2014 was the year in which content Xperience an important step made: the company shifted its focus from print to more online marketing

Content Marketing is sometimes portrayed as a hype. If something blows over. However, that seems unlikely if you look at the impact has been the emergence of content marketing organizations. This applies to brands, but also for offices. That shows the evolution of the Arnhem office Content Xperience has undergone in recent years, from publisher to a full service marketing agency. In conversation with the founder and director Alex Steg.

This article was produced in collaboration between Marketingfacts and Content Xperience.

For years Content Xperience publisher of THINQ Magazine, a magazine that 17 years was a valuable source of information for anyone in the IT world with affinity around IBM.

From print to online

2014 was the year in which content Xperience an important step made: the company shifted its focus from print to more online marketing. A small step from making a magazine, you would think. But with a big impact. Steg: "We went to help businesses orient themselves to the new way of marketing companies. Companies that play with the question of how to make relevant content, how to generate traffic to the website. "

"Over the years and until today the focus is on content remained unchanged. It is the thread of our existence. Without proper and relevant content, we had no right to exist as a publisher. But also makes sure that content companies can be successful in today 'online' time. This has always been the vision of Content Xperience. That is why this view is reflected in our company name. "

"Over the years and until today the focus is on content remained unchanged. It is the red thread of our existence."

new expertise

Content Xperience consisted in 2014 of five employees, especially copywriters and graphic designer. That quickly proved not enough. More hands were needed, but also new expertise.

Content Xperience brought new people into your home with new skills. But the example also took a company does on the front- and back-end software development. "Marketing has become increasingly technical in recent years, so this step was necessary. On acquisition, the company consisted of two people; there are now five. "

"In addition, we now have five campaign managers who only turn inbound marketing campaigns. Determining buyer personas and buyer journeys, guiding the content production, programming the marketing automation And there were people in the analytics to better understand enter the running campaigns. This enables us to efficiently and successfully generate higher-quality leads. "


In total, there are 22 people Content Xperience. That is a growth to be proud of, Steg finds himself: "That transition to inbound marketing has been good to us. It was sad to have to stop after 17 years with THINQ Magazine, but it was the best decision because we could shift focus to other issues. "

"Marketing has become increasingly technical in recent years."

Development

The company's development ran parallel with the development of content marketing discipline itself. "Initially, we mainly written newsletters, press releases and website content. As we wrote everything we wanted to give a nice graphic jacket, we achieved graphic designers in the house. "

"When we saw that other forms of content are interesting, especially videos and animations explanation. That is a form of content that we constantly work. "

"Now, in 2016, is content marketing almost become a scientific process, especially with the emergence of marketing automation. Customers see the whole process, not necessarily as content marketing, for them it is all 'online marketing'. It is up to us to explain the differences, which one must take into account the costs and possibilities. "

"Customers should therefore be careful that they do not buy cat in the bag. It sold quite a lot of air, I feel, especially when it comes to strategy. We also advise on strategy, but we try to do as pragmatically as possible. This is anyway the mentality that prevails in this company: not dicks, but brushing. "

"Now, in 2016, is content marketing almost become a scientific process, especially with the emergence of marketing automation."

SMEs

Steg and colleagues offer their solutions for content marketing and lead generation not only to large companies. "We are fortunate that we work for a number of large customers and we love to do. But I strongly believe that the SME market also needs this method of marketing and should be helped in that. "

"Such companies are often somewhere in specialized, but less then know well how to put it into the market. That starts with creating good content, but it is also about writing blog posts, creating white papers that connect to the audience, explaining animations and video testimonials. There we can help them. "



Alex Steg

In addition, the cost of software licenses also play a role, especially when companies get started with marketing automation. "For us, such a software solution but a machine, it's just software. I always have first significant sorry if customers invest in expensive licenses, sometimes with entry prices of 1,000 euros per month. For SMEs that huge amounts. And then you have to make more content creation and advertising campaigns, so that's going to run in the paper. "

"We often recommend to not have to spend money on expensive licenses, because without marketing automation, you can start with inbound marketing. We have specially developed for SMEs a platform that consists of several components that marketing automation is possible at very low cost. It is quite interesting to take the first steps in this area with such solutions, so you can keep the focus on creating and delivering relevant content. "

"I strongly believe that the SME market is also in need of this type of marketing."

Conversion

"The goal of our content is giving the leads. That may marketing qualified leads or sales qualified leads, depending on the agreements that we make with our clients. "

That does not mean all content to generate leads, but all content must contribute to that process. "It is most common that we create content for the awareness phase, because the phases deeper into the funnel often enough content is available to the client. But also in awareness phase must convert content, for example to download a white paper. "

All content is then made based on a clear briefing. "It describes who should be aangesproken which opvolgcontent there, which ingespeeld need to be, what type of content it should be - an interview, research and the like - which tone of voice we need to handle."

"Only once that is clear, we are going to work. And before it goes to the customer, all the content required to read by a colleague to ensure quality. "

"The goal of our content is giving the leads."

Quality

That quality will Steg important - and not just because it produces more leads. "In order to be successful, there must also sit a heart in your content. So texts should be good and a campaign site should look nice. Last colleague got a compliment from a customer for a new white paper; not only because of the leads, but because he'm liked so much. There you do it for. "

"That was the best part of making a magazine: the discussions about how to deal with the paper, how things should look. We did it without prejudice. As our love for a beautiful product comes from. Commercially, it might not always convenient, but it is one of the more important aspects. "

"And ultimately delivers fruit. Quality pays for itself, despite the higher cost. For example, we get a lot of new customers based on the work we do for other customers. There is a lot of the network and through word -mondreclame. That's a compliment to us. "

How does this relate to the increased automation in the process? Especially when you consider that content creation in the long term may also be automated? "The more that can be standardized and automated, the better. Because that delivers efficiency and that is good for our customers. But there will always be demand for quality. And quality is a people business."

"There will always be demand for quality. And quality is a people business."

growth

How Steg are checking Content Xperience if he return and looking around? "We have experience with the magazine editorial work. We looked at what we could do with content online, we are playfully it started working. This has led to where we are today: specialists in content marketing. "


"That was a nice growth process, we advance also did not think this was possible. We have to focus on content taken a good turn. And I have a feeling that now we know how this game works, a large part of the market only by getting them to do something with it. And so we have a good future. "

"And there is the fact that we want to make beautiful things with a fun group of people having fun and passion for work. We just have fun in, we should like to go to work, which remains the most important thing. "