We started with building a content mission statement: “We will become a destination for education leaders to gain insights that support the front line of education.” That mission informs everything that we do, whether it’s building brand awareness through thought leadership or building interest in our solutions to drive leads. We believe that content is key to engaging prospects and clients at every stage of the buying journey—and even before they’ve embarked on the buying journey.

Be interesting and be useful. It’s simple, but hard to do! Content doesn’t have to be all top-of-the-funnel or bottom; it doesn’t have to be all thought leadership or lead gen; it doesn’t have to follow a certain format or length or tone. But it has to be interesting, and it has to be useful. If you follow those principles no matter how your content program evolves, then your audience will reward you.

We incorporated interactive content into our program because different people like to learn and engage with content in different ways. Some like to read a white paper, some like to watch a video. Many will engage in a poll, quiz or other interactive piece. It’s just one more way we can be interesting and useful to our audience.

ion helps us scale by putting easy-to-use interactive tools into the hands of our content team. Our incredibly talented content marketing specialists and designers team up to create interactive experiences that would take much longer to create from scratch.

With the power of data, we can now prove the value of content marketing. We’ve always believed in it—but now we can show the results to key stakeholders. Our analytics team has been instrumental in helping us demonstrate the results of our content marketing programs. Showing your results breeds buy-in from leadership, which in turn generates more support and resources to invest in your efforts.

I love Content Marketing Institute’s shift to focusing on audiences. To me, that is the next generation of content marketing—moving beyond buyer personas and focusing instead on building an audience with the right people. The buying process will come once you’ve proven your value to your audience.