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Crowdsourcing is a very interesting topic when it comes to content marketing. Why? Because it can be approached from a number of different perspectives and address a number of challenges for business owners, with each strategy yielding different results for your business. When it comes to the ‘search and re-apply‘ method, crowdsourcing your content can be a fairly effective way to increase revenue, grow your reach and engage with your online community.
No matter what business or industry you are a part of, the art of crowdsourcing content is a great way to figure out what your target audience wants and how you can best address those needs. This can be achieved by:
- Gathering information on what type of content to create next.
- Asking questions that are relevant to your product or service.
- Being timely when it comes to current events.
One of the root activities of the Internet is that people are constantly seeking ‘reliable’ information. This can be in the form of which product or services to use, news sources, entertainment, restaurant reviews, etc. Crowdsourcing content can be used as a tool in the same manner. It encourages community and supports those who help improve the process.
Allowing your customers to solidify their presence and develop a voice within your online community can work wonders for your business’ overall reach. Human nature will always remain the same when it comes to the value of an opinion (i.e. the value of polls and surveys in politics = crowdsourcing). Crowdsourcing content naturally creates discussions and allows spectators who are invested in the conversation to follow along.
Now lets deep dive into ‘4 Reasons To Crowdsource Your Content’ below.
1. Develop A Deeper Understanding Of Your Target Audience
Crowdsourcing your content on social media is one of the best paths to take when developing a deeper understanding of your target audience. There’s always a vehicle available to gauge interests around your online community. These vehicles include polls, surveys and comments that can be used to improve and guide your future content.
By using crowdsourcing as a tool to create and curate content, you’ll be able to gather insights from your customers that aren’t always as obvious from just solely viewing data and interpreting online behavior. This includes the good, the bad and the ugly. Gathering feedback from your customers should be a routine practice. Why? It’s a great way to improve and meet the needs of your customer base as a whole.
2. Improve Content, Increase Revenue
Crowdsourcing is a very subtle way of giving the people what they want. Better yet, you can decipher what people don’t want when you train yourself to ask the right questions. When used it effectively, crowdsourcing can help you provide an experience that measures past data, analytics and social media altogether.
One thing for certain is that time is our most valuable asset in life and in business. Being able to give your customers what they want, when they want it, is easier said than done. Crowdsourcing aids this pain point by allowing you to improve your business positioning and increase revenue. This is why your content marketing efforts should serve a purpose when it comes to achieving your overall business objectives.
Every piece of communication matters when your crowdsourcing your content. Even a complaint offers an opportunity for growth.
3. Boost Your Customer Service Skills On Social Media
With crowdsourcing being mainly focused on improvement, growth and creating value. It’s only right that using content to improve your customer service skills is a great strategy to add to your content marketing mix. Content is all about creating conversations and social media is naturally built for one-to-one communication. Crowdsourcing content is about presenting the situation to actually have those conversations.
So, if there is an issue that needs to be addressed. There’s always an opportunity to hold an open dialogue when it comes to your content, product or service. For example, Podcast are a great medium for crowdsourcing because listeners will generally respond to questions like: ‘Who do you want me to interview next?’ As well as, ‘what did you like best about this episode?’ Which will prompt positive and negative feedback.
4. Measure, Measure, Measure
Anything that can be measured can be improved. That includes how people view your business, products, services and content. Opinions and energy are mainly why crowdsourcing content serves a benefit across the board. I believe it’s always essential to lead with data, and when the numbers for growth are confirmed. What’s the best way to capitalize? By measuring your results and improving the process.
Crowdsourcing content can be a great way to measure overall performance when it comes to marketing campaigns, new product releases and new content in general. Given that crowdsourcing is based around the opinions and feeds off the energy of your customers it’s important to place certain parameters in place that can help you succeed. Let’s check them out below.
- Identify your business goals.
- Determine the channel of choice for your customers.
- Choose a collection method that works best for your business (polls, surveys, comments, etc.).
- NEVER go at crowdsourcing alone (Get help).
- Monitor your social media from ONE platform (Try Sprout For Free).
In Conclusion
No matter if your business provides a service, produces products or solely creates content. You want to provide the best experience possible when it comes to creating conversations around your content. Even if its just letting your work speak for itself (there’s always a market for quality) or asking the right questions about content or services to gather feedback on what can be done to improve and where to focus energy.
Crowdsourcing content allows for adaptation, agility and flexibility. It’s all about continual growth, increasing value and building leverage. Take advantage of what the people have to offer. Keyword: THE PEOPLE.
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