Changes in the consumption patterns of customers and their level of demand, confirm that the efficiency of traditional marketing is in the past. Companies need to constantly reinvent themselves and Branded Content is the fruit of this need.
Although it is a strategy that already has a certain track record, in the era of Inbound Marketing it has acquired new strength. This is because it allows you to create a relationship of trust and commitment between the brand and its customers.
Have you ever wondered how some brands manage to form a consolidated community of loyal customers who reject competitors just for “loyalty”? This is accomplished by Branded Content.
Brands can no longer be a simple supplier of products, they must show themselves as a friend, a confidant or even a guide. And when your clients perceive you that way, you will be a little closer to success.
So if you want to know a little more about Branded Content and the benefits it offers, keep reading and you will solve all your doubts. Join us!
What is Branded Content?
The Branded Content is a marketing strategy that is based on creating content that will generate awareness and affinity with its users. How can you achieve this? Leaving behind the traditional promotion of the product and putting the user experience as the protagonist.
These actions are especially important in today’s market, where consumers are increasingly demanding and expect better things from brands. For today’s buyers, the product itself is no longer enough, they want something that will leave a value in their lives.
According to the Inbound Marketing methodology, the highest level a customer can reach is loyalty. This is achieved when the consumer feels so satisfied and identified with the brand that he becomes a kind of ambassador for the company.
When this point is reached, there is a true relationship of trust and commitment between the customer and the brand, and this generates lasting business relationships. This interaction and mutual relationship are what the Branded Content seeks.
Certainly, it is not an easy task to make customers feel really connected and identified with the brand. To achieve this, it is necessary to have the identity of our company well defined and create content that is especially directed to our objective target.
The Branded Content uses various actions and marketing fields correctly to reach your community and strengthen the relationship between them. Here it will be important to develop a solid and defined concept that has the identity of the brand as a banner, and not the product itself.
Perhaps at this point, some will be doubting this type of “product-free” marketing, but the Branded Content results speak for themselves. When the projection of the brand identity is maximized, the company is shown with greater solidity and recognition. And this is a lead magnet.
Branded Content Main Advantages
As you may have already noticed, there are many advantages that a good implementation of Branded Content can give you. And this applies to various areas that offer direct benefits to your marketing results.
Certainly, simply generating content that increases customer satisfaction could be a sufficient advantage. But if you want more reasons to decide to implement it, there are certain highlights that are worth mentioning. Some of them are:
Increase Engagement
By generating valuable content that appeals to the emotion and sensitivity of your customers, you can achieve a true connection between them and your brand. That will grow your fixed community of clients and also their commitment.
In this way, your customers will not only follow you for your products, but also for how good that makes them feel. It is the perfect mix between promoting your product and the emotional factor. This is an intangible but incredibly powerful value for your brand, so you shouldn’t minimize it.
Greater Interaction
In order to generate an effective Branded Content strategy, you must ensure that you handle several content formats and that it is of excellent quality. Not only to be able to satisfy the needs of your clients, but to attract many more.
When the content is good, its reach is increased, since your consumers will want to share it. This generates a high percentage of interaction and also opens doors to new leads. So you will be generating a double benefit.
Consolidation of a Community
The Branded Content makes your customers are no longer mere consumers, but they belong to an exclusive community where the brand is the unifying entity. Creating this is not easy, but when we feed them with the right content, excellent results are obtained.
The main advantage of building a community is that you will have a group of loyal customers. These will prefer you over other brands just for that feeling of permanence and identification they have with you. But be careful, these relationships can be fragile, so you have to take good care of them.
Higher Conversion
Normally, it is a challenge to get a lead to go through the entire purchasing process until loyalty effectively. However, with the help of Branded Content, the process becomes much easier.
You will start capturing leads that from the first moment already feel identified and related to your brand. So you will have no trouble going through each stage of the process. They will go from being strangers to brand ambassadors in a very short time and that also benefits your investment of resources.
Better Positioning
As we mentioned earlier, when you generate quality content, this causes your community to want to share it. In addition to that, they will be the defenders of your brand before their acquaintances and will give you more legitimacy.
All these actions make the positioning of your brand much better, both on the web and in the public vision. It is undoubtedly an investment that will generate lasting and productive relationships with your clients, generating excellent results.
The advantages and benefits that Branded Content offer you will also depend on the approach you give to your strategy and how much empathy you create with your community.
Remember that at this point, the key is to show yourself close and “equal”. That your clients feel that you are just like them and that they are the complement of the other. Emotionality and empathy are the formula for success.
3 Examples of Branded Content Campaigns
Maybe we have already made clear what are the bases and benefits of Branded Content, but now is the time to see it in action.
There are many brands that have used this marketing strategy to strengthen their consumer community, and they have certainly had good results.
To give you a better view of this point, here we show you some outstanding cases of Branded Content in action.
Red bull
Red Bull is considered by many to be the greatest exponent of Branded Content, and this is no coincidence. They have carried out a brand identity strategy over the years and this has reinforced and consolidated them in the market.
Is it possible to think of Red Bull without extreme sports? Probably not. But if we think about it, this is an energy drink brand, so why is it so well positioned in the extreme world? It’s all thanks to Branded Content.
This brand wanted to differentiate itself from the rest of the competition’s drinks and did so from its own identity. It was shown as a product closely related to extreme athletes and thus, little by little it penetrated that plane.
He went from being a sponsor of athletes and championships to being the main organizer of sporting events of world interest. This doubled its target audience: sports drink consumers and now fans of extreme sports.
It should also be mentioned that they knew how to use their resources very well in advertising. That made them be present in all kinds of environments close to their audience. But the focus of this advertisement was always excitement, adrenaline, and camaraderie. The product was almost in the background.
Coca-Cola
A great example of how to create an active and interactive community without much effort is what Coca-Cola did. You surely remember the popular campaign in which personal names were placed on beverage cans. This caused a much greater impact than expected.
A new design for soda cans was promoted here, including a wide variety of common names. In addition to this, they added phrases such as “Coca-Cola from:” or “Share a Coca-Cola with:”.
The special edition design was accompanied by a huge promotion on TV and digital media. They showed the cans as a good gift for a loved one or the protagonists of all kinds of emotional situations.
What was the result of this? Thousands of people buying the drink just to have these cans with their names. Each one looked for a specific name and even collected them. And clearly, they were also an excellent and original gift among friends of the time.
But what about people with unusual names? Coca-Cola went a step further and created worldwide live customization events for cans. So everyone had their can with the name or message of their choice.
This created a furor in consumers who were more pleased than ever with the brand. But it also triggered a viral movement on the networks of everyone who shared content related to cans. An example of how a “simple” but well-thought-out action from Branden Content can deliver great results.
Kit kat
Another successful case of how to boost your brand without directly involving the main product we have with Kit Kat. They knew how to define the characteristics of their target audience and captured them in an original and attractive way.
This well-known brand of chocolates created an application for Valentine’s Day in which the level of compatibility of couples was tested. The purpose of the activity was to get the highest score, and the winner would get an all-inclusive trip to Paris for two.
Clearly, thousands of couples participated in the dynamic and shared the results on their personal networks. This made the app go viral in no time and gained enormous reach.
Social networks are one of the best channels to actively interact with your community and Kit Kat knew how to take advantage of it very well.
In addition, it shows us once again that it does not matter that the product is not the protagonist of your strategy. The high reach and satisfaction of the public will generate profits on their own.
Conclusion
Branded Content is a strategy that has emerged in response to the need for consumers of memorable experiences and quality. Goes hand in hand with Inbound Marketing to create a community of satisfied and loyal users who will have lasting relationships with the brand.
Here we have the opportunity to dare to try new strategies and give our clients new and entertaining content. The most valuable asset of a company is a loyal customer and following the path of innovation, we can achieve it.
The key to success in order to achieve an effective Branded Content strategy is to define the identity of your brand. So you can show it as a product in itself and make your old and new customers feel identified with it. Trade is combined with emotion to achieve memorable results.
So, if you want to reinforce your brand image, create a consolidated community and increase your reach, try Branded Content. It is a strategy that will provide you with solid short and long-term benefits.
