How our Content Marketing Agency Sparks Creativity

We are Ingeniums, a creative content marketing agency located in the heart of England’s second city, Birmingham. We dream up imaginative narratives and slick strategies that connect our clients to their target audience. For us, impactful content marketing involves much more than satisfying keyword metrics and search engine algorithms. To truly garner trust in your audience you need to give them relevant, quality content that sets your business apart from everything else out there.

How do we do this day-in, day-out?

By harnessing the power of creativity in everything we do.

Long harked as the City of a Thousand Trades, Birmingham has become a central base for long-established creative industries. You don’t have to go far to come across graphic designers, media planners, innovative digital architects and more. With such a network of entrepreneurial creative talent all meshed together in one place, Birmingham is the perfect hub for us. The city is a melting pot, with Irish, Caribbean, Indian influences and more shaping the cultural fabric of the city. Inspiration strikes around every corner with unique architectural, music and gastronomic creations.

Birmingham has long marched to the beat of its own drum, and so do we.

Why Content Marketing Needs Creativity

Predictable processes lead to predictable content. At Ingeniums, we make sure all of our content ticks ‘best practice’ boxes, without compromising on creativity. Metrics and systems are important, but they mustn’t suck the soul out of content marketing.

Rather than just focusing on lead generation, our content creation is driven by avoiding the generic and saying something worth saying. Our aim is always to produce relevant content that is useful, inspiring and a delight to read, that rightfully earns the trust of your target market.

There’s a glut of content on the internet. Six years ago, internationally acclaimed marketing consultant and author, Mark Schaefer, wrote an article about ‘Content Shock’. In it, he explained how the deluge of articles, blogs, and pages saturating the web would come to change the content marketing landscape. Now in 2020, the industry is even more crowded. The trouble is, not all this content is bad. A lot of it is brilliant.

To win search engine battles and convert the hearts and minds of your readers, you have two options:

1. Produce the best, most original content on the market in an already crowded area.

2. Look where no one else has looked to find an unsaturated niche that few people are focused on producing content for. Create consistent, quality content to dominate the area and become the authority on it.

What do these two solutions have in common? Both require a huge amount of creativity and original thinking. Without it, your brand fades into the background. With it, you’re in the game.

How We Build A Creative Workplace Culture

Establishing a workplace culture that prioritises creativity and innovation is essential to produce engaging content day in, day out. At Ingeniums, we believe no idea is a bad idea – often the best concepts come from the wackiest suggestions. Before we set out our production plan, we brainstorm content, format and topic ideas as a team, always informed by the latest data.

While original ideas are the foundation of our work, reinventing the wheel every time isn’t always the most successful approach. We keep a continual eye on what is happening in the wider content marketing field; sometimes our best ideas are inspired by something we’ve seen or read elsewhere.

Our briefs don’t micromanage our content. Rather than prescribing a detailed checklist from the outset, we opt for a research-led approach. We focus on the essentials: who are we writing for, why are we writing it and what questions need answering? By pinpointing content purpose and value first, we allow ourselves the space to decide article structure and tone once we have all the pieces. 

Whilst writing, we take breaks to fend off writer’s block and keep our ideas fresh. If something isn’t working, we take action as a team. We’re not afraid to learn as we go, reshaping our ideas and even, gasp, starting afresh.   

How the Ingeniums Keep Creativity Flowing

The strength of a content marketing team lies within the creativity each team member brings to the table. At Ingeniums, we are a tight-knit group of collaborators, but, crucially, we each bring a unique approach and style to the team.

How I keep Creativity as a Writer… 

Alice 

‘Freewriting is my go-to. I just get a blank page and I just go for it. If I’m on a limit, I set a timer so I’m not clock-watching. By the time I stop, usually whatever I wanted to say is on the page. It might be hidden under a pile of crap, but it’s a start. That’s OK because it isn’t the final draft. Nobody ever needs to see it. It’s not a waste of time to write 500 words I won’t use if I also wrote 200 that I will. 

I also draw a lot. If I’m stuck on an idea, I create characters and have them argue it out, or I give myself challenges to stretch the creative muscles. Anything you can do to occupy your hands and mind enough will help your best ideas work their way out. Scribbling, gardening, walking somewhere beautiful. What’s good for your mental health is good for creativity.’

Chelsea

‘When I’m on the go, feel boxed in by the screen or my fingers just won’t type fast enough, I use voice notes to record my ideas. Talking to yourself might be a sign of madness, but for me, the words flow more easily when I talk my way through a topic. In 30 seconds, an article can begin to take shape. You can easily go off on a tangent but that’s the beauty of it, sometimes those free-flowing ideas get you exactly where you want to be – somewhere original and unexpected.

If that’s not doing the trick, I get out in the open. Nothing resets my synapses like fresh air and exercise. By the time I’m back in front of the screen, my head’s brimming with ideas and the words flow easily.’

Creative Content Marketing Ideas

All this talk about creativity won’t amount to much unless we put it into action. Below are some novel ideas of how you can shake up your content strategy. If something sparks your interest and most importantly, you think it would spark the interest of your potential customers, talk to us about how to make it happen.

1. Flip the focus.

Don’t try and sell everything at once. Even if your business does 100 things incredibly well, focus on just one and display it in the most unique way you can think of. Not sure what we’re on about? – Check out this Volvo ad. Volvo trucks come with a huge range of high-spec features. However, for this campaign, Volvo boldly focussed on one element, Dynamic Steering. 

2. Share your must-do’s.

People don’t have time to learn everything there is to know about your business or industry. Give them the most important information quickly and let them get on with their day. A useful message delivered efficiently will always be more popular than a long-winded explanation to bump up the word count.

3. Expand your FAQs.

Frequently Asked Question pages are always your biggest hitters when it comes to search engine rankings. Make the most of the keywords and expand these questions into a series, addressing each one in turn. Not only will your SEO improve, but these are frequently searched questions for a reason, so your readers will love it.

4. Be the link master for your industry.

Sometimes the best content isn’t the easiest to find – believe us, if it was, we’d only have half a job. Even if it seems counterintuitive, becoming the go-to authority for content on your industry, whether you wrote it or not, will keep your followers coming back. After surveying reader preferences, weekly newsletter Adultish upped the number of links they included as they were such a popular feature.

5. Let your readers in behind the scenes.

Everyone is selling a finished product or perfect service, but businesses’ rarely have the confidence to let people in behind the scenes. Turning your production process into a selling point is an easy win- the content is already there and audiences love an inside scoop. A growing area increasingly steering consumers is ethical sourcing. If you have a particularly interesting or planet-friendly manufacturing process, show people!

6. Become an industry mythbuster.

Establish yourself as an authority in your industry by addressing common misconceptions. Show that you know best with an honest, convincing argument and you’re another step closer to earning the trust of your ideal customer.

7. Use case studies to earn consumer trust.

Know you can do a stellar job but not sure how to advertise it? The solution? Show, don’t tell. Explaining what you do with generalisations can quickly disengage the reader. Instead, make it obvious and more engaging with a case study of your most successful, or unique, real-world examples.

8. Create shareable content with visual statistics.

Nearly everyone loves to quote a statistic to dramatically make a point. Uncover an interesting statistic related to your industry, or better yet crunch your own numbers. Created branded infographics and accompanying content that can easily be shared across your social media channels.

9. Still unsure? Ask your audience.

Once you have established a sizable following, harvest them for the best ideas! Asking them directly is a great way to begin a meaningful conversation with your customers and lets you know exactly what they’re after. You could even experiment with a live Q&A on social media, via video stream or Twitter hashtag.

A Content Marketing Agency With More Than Just SEO Skills

We know those search engine result pages don’t magically appear how you’d like. We understand the technical ins and outs of the industry: SEO is important, keywords are crucial, working within a budget and to strict deadlines goes without saying. We’ve got the business side covered, but that isn’t where the magic happens.

Before we even get to all that, we think. Outside the box, next to the box, so far away from the box you can no longer see it – anywhere but inside it. We take creativity to the next level. Looking for originality and bold ideas? You need a content marketing agency that is willing and excited to go that extra mile and produce something brilliant. Contact us and we’ll show you what we can do.