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Let’s face the truth — many B2B companies struggle with content syndication. They often know that they need to have a piece of content republished or distributed but don’t know how, where or why.
Simply, they lack the right content syndication strategies.
A content syndication strategy is an essential part of any B2B business. It’s what fuels your lead generation and ultimately drives your B2B sales funnels.
But getting it right isn’t easy–there are mistakes that many companies make when trying to build their strategy. These common mistakes hinder their efforts and kill their conversion rate.
- Content Syndication Strategy Overview
- 10 Common Content Syndication Mistakes
- Syndicating The Right Way
- Conclusion
#1. Content Syndication Strategy Overview
One of the easiest and fastest ways for B2B companies to build their business and get their content in front of thousands or millions of potential customers is via content syndication.
Content syndication is a strategy that allows organizations to share and promote their content, products, or services through other websites, blogs, and social media channels.
If done correctly, businesses and consumers alike can benefit from content syndication. Businesses can use it to promote their products or services and increase brand awareness. Consumers can benefit from the increased exposure to relevant information on topics they love.
Other benefits of a good content syndication strategy for businesses include increasing brand exposure, increasing traffic and reaching new customers, increasing engagement, enhancing brand authority, and building trust.
Unfortunately, some B2B marketers do not implement their content syndication strategies correctly, despite the benefits. Because of their content syndication errors, they cannot establish credibility and reach a wider audience than their website can provide. In addition to wasting money and time, they also have trouble getting others to share their content.
#2. 10 Common Content Syndication Mistakes
When you’re first starting out with content syndication, it can be difficult to know what you should be doing and what mistakes you should avoid. Here is a detailed list of mistakes made by some B2B companies along with insights and advice on how to avoid these mistakes:
- Not having a content marketing strategy in place
- Not using real data when creating content
- A lack of consistency:
- Being too pushy about getting shares
- Not having a dedicated team for content syndication
- Not leveraging data analytics
- Not having a strategy for how often you’ll update your content
- Not tracking results from each syndicated piece of content
- Confusing marketing with sales
- Being too vague in your calls-to-action
#a. Not having a content marketing strategy in place
The first mistake that B2B companies make is not having a content marketing strategy in place. Without a plan, it’s impossible to measure the success of your efforts. Plus, you won’t know what types of content perform best or what pieces should be re-purposed. A content marketing strategy will help you determine which topics to cover, how often you should publish content, and what types of formats work best for your audience.
#b. Not using real data when creating content
Another common mistake is not using real data when creating content. You may think that you know what your customers want but if you aren’t using actual data from surveys or other research methods, then how do you know? Real data will help you create more relevant and engaging content that will resonate with customers better than any guesswork could ever do.
#c. A lack of consistency:
Some B2B companies lack consistency when syndicating content. They might use one syndication service for one type of content and another for another type. This is an easy way to lose credibility with your target audience and waste time on re-syndicating content you’ve already published elsewhere. An effective content syndication strategy requires consistency, otherwise, it won’t work.
#d, Being too pushy about getting shares:
Another mistake you’re making is you’re being too pushy about getting shares. If you’re asking for a share, make sure that the content is worth sharing. If you’re not willing to do the work and create good content, no one will want to share it. Publish quality content so people don’t think of your company as a spammer or someone who doesn’t deliver on their promises.
#e. Not having a dedicated team for content syndication
Many B2B companies take an under-resourced approach to content syndication. They may have one person who handles all of their social media accounts or who manages their website content. But this is a mistake because it’s important to have a dedicated team that understands your business objectives and knows how to create relevant, engaging content regularly.
#f. Not leveraging data analytics
Many B2B companies don’t have any analytics set up for their content syndication efforts, which makes it difficult to know what’s working and what isn’t. Without data, you can’t make informed decisions about what types of emails are performing best or which types of topics resonate with your audience. Plus, if you’re not tracking engagement rates or conversions from each piece of content, you’ll never know whether it’s worth putting more time into that particular topic or format. Using analytics tools like Google Analytics can help correct or avoid this mistake.
#g. Not having a strategy for how often you’ll update your content
If you want to use content syndication effectively, then you need to have some sort of plan for how frequently you’ll be updating or adding new pieces of content to the directory sites where you’re placing your syndicated links. If you’re not updating regularly enough, then there’s no point in placing those links — they’ll just go stale and have little value to anyone.
#h. Not tracking results from each syndicated piece of content
You should track everything about your syndicated campaigns: what works, what doesn’t work; where the traffic is coming from; who clicks on the links; etc. This information helps inform future decisions about where to place links and what type of content works best for each audience type or industry vertical.
#i. Confusing marketing with sales
Many companies make this mistake by creating content that doesn’t speak directly to their customers’ needs — instead, they make it about themselves or sell hard without giving their audience members a reason why they should buy from them instead of another company in their industry. Don’t be like them. Create content that addresses your customer’s problems.
#j. Being too vague in your calls-to-action
If you want people to visit your website after seeing your content on another site, then make sure that call-to-action is clear and actionable. Don’t leave it up to readers to figure out what they should do next — tell them! This means using clear language that tells readers exactly what they need to do and where they need to go next (i.e., “Subscribe today,” “follow us,” etc).
#3. Syndicating The Right Way
In your quest to uncover the most effective content syndication strategies, you need to take into account all aspects of your business before determining the best way forward. So how do you make sure that your efforts are worth it? Here are five tips to help you do content syndication the right way:
- Create a clear syndication goal
- Repurpose your existing content
- Keep your syndicated content fresh
- Optimize for SEO and social media sharing
- Monitor performance
#4. Conclusion
Ultimately, while there is no one way to effectively syndicate content, the best way to accomplish your syndication goals will likely vary based on several variables. The most important thing to remember is that you are creating content to reinforce a particular message or experience for your readers. As such, each experience must follow the same theme (and keep in mind what you’re selling!) so that your audience doesn’t become disjointed and confused. If you plan on investing time and resources into a content syndication strategy, make sure you prepare yourself to avoid these common mistakes, intentionally or otherwise.
