The internet has become such a competitive place, with numerous brands vying for the attention of the same audiences. Even if you have an effective marketing strategy, that doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll experience any tangible benefits. In fact, most businesses will never enjoy significant organic traffic from search engines and social media platforms.
In an attempt to increase their online visibility, businesses often decide to amplify content through multiple channels. Aside from sharing a piece on their site, they’ll also use social media marketing, paid ads, and other approaches. By sharing their posts through third-party websites, they not only get more traffic but also boost brand awareness.
In this article, we’ll talk about content amplification, how the concept works, and the best practices. Enjoy!
What is content amplification?
Content amplification is a process during which a company uses numerous online platforms and strategies to reach a wider audience. In other words, instead of relying on one specific tactic, you try to do everything in your power to increase visibility across the web.
Aside from sharing posts through various platforms, amplification also presumes maximizing the impact of every channel. For example, you can use content amplification tools to improve performance on social platforms. Or you might use guest posting to get more organic exposure.
A common misconception within the digital marketing industry is that content distribution and amplification is the same thing. While these two are related to each other, they have their differences.
Basically, content distribution is a subset of content amplification. To amplify your content, you first need to share it on as many marketing channels as possible. This is referred to as distribution. After that, you also need to maximize the impact of every approach. Based on that, amplification encompasses sharing (distribution) and also channel optimization.
What makes content amplification so important?
For the most part, amplification is a content marketing strategy we use for web articles. Once we publish a blog post on our site, we share it on various social media channels and other platforms. This ensures that as many people as possible see our message. Among others, amplification is a good digital marketing strategy to make posts go viral.
Given that our amplification efforts help diversify web traffic, it makes it a perfect strategy for minimizing business risks. In other words, you’re no longer reliant on website traffic for lead generation. Even if your search engine optimization flops, you can achieve a lot through paid and earned media.
Among others, using a content amplification strategy allows you to reach relevant niche communities. You can pinpoint a target audience that’s more likely to become potential customers. In that regard, amplification doesn’t only help generate traffic, but it also allows you to convert at a higher clip. It’s especially efficient for targeting small business owners.
What are the content amplification challenges?
While using a content amplification strategy sounds like an amazing solution, it does have its fair share of challenges:
Increased costs
Unlike regular website posting, you need to venture to other platforms and explore marketing approaches you might not be familiar with. So, your content marketers should have some understanding of social media, paid ads, emailing, and influencer marketing. Native advertising can quickly ramp up the costs of the projects, especially if you have to create visual solutions for your posts.
Among others, amplification will force you to create teams for different channels and delegate tasks. The previous marketing team you employed probably won’t be enough, so you’ll need to onboard additional specialists. Of course, this also means investing more money in new tools.
Complexity
As previously mentioned, content amplification is an extremely complex process that requires a keen understanding of digital marketing. Even if you simplify the in-house operations, you’ll still waste a lot of time trying to develop new channels and create relationships with influencers.
What’s worse, the more you try to share the message, the more resources you’ll have to invest. Just imagine how much time you’ll need to build a presence on every social media platform you’re planning to use. This is especially true for Facebook, Google, and LinkedIn Ads, which, unlike SMM and SEO, always require money.
Perhaps the most dangerous thing is that amplification is a major distraction, especially if you don’t increase the size of your marketing team. As you place emphasis on distribution and developing other channels, your main channel is bound to slip up.
Lack of control
The lack of control is another common issue with content amplification. Compared to promoting content on your platform, using third-party websites presumes you won’t be able to influence how people interact with the post. There are also instances where businesses pay enormous amounts of money for promotion and get betrayed by the influencer or partnering company.
This is especially tricky if the content’s quality is lower than you initially presumed. As the message starts spreading around, you’ll be exposed to significantly more backlash. Alternatively, you might invest a lot of money to promote the piece only to realize that no one cares about it.
Creating a content amplification strategy
If you want to get the most out of your content marketing, it’s necessary to have clear goals and a feasible strategy. Here’s how this would look in practice:
1. Find content worth amplifying
As previously mentioned, amplification can cost a lot of money. Unless you’re a large company with several marketing teams, it’s usually too expensive to pursue this tactic repeatedly. Instead, you have to pick and choose your battle, focusing on content with strategic value for your brand.
Based on that, here’s how amplification would affect posts with different performances:
· Low performance
These articles might’ve struggled in one way or another. Most notably, they might’ve had better performance if they were shared via different platforms. For whatever case, your website audience didn’t like it, so you can try amplification to approach the problem from another angle. Alternatively, you could try making some alterations before sharing it on other channels.
· Mediocre performance
Mediocre posts gained some traction through your website, but they never managed to take off. If you decide to promote content on some other platform, you might be able to squeeze additional value from it without significantly higher costs.
· High performance
These articles are the cream of the crop. According to Google Analytics, the users reacted favorably to it, so you can keep pace by sharing the blog posts on other platforms. Amplifying high-performance content is the best method to help the piece go viral. In that regard, these types of articles have the highest amplification potential.
2. Interview existing customers
Content amplification can be a hit or miss. The reason being there are simply too many channels you can choose for a promotion. Because of that, you need to be meticulous when choosing the best one for your brand.
Perhaps the simplest way of approaching the issue is by interviewing existing customers. The best thing about this method is that loyal fans are more likely to provide relevant data. Among others, you can ask them questions such as:
- What are your favorite social channels, and how do you interact with them?
- Have you ever bought products after interacting with Facebook, Google, and Instagram Ads?
- How often do you click on contextual links on other sites?
- Are you affected by influencer product recommendations?
- Do you interact with brands that pitch you via email?
Depending on their reaction, you might decide to pursue one or several methods. Most importantly, make sure that the users interact with these channels frequently enough. Otherwise, you might pursue strategies based on false positives.
3. Create teams and delegate
When planning an amplification project, many brands go overboard with their initial investment. Some of them spend lots of money hiring several marketing teams to manage different channels. In many cases, this is an unnecessary risk that eventually doesn’t pay off.
The first thing you need to assess is how frequently you wish to implement this strategy. For many brands, amplification is a one-and-done tactic. They try it once, and after being disappointed with the results, they completely scrap the strategy. So, there’s no point in building an in-house team unless you’re willing to commit long-term.
So, the best way to start is by hiring experienced freelancers. Even if you have to pay extra, hire someone who can push the envelope. If this individual can’t yield the required results, there’s a chance you’ve failed during the planning phase. However, if they succeed, it can be used as a blueprint for future amplification campaigns.
4. Use the right messaging
Using the right messaging should be the focus of your content amplification strategy. Keep in mind that you can’t simply copy-paste your blog post into Facebook and expect that people will read it. Instead, you need to create excerpts from the text and use them as a hook. Alternatively, you can use a completely different post altogether.
Here are some tricks that will help you create the right message for every platform:
- Learn more about the platform you’re using. How long can the posts be? What are the best posts for attracting attention?
- Make sure people understand what they’re clicking on. Explain the content on the landing page, and don’t promise things that aren’t present in the original article.
- Use intriguing visuals. The image quality is one of the main reasons why people leave the original platform in favor of outside websites.
- Don’t be afraid to utilize clickbait language. This is especially true for social media posting as you have to compete against numerous other distractive messages.
- If you’re trying to drive traffic through guest and forum posting, make sure that the link anchors are descriptive enough.
- If you’re using influencer marketing, make sure that the person you’re hiring is the right fit for the project. Create a pre-made video where they’ll just have to read the text.
In some cases, it’s possible to use the same message and visuals on several different platforms. This is especially true for social media, given that most of these websites allow images + text. Still, make sure that the message can properly fit each of these sites.
5. Find the right promoters
Unless we’re talking about paid media, there’s a good chance you’ll have to interact with other influencers during campaigns. Whether we’re talking about forum or guest posting, influencer marketing, or similar tactics, you often rely on other people to share your message for you.
Ideally, you should connect with individuals who are well-respected in your industry. Don’t be afraid if they’re working with other brands; this is a sign they can also help you as well. If you manage to hit it off, you might also do interviews in the future, further building a reputation with their audience.
The good thing about these connections is that you can reuse them for other content amplification campaigns. This is especially true if the influencer you hired has provided great results. Among others, if you hire the same person over and over again, you might even get some discounts after a while.
6. Determine KPIs
You should always rely on key performing indicators for assessing the success of a campaign. The main issue with this method is that the traffic numbers can vary significantly from platform to platform. So, you need to find common denominators that would apply to all channels.
Here are three universal categories of metrics you should pursue:
· Engagement
Engagement is vital for tracking the success of social media posts. You can jump into each platform where you post to check likes, shares, and comments. This is also important for your future campaigns as it will show you which platforms are best suited for your business.
· User behavior
You can also segregate user behavior based on the traffic source. Check how different channels performed based on landing page views, time spent on pages, bounce rate, and such.
· Sales
In the end, the main reason to amplify your content is so you can make more money. Given that these campaigns can be expensive, especially if you don’t have the structure, they need to have a clear impact on your bottom line. So, you’ll have to assess whether the campaign helped you drive more people into the sales funnel.
5 Best amplification platforms
While you can share your message all over the place, it’s usually much better to focus on a few online channels that work. Here are the 5 best amplification platforms according to MiroMind:
1. Social media
Organic content amplification through social media platforms is the best way to go. Websites such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter can be great sources of external traffic, allowing you to reach new audience segments. Even better, you don’t need a lot of money to share the post on your account.
The only issue with social media marketing is that you need to have well-established accounts to create an avalanche effect. Your goal isn’t to share the post with your fans but to force fans to share the message with their friends.
2. Paid ads
Unlike organic optimization, paid ads usually presume a much higher investment. So, if you wish to pursue this method, you should first determine that the landing page has a commercial value. Linking to a regular blog post won’t cut it because these posts convert at a significantly lower rate.
Still, using paid content does have its advantages. Most notably, it allows you to gain visitors immediately without having to rely on Google search engines. This is vital for main service pages that otherwise struggle to gain links and visitors.
3. Content syndication
Using content syndication platforms is another fantastic way of promoting your content. With this strategy, you’re using external sites like Medium to republish your content. By doing so, you get massive third-party site exposure without having to build up your platform.
The main issue with content syndication is that your posts might look a bit spammy. What’s worse, some users are willing to do just about anything to garner extra attention, including extreme link baiting. Additionally, if a person reads your post on an external platform, they don’t have the incentive to visit your site and convert.
4. Influencer marketing
Influencer marketing campaigns are becoming more and more popular with each passing year. This approach allows brands to connect with a target audience without having to develop their network. If you partner up with the right person, running such a campaign can provide a major boost to your brand in a short amount of time.
But, like with other approaches, there’s a catch. You need to find the right person for the job. Not only should they have access to the right audience, they should also be the right brand ambassador. If you hire a person who doesn’t fulfill their part of the bargain, it’s like flushing money down the drain.
5. User-generated content
User-generated content is the best type of promotion you can get. Basically, these are posts where internet users and influencers mention your brand. For example, these can be product reviews and similar types of content.
The nice thing about user-generated content is that it’s unprovoked. People mention your products and services without being page, which makes the message more genuine. However, the tough thing about this form of content amplification is that it only works for well-established brands. Furthermore, you can implement it by yourself and have to wait for users to notice you.
4 Best content amplification tools
Like with any other marketing process, people use various SaaS to improve their amplification. Here are the few best programs that can help your campaigns:
1. HubSpot
HubSpot is recognized as one of the best marketing platforms in the world. You can use it for blogging, email, and social media campaigns. In that sense, it can replace numerous other marketing tools.
The reason why HubSpot is fantastic for content amplification is that it allows you to create posts for various platforms from a single dashboard. You can simultaneously create Facebook posts, tweets, Instagram, and LinkedIn posts. This gives you full control over the process while simplifying tasks.
2. Google Analytics
Google Analytics is marketers’ bread and butter. The tool provides relevant information, straight from Google, regarding your website performance. You can use it for any step of the campaign, from planning to execution. Furthermore, the new Google Analytics 4 will make ad campaigns much more predictable.
Above everything, Google Analytics allows you to analyze different traffic sources. You can check the visitors from organic search, social media platforms, email campaigns, and direct and referral sources. More importantly, it gives you a breakdown of behavior and conversions based on the traffic source.
3. GaggleAMP
GaggleAMP is a fantastic option if you wish to focus on user-generated content. The platform gives you access to consenting users’ accounts (usually the company’s employees). That way, you can publish social media posts on their timeline as if they shared it with their followers.
GaggleAMP can significantly increase your audience without any additional costs. Of course, the tool’s usefulness will vary based on the size of your team and their followership. Given that the platform allows you to share messages through people’s accounts instead of the company profile, it makes the posts more relatable.
4. MeetEdgar
MeetEdgar is another platform that specializes in social media posting. Aside from allowing you to share content on several websites simultaneously, the software also has a few other nifty features. The best one is an analytics suite that allows you to monitor the campaign’s performance.
We also liked the reposting functionality that allows you to constantly share content with your followers. Of course, you can choose which ones to repost and how often. The link shortener is also nice, allowing you to significantly improve social media conversion.
If you need assistance with your amplification or any other content marketing process, contact MiroMind today!