Content Marketing Tips for 2011
 By Joe Pulizzi, founder, Content Marketing Institute

1. Realize you’re a media publishing company (yes, you as a person and as an organization). The whole idea of content marketing is to create relevant, engaging content. Publishers don’t simply start writing—they listen, research, experiment, and plan before they publish, and so should you!

2. Truly integrated marketing is difficult to achieve, but worth the fight. It is all too common to have various tactics siloed in organizations today. Break down the barriers and don’t think integration means having the same message on every channel. Each new channel has its own unique audience that deserves your team’s attention.

3. Consistency. Consistency. Consistency. Whether you are starting a blog, a custom publication, or any other content marketing initiative, make sure you start with a plan. Develop a schedule, and consistently deliver on your “content promise” to your customers.

4. Start by planning and understanding your expectations for each content marketing effort. The discipline of content marketing is not new. It is simply becoming more important in today’s environment. Before adding any tactic to your to-do list, make sure it fits into your overall marketing plan, and that clear expectations have been set.

5. Bad content is a commodity. Good content is invaluable. It goes without saying that you want the content you create to be truly unique. Otherwise, you’re simply wasting your time and adding to the “noise.”

6. Evaluate your content marketing budget for 2011. The average company spends 20 percent to 40 percent of their total marketing budget on content marketing. If your budget dedicates less than 30 percent to creation and distribution of content, you should put some thought into how you allocate your budget for 2011.

7. Consider balancing doing-it-yourself vs. outsourcing. Once you have content marketing worked into your overall marketing plan, consider outsourcing the more complex components, and keeping what you can handle in-house. At the end of the day, don’t bite off more than you can chew.

8. 2011—the mobile marketing tipping point. If social media was the rage in 2009 and 2010, 2011 is going to be the year of mobile marketing. All marketers should be thinking about how we can develop helpful, useful content for people who want it and need it on their mobile device.
 
---Source: Priority Integrated Marketing July 16, 2010 (www.priorityresults.com). Joe Pulizzi is an author, speaker, evangelist, and content marketing expert. Check out Joe Pulizzi on his LinkedIn page (http://www.linkedin.com/in/joepulizzi) or follow him on Twitter (@juntajoe).