Last updated - March 21, 2022
When planning and creating content for a WordPress website, most webmasters focus on keywords. The reason is simple:
They often have limited budgets and believe they can’t spend that money on creating high-quality content. Keyword-focused website pages seem easier to drive visibility and traffic, later turning visitors into leads. But guess what’s wrong with such an approach?
Dozens of other WordPress website owners think the same. As a result, users get tons of platforms with the same content strategy, offering the same content assets of the same topics, types, and quality. And all those websites compete for top places in Google, not in the hearts of their target audience.
It stands to reason that professional content marketing has nothing to do with such tactics.
Instead of publishing tons of superficial content assets, focus on those your target audience would care about and those helping promote your product or service. And while there’s no single tool, plugin, or method to tell you what exactly your prospects want, you can figure out what content types they will enjoy most.
For that, concentrate on being strategic or tactical rather than keyworded and demographic. Knowing what content your readers look for (lists, insights, videos, step-by-step how-to’s), you’ll diversify it accordingly.
Below you’ll find the top seven content types for every WordPress website to consider:
1) Landing page
The big chances are that you know the power of landing pages for online business, whether it’s big or small. Your WordPress website needs a landing page for marketing campaigns; that’s where visitors will “land” after they find you in search engines and learn more about your business.
The only goal of a landing page is to convert visitors into leads. If you sell products or services, a landing page is a must-have for your small business website.
Your landing page can be a website homepage or separate page, specifically designed for marketing campaigns. But whatever the case, you need to pay precise attention to this page content.
The best content practices for your landing page to work:
- A headline that grabs attention and compels visitors to stay here and learn more about you
- A hero image, aka a banner image on your page to trigger positive emotions and demonstrate your benefits
- A benefit-oriented and clear offer answering the “What’s in there for me?” question
- Added value
- Trust signals (guarantees, customer testimonials, user-generated content, etc.)
- Contacts
- A call to action, inviting and persuasive enough for users to take your desired action
2) Lead magnets
A lead magnet is a way to get leads in exchange for something valuable. Offer them something they can receive immediately via email: a free trial, a checklist, a whitepaper, a report, an e-book, you name it. If it hits their needs, they’ll provide you with email and subscription — and you’ll earn leads without annoying them.
Lead magnets promote your brand as an authority. They are engaging, provide value, and are sharable. Think of a lead magnet you can offer via your website and place it as a downloadable file for visitors to get in exchange for their email address.
Here go a few ideas on what can be your lead magnet:
- Webinars, podcasts, e-books
- Free trials
- Online demos or events
- Templates
- Contests, quizzes, special offers
- Content “baits,” such as reports, case studies, checklists, how-to guides, video courses, cheat sheets, and so on
3) Long-form, evergreen blog posts
Why does your WordPress website need a blog?
It’s a chance to perform well in search engines, generate backlinks, and cover all SEO-related stuff. Also, as reported by Orbit Media’s annual study of 1000+ bloggers, long-form content (1,500+ words) drives more engagement and boosts conversions.
What to publish on your blog to get results?
- Step-by-step practical guides
- Ultimate how-to articles
- Educational content assets that help your target audience solve a problem
- Deep analyses of concepts and phenomena related to your niche
- Lists, expert roundups
4) Original research, statistics
Content marketing experts admit that such content types as opinion, reference, and authoritative research often outperform others because they often become go-to references:
Other websites cite your data, backlinking to your content and thus boosting your visibility, authority in the niche, and user trust.
Yes, it’s time-consuming and challenging to create such content (original research has never been easy); but that’s precisely why it’s so valuable and gets such great conversions (links, traffic, and shares).
What to publish:
- Your experiments and their results
- Observations and analysis
- Surveys
- Analysis of existing research
- Collections of up-to-date statistics in your niche
5) Customer reviews
You know that 90% of people don’t trust ads and brand stories a business tells about itself. They listen to friends, relatives, influencers, and other customers instead: 77% of people say they read product reviews and feedback from other customers before making any purchase decisions.
With that in mind, you may want to publish some genuine customer reviews on your WordPress website to maintain it, build trust and motivate visitors to have a deal with you.
You can design customer reviews and testimonials as a sidebar or a mini-block on your landing page. Think of publishing interview blog posts or roundups if you have super loyal customers ready to share detailed feedback.
6) Case studies
It’s a powerful marketing tool to build social proof, build authority, and make the target audience trust you. Case studies are success stories from your business or customers dealing with your company, sharing practical benefits of your deeds for others.
It’s your chance to showcase your expertise, demonstrating how you managed to solve a customer’s problem.
You can put them on the website’s homepage or landing, publish them as blog posts describing what (and how) you do to get results, or tell about them in meetings or other events related to promoting your business.
7) Visual content
Whatever content type you choose to publish at your WordPress website, do your best to support it with visuals:
Images, videos, tables and graphs, GIFs, memes, infographics — all they wield significant influence on user engagement, your SEO metrics, and overall conversions.
Visual content performs better because it’s more appealing: The human brain processes visuals 60,000 faster than text, and that’s why we pay attention to images first.
It’s your chance to communicate a marketing message where your written content is lacking: Studies prove that 91% of customers prefer visual content over traditional formats; also, it increases retention, improving content comprehension by up to 89%.
Final thoughts
Content types are many, but it doesn’t mean you need to use them ALL for your WordPress content marketing strategy. Do your target audience research, know what they want, and focus on content assets that will bring value to users and serve to promote your expertise.
There’s no need to restrict yourself to blog posts or video content only. Start with seven content types from this article, test them to see what works and fits your strategy best, and succeed with your content marketing endeavors.
