How to Build an ROI-Focused Product Content Strategy
“Great products sell themselves” is not necessarily a term that fits today’s ultra-competitive open markets. Customers often have several options from which to choose, and their decision to purchase one product over another often comes down to the quality and accessibility of information. In those cases, an effective product content strategy is crucial for improving sales.
While quality content creation can help generate new business, the time and money involved can often be substantial. Businesses need to keep in mind that increasing these costs can often offset improved product sales.
To that end, content creation teams must consider adopting steps that can help corral expenses and improve ROI.
Six of those steps are as follows:
When you are drafting your product documentation, you consider your customer base and tailor content specifically to that audience. The most engaging and compelling product descriptions often address the specific needs of the intended end-users.
When doing so, also consider incorporating terminology that those customers would use in everyday life when communicating with either you or each other.
By first thinking about who that ideal customer is, begin to envision what a conversation with them would entail, and in turn, you will have a better sense of how to connect with them.
While it is important to know what content is relevant and appropriate for your customer base, communicating a consistent message at every stage of the customer life cycle is also vital.
If the product information you disseminate to prospective customers – such as features, specifications, or promotions – is inconsistent, those customers will begin to question your credibility. This can adversely affect their decision to buy from you.
Questions you will look to answer to preserve consistency include (but are not necessarily limited to) the following:
It will only take a marginal difference in consistency to affect your credibility. Those small details are often important and can mean the difference between a customer choosing your products or those of a competitor.
To encourage consistency, consider creating a product content style guide.
In this document, you can detail what information you need to include (and the tone you need to use) to create content that aligns with your branding. You can view this as a universal guide that you use for all products.
This document includes everything a team writer must know about the documentation procedure – even the details you consider simple or obvious. The point is to ensure that you have covered all your bases, and the writers have all the information they need to draft the document.
That style guide includes rules on the following:
Like preserving data and language consistency, your documents’ content and design need to work together seamlessly. If they do not align effectively, this will be another instance in which customers view your message as inconsistent, potentially leading to credibility issues.
Ensure that any images incorporated into the text properly reinforce the product information you are providing. If those images communicate anything that conflicts with your text (or introduces completely new data not otherwise discussed), you will confuse customers.
This means that the writing and designing teams must collaborate during content creation to ensure that everyone is clear on how you will be providing product information to customers.
Including a well-thought-out FAQ page is useful because:
If you manage a blog on your website, include links to the respective products from your online technical documentation portal content as often as possible.
You will increase the content’s credibility by connecting the two because would-be customers can identify a direct correlation between the text they read and the product itself. From the reader’s perspective, the content is then more than just a collection of well-written words – it is also a description and summary of a tangible product.
Frequent links will also continually funnel prospective buyers back to your product. The more they view the product, the more likely they will purchase it.
Effective Product Content Strategies Require Documentation Management
Implementing a high-quality product content strategy is an effective way to enhance your overall ROI by instilling customer confidence and reducing ongoing technical support costs.
However, those documents can only improve your bottom line if they are well organized and accessible to your customers.
At Zoomin, our team of experts understand content management and can work with you to consolidate documentation in ways that better disseminate product information to your customers.
