Content marketing is hard to get right. In fact, industry expert Neil Patel reports that only 9 percent of B2B marketers rate their organizations as very effective at content. Yet without compelling content, your organization’s ability to establish a reputation, generate leads, build trust and humanize your brand can all suffer.

Read on for the Wilks Communication Group score card to optimize your content and fast track conversion to sales. Here are the top three questions to guide your strategy development to deliver the content-driven results your organization can bank on.

Do you have a clear content strategy?

An unclear strategy begets lackluster content that will be undifferentiated from competitors or lacking in cohesion with other content you’ve already produced.

Your content strategy should be aligned to serve the evolving needs and interests of your audience and consistent with your own unique brand attributes. Following this approach will clarify what works and what doesn’t, and will result in strong content to engage your audience and drive them to learn more about what your organization has to offer.

Is your content useful?

If your content consistently fails to drive organic traffic or capture the number of leads you’ve hoped for, you need to ask yourself: How useful is this to our audience?

Because no matter how compelling your thought leadership is, if it doesn’t help your audience solve a problem or approach a business or organizational challenge differently, it is unlikely to meet your objectives.

Format can also play a role here, too. Examine web analytics to understand how long users typically engage with content and shape it accordingly. Got them for 15 seconds? Think infographic. More than a minute? Look at a highly skimmable long-form article. Remember to use video, the most engaging type of content, whenever you can.

Is it actionable?

You should also examine if there is a clear call to action. How easy is it for the audience to take the next step? Is the call to action appropriate for where they are in the purchase cycle? Does it align with their preferences (texting or chatting vs. calling)? These are all important considerations that will more closely align your content efforts to sales.

Content that converts will always require a thoughtful approach and deep audience understanding, but leveraging your brand’s expertise to build sales does not have to be daunting. Answer these three questions and you’re off to a solid start.

The WCG team is happy to help too. Drop us an email at hello@wilksgrp.com if you’d like our team to learn more about how we can help optimize your content.