The Key, The Secret by Urban Cookie Collective is this week’s tune.
What links this classic 90’s dance track to marketing, you ask?
Well, this week we’re talking about gated content.
Gated content is material, which rather than giving away for free, you offer in exchange for personal information.
In other words, you keep the content ‘secret’, until the customer uses a ‘key’ to unlock it. Get it?
It’s the classic ‘click here for a free download’, before a pop-up box emerges asking you for your name, email address or other personal details.
It’s a good marketing tactic.
Gated content means that you will have invaluable information about your customers that can generate business leads.
There’s a whole host of content you can gate… white papers, articles, blog posts, videos, eBooks, product demos, case studies - you name it.
Producing really high quality, valuable content can cost you blood, sweat and tears, so gated content is a good way to ensure a return on your invested time.
The key is making the content behind the gate as valuable and helpful as possible, so that a customer will decide it is worth spending the time putting in their details.
Think about how you will whet the appetite of your target customers. You want to reveal just enough to pique their interest and convince them it is worth the exchange to see the full picture.
But there’s a balancing act here... Consider what information is most important to your business and marketing goals when deciding what information to collect in exchange for your content.
The more data you ask for, the more you will know about your potential customer, but the less likely they will be to follow through with entering it!
And before using gated content at all, it’s important to zoom out and think about what you are trying to achieve with your marketing.
Are you trying to generate business leads? Know more about your customer?
Or, are you trying to develop and raise brand awareness?
Not everyone is comfortable sharing personal information, so if you’re looking to develop brand awareness, it might be a good idea to use gated content later down the line (or in marketing terms… further down the marketing funnel).
Read our blog post all about using the marketing funnel here: https://www.themarketingdetectiveagency.com/post/music-and-marketing-marketing-funnel