Last updated on November 3rd, 2022
How to build traction and generate leads through Content marketing?
Now, brands out there are continuously striving to fill the aspirations of people like you and I. But brands take a different approach, they don’t just portray themselves as a product or service through a flashy logo or a catchy slogan. Instead, Lifestyle brands keep in mind the needs of their target audience. Their message is in concordance with the aesthetics, ideals and aspirations that their audiences identify with. Their content is meaningful and serves the very purpose of catering to the lifestyle of people.
What Is an Effective Content Strategy for Your Lifestyle Brand?
There is no single element responsible for a successful content strategy. Instead, multiple formulas, trials and errors, permutations and combinations are responsible for delivering an effective content strategy. You might have a blog that’s engaging or perhaps visuals that are interesting and shareable. But there has to be one base strategy that accumulates all the elements together. Individual elements don’t work in the longer run. There has to be substance and permanency. For this, you might have to brainstorm with the team and define your target market. After this, you will have to ask yourself certain questions about your target persona. These questions could be: –
- Age & Gender
- Income
- Interests/Hobbies
- Sources of influence(blogs, celebrities or other influence)
These questions will help you in crafting content better. When you have answers to these questions then you will speak the language of your customers and create engaging pieces of content; content that your customers can relate to. When you have a content strategy that aligns with the interest of your audiences, then you will not only attract customers but convert them.
How Is It Possible for Lifestyle Companies to Develop Trust in Their Customers?
To create a successful lifestyle brand, it is important that the brand forms a deep connection with its target audience. Most of the brands fail to fill the gap because they do not match their values with the target audiences. Brand’s voice, persona and ideology should resonate with its users and its marketing efforts should remain consistent across the board.
Marketing for your brand should not be done for the sole purpose of creating buzz. Instead, your efforts should be maximized in turning your users into brand advocates and loyalists. Lifestyle brands should focus on user-generated content and their communities to maximize customer acquisition and retention. Their audience should be the heroes and the decision makers.
How to Build Traction for Lifestyle Brands?
One of the biggest challenges for any lifestyle business whether established or a startup is- how to build traction and generate leadds through content marketing for their brand as this is what makes or break a business.
Even while building a strategy for traction there are challenges like lack of time, confusion about what to prioritise etc. So, creating engagement without compromising the brand’s value is a tough nut to crack. But there are ways to solve this problem, and we will talk about some ways that can help build traction and generate leads for a lifestyle brand.
1. Blogging Is an Evergreen Strategy
This is old but gold. Blogging never gets out of fashion, and by writing shareable blog posts you can tell your audiences more about you. You can write impactful blog posts that can include how-to articles, behind-the-scenes info, new product launches, and Q&As with internal experts. And this can be followed by opinions, feedback and suggestions on the topic to propel interaction. However, the takeaway is that a generic blog will not help you win the race. The competition is high and your users have a wide variety to choose from. Therefore, if you really need to see your blogs garnering results, then you have to invest properly in it and create meaningful content.
Example:
Wholesale foods through its blogs and articles have made sure that it does not just appear as a grocery store to its audience. Rather it has positioned itself as a lifestyle choice in the minds of its users. Its articles talk about how one can save money but still stay healthy. Wholesale food believes in healthy living and wants to help people make healthier choices. For this, the brand uses a lot of proactive language such as “I want to learn/do” as a search option in its navigation bar. This makes the audience feel that they are active players in the entire process and their role is the very important. Therefore. through such content in its blogs, Wholesale food is not just attracting new customers, but also establishing long-term associations with users.
2. Get Personal
Personalization has been the in thing for the content marketing arena for brands. A study by Accenture showed that eighty-one percent of consumers wanted brands to get to know them and understand when to approach them, as well as when not to.Companies use AI in content marketing and content marketing resources to understand their audience better. Personalization using AI in content marketing and content marketing resources and social media can work very well together. To know more about your customers, you should visit platforms that are most likely to be visited by your audience. Social media is one of the most significant tools that can promote your lifestyle brand’s name in the right sense. Through social media, you can also collect data and gather insights about your target audience. When you have your buyer persona created, you can easily craft content according to their needs.
Example:
Nike is an apt example that uses social media like Twitter to enhance customer experience. @NikeSupport on Twitter is super quick to respond to customer queries and complaints. This solidifies the relationship between the brand and its customers.
3. Creating an Effective Video Strategy
Brands are invested in video marketing in 2018. In fact, they are not just creating effective YouTube channels, they’re also embedding YouTube videos on their own websites. According to a research, the top marketers have an average of 181 videos, while the bottom has 29. Also, marketers with a better strategy and results produce videos with varying video lengths, ranging from 30 seconds to 20 minutes.
Example:
Travel portal Ixigo’s CEO Aloke Bajpai aims to make travel an enjoyable and informed experience for their users with their apps, content and research website. For this rolled out a very interesting and unique marketing campaign “Know and go” on Youtube. The ad film captures the aspirations of a small boy who wants to visit TajMahal after watching it on TV, but he is unable to because he gets a no from his father. What he does about it is something that you can enjoy watching here.
Through this, they were optimistic about reaching out to many more travellers across geographies and strengthen their positioning of being the most trusted travel website in India.” Another example is MakeMyTrip, they believe that Youtube/Video is a very powerful channel that, if utilised well, can create a deep positive impact on consumers. Their video series ‘Customer First Stories’ captures the happy stories of customers, where they address specific hurdles that MakeMyTrip sorted out enabling a hassle-free journey. These videos, a minute or more in duration have received tremendous appreciation. You can watch them here.
4. Being a Part of Communities
Quora has a huge base of monthly visitors amounting to 1.5 million. You can use Quora to build authority on your chosen topic, learn from others, answer questions about your product directly and find out the questions people are asking about your product or industry. By signing up on popular q&a sites like Quora or Reddit or a group on Linkedin you can build authority on your chosen topic, learn from others reach out to audiences that are asking questions that your brand can answer. Here the idea is to spread knowledge and not promotion. Therefore, you can answer questions such as “What are the upcoming lifestyle brands” or maybe “Which recent products have affected the lifestyle of millennials in a profound way”. And you can give your website or product as a reference.
Example:
You can post questions like the one in below and can add relevant answers to form a community and get associated with more people.
5. Pin Pinterest to Your Content Market Strategy
Pinterest is blooming and brands are now using this platform to showcase what they have got. It is gaining popularity amongst the masses across the globe prodding businesses to flock towards it. A research showcased that 93 percent of the pinners use Pinterest to make a purchase. It is also one of the biggest sources of referrals for them. Another research showed that 55% shoppers rely on Pinterest to make their choices. Pinterest differs from other social media because people usually land on this platform to discover something new. And this is exactly what the brands worldwide should tap into.
Example:
The ethnic wear brand BIBA is one of the most loved in the country and has made traditional attire fashionable and trendy. The brand had introduced a Mother’s Day collection on Pinterest. This was a blend of elegant outfits, comprising salwar kameez, dupatta, ethnic & mix and match. 
6. Hashtag Your Way In
Hashtags and twitter marketing can increase your follower base by leaps and bounds. Here are some reasons that consolidate this statement: – Hashtags are searchable, and by using them, you are increasing the chance of being found by members of your target audience.
Hashtags bring conversations on the same topic in a single thread and makes it convenient for users to understand, evaluate and compare ideas. So basically, if there is a trending conversation that your lifestyle brand can contribute to, then you should use that hashtag as a part of your social media posts.
- You can run social media contents and have your participants use a specific hashtag. This will help you organise your contest better and also spread awareness about the brand at the same time.
- You can increase your follows and engagement considerably on Instagram by looking for popular hashtags that adhere to your brand services, offerings and values.
- You can use Twitter’s Trending News for promoting your brands. Use the news hashtag that is trending in your posts for the day.
Another mind-blowing way to combine Twitter & hashtags are the relatively new Twitter chats. Here users answer questions and discuss topics with one another by including a specific hashtag in their tweets.
Example:
Nykaa did wonders with its #BackToBlack contest. The contest was easy to play and the rewards were hard to resist, so there were many who played to win. Read below to understand it.
7. Instagramming the Right Way
Gone is the time when Instagram was just known for cool filters and quirky selfies. Instagram now has a huge base of 700 million active monthly users. Instagram is now a platform that represents many brands and enhances their value.
Example:
Adidas on Instagram has about 15 million followers and has a high influence on the platform. They majorly use Instagram to promote their brand and engage their audience with interesting visual content and videos. Every image contains an Adidas product and most of the images have women. This is a smart move by the brand as Instagram’s sixty-eight percentage of users are women. Adidas is seen to be consistent in its tone and quality, and strategically crafts its content according to its target base.Follow these Instagram content marketing examples for a better idea.
8. Outreach
There is no denying that influencer outreach gives higher ROI’s. People always look up to these influencers and their viewpoints. And if the influencers have something positive or interesting to say about the brand, then their followers will take their word and spread it too. A report by Twitter said that forty-nine percent of consumers trust recommendations and suggestions from influencers while making decisions to buy. We will quickly give you some reasons that will convince you to try out influencer outreach.
- Word of mouth and brand advocacy works wonders if influencers are in the picture. This is because the influencers are more capable of making any lifestyle brand sound more authentic and relatable. They can maybe write about and photograph a brand’s products in a more natural way, such that it does not seem promotional.
- Not only can the influencers talk about their viewpoint on your brand with ease, but they can easily form a connection with the audience by giving away your coupons or freebies. Free coupons or giveaways seem more attractive when given by a celebrity or a person with reach.
- Influencers can be very creative with videos. So, for example, if your product needs to be explained well, you can request your influencer to show your product in a tutorial format. This creates a lot of interest amongst users and they interact by reviewing, commenting or purchasing. These videos are also good in the longer run, as these videos are not just limited to one campaign. They work wonders even after your campaign is over.
Example:
Philips had introduced its latest kitchen appliance Air Fryer in 2012 and there were very few who knew its application and use. It allowed deep frying of a variety of food items with 80% less oil consumption. Despite such a huge feature, the Air Fryer remained relatively unknown in the market. This is where Philips along with its digital agency Ogilvy One roped in Sanjay Thumma who is known for his cookery channel on YouTube called Vahchef. The campaign started a six-month long show called “Philips Superchef” that managed to create a lot of awareness amongst consumers. You can watch it here
The Takeaway
Lifestyle brands don’t sell products, instead, they sell aspirations. Therefore they capture the long-term vision of their users of who they want to be or what would they like to possess. These brands promise and declare that they can make these visions and aspirations into a reality. But for them to claim something like this and for the users to believe in this, the brands need to speak with utter honesty. This honesty coupled with passion will allow them to form strong & long-lasting bonds with their audience.
Lifestyle brands should make sure that their audiences do not feel susceptible and regretful after the purchase. Their promises should evoke loyalty and belief in the minds of users. This blog guided you on how to build traction and generate leads through content marketing, we hope it was helpful.
