Did you know that over 50% of nonprofit marketers say that one of their most significant barriers to content marketing is finding the time to develop and create content? In other words, finding the time to write efficiently and effectively, including having staff with the skillset to do so, is lagging.
However, in our "content is king" marketing world, we can't afford to ignore the power of our words. Therefore we have to make time, increase our capacity, and come to realize that great content holds the same punch as great design.
Dare I say that the content stakes are higher in the nonprofit sector. In this industry, relationship is everything. The rapport that we build with our members, donors, partners, community, and supporters are the spokes that make the wheels of our organization go 'round.
I know this isn't new news, but I'll go ahead and just say it, "We can't have a relationship without communication, and we can't have communication without words." For organizations, those words are nine times out of ten written and developed into content dispensed through various marketing channels.
Now, I won't negate that writing takes time. To write well is to produce works of art. The evidence resides in the great authors of our time. Maya Angelou, Truman Capote, W.E.B. Du Bois, Barbara Ehrenreich, were and are artists of words. Their content creations rewrote history, transformed lives, and moved us to action.
The objective for nonprofit marketers who produce content isn't too far off. The time spent to change history, impact our world, and move our audiences into action all for the conquering of the mission, is well worthwhile. We can't see it as time lost, but as time invested for more substantial gains.
Here's a little secret weapon we content producers use to ensure that our investment matures. It even helps reduce the amount of time spent on content development.
Ready?
Do not produce content for content's sake. Your content must birth from a content strategy that your organization has in place, and that strategy should stem from an integrated marketing plan. Without a plan and a strategy, everything written ends up in an abyss.
Every writer creates an outline that is informed by a few key elements. Your purpose for writing, who you are writing for, what you want the reader to feel, think, and obtain from the words written, and the actions the reader should take when they arrive at the last period - are all vital information points that give the outline its course. A content strategy built from a marketing plan does the same for our writing.
In other words, we give our content a roadmap and a direction to head in that leads to a well-known, thought out, and defined goal.
The more you know about where your content should lead to, the less time will be spent on writing. All that is left to do is to create works of content art.
Need help with those words? Contact us to learn how we can assist.