For the most part, content writing isn’t a high-paying job. But there’s one area of it that both pays well…and is growing. I’m talking about content marketing, and it can be a great opportunity for someone with a background in copywriting. Intrigued? Read on…
Today’s question comes from Jasmine M. who asks, “I came across a job listing for a Content Marketing Manager. The job description was a little cryptic; is that something I could do with my copywriting background?”
A few weeks ago, we talked about content strategy, which, despite its name, is really about how copy is organized on a site.
Content marketing, on the other hand, actually is about content: It’s s really the planning and strategy that goes into how content (and content only) is created and distributed to help support a company’s goals.
Even though content writing doesn’t directly sell the way that copy is designed to, content can be important to a company because it can attract people to a company’s website, encourage them to engage with the brand, build brand loyalty, create opportunities for people to share it (and, thereby, introduce new people to the brand), build trust in the brand, and, through all of these, maybe even help to encourage a sale.
As a content marketer, your job is all about figuring out what you want your content to do by identifying your content’s goals, what content you need to create to do that, how to go about creating that content (staffing, scheduling, etc.), how to serve it up (how often and via which media), and which group(s) to serve it to. If this sounds simple…it’s not. A great content marketing plan takes a lot of thought, evaluation, testing, and re-thinking, re-evaluating and re-testing.
Content marketing can be a great career for someone with a copywriting background; an understanding of strategy, brand voice, target audiences, and benefits to consumer are fantastic building blocks for this career.
However, just like copywriting, it’s a career that requires training—you won’t be able to just hop into it without knowing how to do it. (We’ve actually created a content marketing course as part of our Comprehensive Copywriting Academy to train our students.)
If you are interested in it, though, it’s a fantastic field to get into. Companies are beginning to appreciate the importance of content more than ever and, even if many aren’t yet willing to pay very much to get it written, many are willing to invest in a top-notch content marketer to manage it all for them.
Your turn! Have you worked with a content marketing manager? What was the experience like? Let us know in the comments below!
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Catherine Weed says
March 2, 2015 at 3:07 pmHello Nicki, great article! I look forward to getting to that part of the course as it is something I find very interesting. I bet it’ll be something important to understand, even if you are simply working with/under a Content Marketing Manager.
With how important content is becoming I have also been hearing about something called ‘SEO Copywriting’. Do you have any thoughts to share on that niche? It seems like a way to further separate a Copywriter writing a website’s copy from a Content Writer doing so.
Nicki Krawczyk says
March 3, 2015 at 3:37 pmHi Catherine,
I’m glad you found it helpful! And I think that deep dive course will definitely be useful for you.
SEO stands for “Search Engine Optimization” and it’s the practice of using different tools and techniques to help various pages on websites end up higher on a search engine’s results page. For example, if you sell sweaters made of llama wool, you’d want to use these techniques in the hopes that when people search for terms that are relevant to you (terms like “llama wool,” “men’s llama sweaters” and things like that), pages of your site would rank high on the results page that Google displays to people who search those terms. Here’s the thing though—and I go into it a bit deeper in this article if you’d like more insight https://filthyrichwriter.com/copywriting-qa-the-truth-about-seo-copywriting/ — “SEO copywriting” is really kind of a false niche. Any copywriter worth their salt should already be using those “SEO tactics” to write their copy. What I mean is that they should *naturally* be incorporating terms that people are searching for, just because those terms are a natural part of writing about a topic. (Definitely check out that article if this isn’t quite clear—I fear I’m talking a little too high-level due to the space constraint. 🙂 ) The full discussion is a bit more broad than that, but suffice it to say that, sure, people still advertise that they are “SEO copywriters” and sometimes people even still look specifically for SEO copywriters, but it’s really just part and parcel of being a good copywriter. Does that make sense?
Thanks for commenting!
Nicki
Catherine Weed says
March 9, 2015 at 1:17 amI am so glad I asked. There isn’t really a special song and dance to do to make it magically SEO friendly. If you are doing the SEO, or working with someone who is, decide on the specific SEO Keywords and implement them into the copy naturally. The right keywords should relate to the content in a way that you’d use them naturally when writing it anyway.
AH! Thanks! I almost bought into this whole ‘SEO Copywriting Course’. I’m glad I went with your comprehensive course instead. I almost did the other one until I got the invite to yours. Dodged that bullet. 🙂
Nicki Krawczyk says
March 9, 2015 at 3:50 pmHi Catherine,
Yep, that’s it’s to a T! And I’m glad you’re happy with our training—we most certainly aim to please! 🙂
Thanks!
Nicki