Social Media Marketing vs Traditional Marketing
It’s no secret that social media has taken over the world, social media started as a way for people to stay connected with friends and family.
What's the Difference Between Content Marketing and Social Media Marketing?
Content Marketing and Social Media Marketing can both help increase your traffic by a significant amount, the main difference between the 2 is that in content marketing.
Written By Daena King
Mar 2023 / Reading Length: 6 minutes
Content Marketing and Social Media Marketing can both help increase your traffic by a significant amount, the main difference between the 2 is that in content marketing, you are focused on creating high quality informative content, whereas social media marketing is all about creating content that is shareable and engaging.
In the digital world, it’s no secret that businesses need to have a strong online presence in order to stay competitive. Marketing has moved from sole the purview of the ad agency to a new and exciting realm: digital marketing. There are lots of strategies for digital marketing, and two of the most popular are social media marketing and content marketing. Whilst both strategies aim to reach and engage a specific target audience, there are distinct differences. Today, we’re going to explore the differences between social media and content marketing.
What Is Content Marketing?
Content marketing is a marketing strategy wherein you create and share valuable, relevant content in order to attract and retain a target audience. The goal of content marketing is to educate and inform the audience, establish trust and authority, and ultimately inspire the audience to become customers and buy into a business’s content or services.
Benefits of Content Marketing
One of the biggest benefits of content marketing is that it is an inbound marketing strategy. Instead of going out and finding customers, your business posts information that brings them in. This is extremely important because customers are increasingly rejecting interruptive advertising. For example, the click-through rate for onscreen ads is 0.07% in the UK. That means that if you wanted to get a single click-through, you would need an average of 1,428 impressions.
However, if you use content marketing as a strategy, you can use content to draw your customers to your website. This not only saves on advertising costs, but also creates a more organic, natural relationship with the consumer audience.
Content Marketing Strategies
While every business’s content marketing strategy will be slightly different depending on what your business can offer the consumers, the process always starts out in the same way. Your business must research the target audience and their needs.
Some tools you can use for this include:
- Keyword research
- Social media analytics
- Customer surveys
Once the audience and topics are identified, the actual content creation process can begin. This involves developing a content strategy that outlines the types of content to be created, the frequency of publication, and the distribution channels for the content. Content must be high quality, relevant, accurate, and valuable to the audience.
After the content is created, it needs to be distributed to the target audience. This involves promoting the content through various channels, such as promoted posts, social media, email marketing, and search engine optimisation (SEO).
Once your content is out in the world, analytics will tell you how successful your content marketing strategy is. This involves tracking metrics such as website traffic, social media engagement, and conversion rates to understand how the content is resonating with the audience.
Types of Content for Content Marketing
There are many different types of content that can be used in content marketing. These include, but are not limited to:
- Blog posts, which are one of the most popular types of content.
- Videos, which are very engaging.
- E-books and white papers which are great for providing in-depth information and thought leadership on a particular topic.
What Is Social Media Marketing?
Social media marketing is another important strategy for digital marketing. It involves creating and sharing content on social media channels to reach and engage with a target audience. The goal of social media marketing is to build brand awareness, drive website traffic, and, ultimately, increase sales and revenue.
Why Does Social Media Marketing Work?
At its most basic level, social media marketing works because social media platforms have become an integral part of people’s daily lives. According to the We Are Social 2022 report, there are now over 4.95 billion internet users worldwide, and of those 4.95 billion, 4.62 billion regularly use social media. Everybody is on social media, so it is simply sensible to employ a marketing strategy that targets social media.
The social nature of social media also makes this an effective marketing strategy. Social media users frequently join interest groups or produce data that make their interests, preferences, and behaviour extremely clear. This makes it relatively easy for businesses to create marketing material that is relevant, engaging, and shareable.
Benefits of Social Media Marketing
When your business engages with your audience on social media, you will enjoy increased brand awareness and improved customer engagement. This is because social media platforms are a great way for businesses to interact with their customers and build relationships with them.
By responding to comments, messages, and reviews, businesses can show that they care about their customers and are responsive to their needs. This will also create enhanced, easier customer service and allow for better targeting and retargeting.
Social Media Marketing Strategies
Getting started with social media marketing requires a range of activities. First, you need to identify your target audience and their social media behaviour. You need to find the keywords that resonate with your audience, and you need to meet them where they are. Each social media platform has its own user demography, and you need to find the platforms your target audience uses.
There are many social media platforms, and here are some of the most common ones for social media marketing.
The content your business creates for social media must be topical, relevant, timely, and short. It must be visually appealing and easy to digest.
Businesses should use social media analytics tools to understand what types of content are resonating with the audience and create more of the same. A social media marketing strategy will fail if businesses do not pay attention to analytics and metrics. The key metric for social media marketing is engagement. Other important metrics include reach, engagement, and conversion rates. These will provide insights into the effectiveness of social media marketing.
Types of Content for Social Media Marketing
The ideal content for social media marketing looks great, is highly readable, and scans well and quickly. These include, but are not limited to:
- Short text posts, such as Tweets or Facebook posts.
- Short form video, which can be repurposed across platforms should you so choose.
- Images, including infographics, which are extremely shareable.
So, What’s the Difference Between Content Marketing and Social Media Marketing?
By now, you’ve probably realised that there are lots of differences between content marketing and social media marketing! Here are some of the most important key differences.
| Social Media Marketing | Content Marketing | |
| Content Focus | Focuses on creating content that is shareable, visually appealing, and engaging. | Focuses on creating high-quality, informative, and educational content that provides value to the audience. |
| Content Form | Content is often short-form and designed to capture the audience’s attention quickly. | Content is often long-form and in-depth, designed to engage the audience and provide them with useful information. |
| Content Form Examples | Social media posts like Tweets; Youtube Shorts, Reels, and other short-form video; algorithmically-friendly posts | Newsletters, blog posts, articles, and other longer-form content |
| Distribution | Primarily distributed through social media channels such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn. | Can be distributed through a variety of channels, including a business’s website, email newsletters, and social media platforms. |
| Important Metrics | Metrics such as reach, engagement, and conversion rates are used to measure the success of the social media marketing strategy. | Metrics such as page views, time on site, and lead generation are used to measure the success of the content. |
SEO for Content Marketing and Social Media Marketing
SEO plays an important role in both content marketing and social media marketing. For content marketing, SEO…
- Ensures the content is discoverable by search engines
- Improves search engine rankings by optimising for relevant keywords
- Targets content to specific audiences
- Builds links and other off-page SEO factors
- Improves domain authority and search engine rankings
SEO plays a less direct role in social media marketing, because social media content does not have a direct impact on search engine rankings. However, social media profiles can appear in search results, and social media can indirectly influence search engine rankings by driving traffic to a business’s website.
Now that you have a better understanding of what’s the difference between content marketing and social media marketing, are you prepared to bring your business’s marketing strategy into today’s digital landscape? Whether you’re looking for help with SEO, social media marketing, or your overall digital marketing strategy, the services we offer can help.
Other articles picked for you
Social Media Marketing: The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly
As social media becomes more and more popular, it’s important to understand the benefits and disadvantages of social media marketing. On one hand, social media allows businesses to connect with customers easily and share content quickly.
Can Social Media Marketing increase Brand Awareness?
Social media marketing is one of the most powerful tools for increasing brand awareness. However, effectively establishing awareness of your brand is a lengthy, complex, and multifaceted process.