golf resort, golf equipment via articles, videos, photos instead of ads.
As more and more customers are fed up with interruptive, irrelevant marketing messages, content marketing can help marketers to develop relationships with customers and become part of their life.
I am sure that one of your main challenges is demand generation not just among potential cusotmers and guests, but also among existing ones.
This is not a simple task as our potential customers’ journeys are becoming very complex.
We cannot afford to neglect the highly competitive and loud marketplace of experiences and the noisy and fragmented digital world.
Let me give you a very simple example: to gain attention and visibility on Facebook.
The empowered customers are also a nice challenge.
Golf resorts and golf club should stop creating content randomly!
I was very surprised to find in a recent Convince & Convert Report that 60% of the marketers don’t have a content marketing strategy.
This is a luxury!
I also disagree with those golf clubs and resorts who order photos for their visual content library (or you can call it as a media asset library as well) and use these photos for at least 1 year.
Today’s photos should express the actual atmosphere and reality. People are looking for authentic visual content.
The emotional, unstaged, real and raw images with real people can create much more trust.
Without having a content strategy is like a Ryder Cup team that competes without a playbook.
Well-documented content marketing strategies are essential for content marketing to be sustainable for any organization.
Such strategy can:
- Align every single member of the golf club’s/resort’s sales and marketing team;
- Improve the effectiveness of content revisions;
- Make every dollar count toward the right resources and business objectives.
- Tie every single piece of content back to a strategic goal.
7 elements of an effective content marketing strategy are:
- Define Goals & Objectives!
- Target audience(s): what kind of people would you like attract to your golf club or golf resort?
- Use content marketing at all stages of the funnel, not just the top!!!
- Channels – where do you want to distribute your content? Define also the purpose of each and every channel you would like to use.
- Content execution – What does all of this content look like, and how will it be executed?
- Content promotion – how will you promote your content?
- Measurement – define your KPIs! E.g. website traffic, audience engagement, the quantity of leads, the quality of leads etc.
It is worth experimenting with various content types at each and every stage of the sales funnel.
If we want to gain attention in the current content tsunami, then we should try to be as relevant as we can.
To be able to come up with relevant and engaging content golf club should invest in understanding their customers by using the following techniques:
- Social media monitoring;
- Web analytics;
- CRM data analysis;
- Qualitative researches: focus groups, in-depth interviews etc.
- Questionnaires and surveys etc.
If you want to be really smart then invite your customers into the content creation process.
One of the biggest benefits of using user-generated content is that you will gain social proofs.
User-generated contents are more trustworthy contents,
Another interesting content marketing best practice is content curation. Curata found:
83% of marketers curate/share content with their customers and/or prospects from third party sources such as blogs, social media, industry publications or news sites.
What I see today is that marketers are becoming in a certain way media companies. Just look at the example of Marriott.
Marriott created an in-house content studio in 2014. The studio is dedicated to producing creative, engaging, cross-platform digital content to attract the next generation of travelers.
Marriott Traveler is an excellent example of an outstanding content marketing initiative.
They are not only using classic content types like photos, videos, articles, but also podcasts.
It is worth an experiment with podcast since podcast listenership in the US is skyrocketing (cca. 73 million in 2018, source: Edison Research).
Plus, these audiences are affluent, well-educated, and committed to the content.
According to Activate Tech & Media Outlook 2018, podcasting has been projected to double its reach to 112 million people and produce over 15 billion hours of content by 2021.
So far I have not found any golf resort who would utilize this communication channel.
What I see is golf resorts and clubs are utilizing mainly these types of content:
- photo,
- brochures,
- video – I like the videos of Gleneagles Hotel,
- live streaming videos (e.g. Las Colinas Golf & Country Club),
- blogs (e.g. PGA Catalunya Resort: it is a pity that it is outdated)
- online magazines (e.g. Pebble Beach Resort)
Content marketing platform for golf clubs
I was surprised at the latest IGTM event in Ljubljana, Slovenia that most of the golf resorts and golf clubs, not to mention the destination marketing organizations are still using hard copy brochures and other materials for promotional purposes.
Toscana Resort Castelfalfi was the most innovative exhibitor by using Virtual Reality.
Why don’t they utilize content marketing platforms to create interactive (e.g. adding videos, surveys, podcasts etc.) online magazines?
With content marketing platforms like Joomag, golf clubs can create any kind of interactive digital content- newsletters, brochures, magazines, distribute them to their audiences, generate leads and win more loyal customers.
For a more in-depth look into content marketing’s role in the golf industry check out “Content Marketing for Golf Clubs” white paper.
One of the biggest advantages of such contents that they are sharable, more engaging and good for link building (SEO) as well.
This article was brought to you by Joomag, the leading content marketing platform.
