For people who wear many hats on a small marketing team, content marketing might sound like a scary term.

After all, to do it well, it’s important to be able to produce high-quality content on a consistent basis. If you’re serving multiple marketing functions, that feat might feel impossible.

Luckily, successful content marketing with a small team is possible.

It’s also a necessity: Content marketing helps you reach the customers in most need of your product or service. By reaching leads through quality content that speaks to them – NOT to your brand – you are empowering them to choose your brand.

Sometimes they choose you right away. Sometimes they choose you six months later. Still, they choose YOU.

The struggle is real

Unfortunately, small marketing teams sometimes struggle to do content marketing well. That’s often because:

• There isn’t enough time in the day to keep up with the volume of high-quality content needed to make an impact.
• Due to limited budgets, recruiting top content marketing talent is tough in an increasingly competitive job market.
• C-level executives or supervisors do not understand the value of content marketing.

The key is to develop a content marketing strategy that delivers results without overtaxing your staff, or your budget. I’m here to tell you it can be done – but not before you realize and accept this one thing:

It’s not about you. It’s not about how great your company is, how much money it’s brought in, or how many people currently do business with you.

It’s about your customers. What are their pain points? What do they need? How is your company in a unique position to address those needs and pain points?

Once you can honestly and effectively answer those questions, you are well on your way to content marketing success.

It can be done

Other companies are answering those questions, and seeing excellent ROI as a result. For example – Frontline Education’s content marketing strategy accounted for 32 percent of its new business. AARP’s content marketing program, featuring “AARP – The Magazine,” is read religiously by more than half its members.

If your staff is small, don’t worry – you can still achieve results like this! Your approach will require a little creativity, but it can be done. Here are some ways to make it happen:

Focus on quality

If you’re keeping a laser focus on your customers, this part will be a lot easier. Constantly gather and analyze the information your customers are giving you through their interactions with your company.

• What kinds of question do they ask when they take the time to call or email?
• Are they leaving you mediocre reviews?
• Are you seeing a trend in online conversations surrounding your company?

If your content consistently addresses the very topics your customers care about, your content will be found online by the right people, who will then visit your website and turn into leads.

Hire an intern

According to this Hubspot study, companies that publish 16 or more blog posts per month get more than triple the traffic of those that only publish up to four times per month. But … 16 posts a month? We don’t blame you if that sounds impossible.

Still, one post per week to help drive traffic to your website is better than nothing.

Hiring an intern is a cost-efficient way to help the staff keep up with content demand while keeping costs down. Many talented, up-and-coming people who need the experience will likely jump at the chance!

One challenge that utilizing an intern to generate content is that the intern likely won’t have the technical or industry expertise to create content that appeals to your target audience.

Collaborate across departments

If you’re starved for content ideas, you need to enlist the help of other departments that regularly interact with customers, or the data they provide.

Connect regularly with your sales department by setting up a way for them to share the customer pain points they hear about most. Companies use collaborative software to jot down pain points and ideas about potential blog articles. This feedback can be used to develop high quality blog articles, eGuides, and case studies to fuel your content marketing program.

The major obstacle utilizing different departments to fuel your content marketing program is that actually getting a sales rep or someone on the executive team to sit down and write can be like pulling teeth.

Outsource content creation to a reliable partner

… but don’t outsource to just anyone. Lower quality content providers without industry expertise will end up costing you more time and money with rewriting and editing alone.

Instead, consider a content provider like us. Tempesta Media’s team of industry and subject matter experts can deliver high-quality, on-budget content tailored to your customers’ needs.

Think of Tempesta Media as an extension of your marketing team or an entire copywriting department for your organization. Writers with industry expertise, Voice Profile style guides, and guaranteed turnaround times ensure that the writing quality is high and the process is easy.

We can help you execute a consistent, top-quality content marketing strategy that turns leads into new customers. Give us a call to get started or schedule a time on our calendars to chat.