In the words of BuzzFeed’s Jonathan Perelman, “Content is king, but distribution is queen. And she wears the pants.”

This is true because building a clever content distribution plan is essential for long-term success in content marketing.

According to Blogging Wizard, 79% of content marketers use content marketing to generate high-quality leads.

But how can a fantastic piece of content have an impact if no one reads it? This is where excellent content distribution comes in.

To optimize reach and cultivate brand loyalty, we’ll walk you through the best strategies for creating a content distribution plan and successfully promoting your content.

So, What is Content Distribution?

Content distribution is the act of publishing, sharing, and promoting your content via numerous online platforms.

This applies to your commercials, email newsletters, social media pages, websites, and other channels that we’ll discuss shortly.

However, before we get started, let’s talk about the significance of content distribution and why you should be concerned about it in the first place.

What is The Importance of Content Distribution?

Without a powerful way to distribute, promote, and advertise your content, it is unlikely that you’ll attract new fans or customers.

Consider this: Would you have heard of them or read their novels if your favorite authors didn’t have a company to print, distribute, and market their books at your neighborhood bookshop? Most likely not.

Reaching your target market and introducing yourself to those who have never heard about you is next to impossible, except if your brand is well-known.

Simply put, content distribution enables you to deliver your work or content to the relevant audience through the proper channels at the right moment.

Check out these statistics about content distribution:

• One piece of content is published every day by 60% of marketers.
• Twitter receives about 8,000 tweets every second.
• Every day, Google handles more than 5 billion searches.

Can you see that there has been a sharp increase in content over the past few years but a corresponding decrease in demand?

We have limited time to actively search for and consume the over 4.5 million blog posts produced daily.

That’s why, before you put the metaphorical pen to paper, you should plan where and how you intend to distribute and advertise your content. Otherwise, you risk wasting your time, energy and resources.

What Are The Types of Content You Can Distribute?

There are different types of content, and each one is unique.

The content type you choose will also determine the best content distribution strategy to use.

Content types include:

• Newsletters
• Blog posts
• Videos
• Success stories and case studies
• Infographics
• Research studies
• Product landing pages
• Articles (non-blog posts)
• Podcast episodes
• Checklists
• White papers and guides
• Ebooks and templates
• Research, Pillar pages, and other long-reads, such as how-to guides

5 Ultimate Steps to Building a Winning Content Distribution Strategy

Your strategy for content distribution must be sustainable and deliberate to be successful. You can’t just try it at random and hope it works out.

Maintaining consistency and gaining momentum is also crucial. Otherwise, your content marketing efforts could go down the drain.

The following five actionable steps will help you develop the perfect content distribution strategy for your business:

1. Do Some Research on Your Target Audience

Researching your audience is essential to any content strategy that succeeds.

You don’t have to ensure that everybody on the internet sees your stuff. Find those who genuinely need your services.

Recognize the kinds of content that your customer responds to positively.

To guide you in discovering which types of content will be helpful to them, map out their customer experience, and develop a buyer persona.

Examine your current content and determine why parts performed well while others did not. Identify the successful distribution channels.

Which articles received the most likes, shares, and comments?

This can help you understand the subjects that are important to your audience.

Consider your competition as well. What do they do? Where are they publishing their materials? You can learn a lot about your target market from your competitors.

2. Establish Objectives and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

Setting clear goals for your content distribution approach is crucial. Define your content’s objectives and create KPIs to monitor its success.

Is increasing sales your primary objective? Conversions should therefore be your blog post’s Key Performance Indicator.

Is increasing outreach your goal? An overall lead count can be used as a Key Performance Indicator for your downloadable content.

Make your objectives SMART:

• Specific
• Measurable
• Achievable
• Realistic
• Time-conscious

This guarantees their efficiency and ability to produce the best results.

3. Create A Content Calendar

A content calendar is a tool for organizing content planning, scheduling, and creation.

Your team will benefit from using a content calendar to determine how, when, and where your content needs to be released.

Calendars for content creation make marketing teams more effective and productive. It is a crucial component of any content marketing strategy.

To ensure that everybody is on track, the content calendar must always be updated.

The names of the staff members accountable for each process should be listed, and it should be available to the entire team.

4. Share and Promote Your Work

You know where and when to post your content because your content calendar is ready.

You can decide when to publish and automate it using content distribution technologies and tools.

If you choose to run advertising, be aware of the best practices and make an effort to adhere to them. When deciding which sites to post your content on, follow their policies.

5. Monitor, Measure, and Improve Your Content For Better Outcomes

Publishing content only starts the process of content distribution.

It also includes measuring the effectiveness of the content. You know the relevant data and the necessary metrics when your goals are established.

This will guide your analysis of which content is doing well and why.

Then, you can reproduce any content that is performing well and enhance the content that is not.

You can also determine whether the failure or success of your content is attributable to the content quality, the platform where it was published, or both.

Conclusion

Without an effective content distribution strategy, great content becomes wasted.

Conversely, a deliberate distribution investment will ensure that the right audience sees your work. In turn, you earn brand loyalty, sales, and increased ROI.

So start with researching your audience, establishing relevant KPIs, developing a content calendar, choosing the best platforms to distribute your content, and tracking your results.