So what is content syndication in digital marketing?
Content syndication services get content you have developed into the hands of new viewers by leveraging the strength of someone else’s readership. If you can effectively integrate B2B content syndication into your current marketing strategy, you not only increase the effectiveness of your content marketing efforts but also generate leads who are potentially more interested in reading your content and knowing your products.
Here’s how it usually works:
- First, you’ll want to determine your ideal audience. Depending on the content syndication service you use, the granularity of the criteria for your target audience will vary.
- Once you have selected the segment of the community that you want to target, you’ll then submit your content. This content could be a white paper, report, short-form copy, or long-form copy. Ideally, you’ll want to choose an asset that you believe has high value to the anticipated reader, i.e. something you think they would want to download and read.Â
- Your chosen asset will then be published to the community and promoted to your target audience until your goals are reached. Generally content syndication marketing is for the purpose of generating form fills (downloads) for the content.
You’ve seen it happen time and again, you work with a team to develop a great piece of content but then realize that your audience is too small to have the impact you want.
That’s where content syndication marketing can come in.
Content syndication platforms
There are many content syndication platforms out there. Some of the mainstream websites that you may associate with syndication content for free are :
However, on these free platforms you’re not really syndicating content so much as reposting ideas, discussions or topics.Â
The key to your success depends on a variety of factors. For instance, do they have access to a large network? Have they ensured that the members of their community (your potential audience) are vetted? You want to make sure that your content is not just being blasted to a group of people who may not be interested in the solutions you have to offer.
You should also be aware of the fact that different platforms are designed for different objectives. For example, B2B content syndication platforms focus on B2B marketing, which means that the community is interested in those kinds of solutions. In this case, you’d expect the platform to have a large audience of professionals in a variety of industries who are looking for solutions for their businesses.
In case you are looking for web syndication, where content from one website is made available to other sites, it is a more complex process which involves licensing agreements, revenue share etc. And that may be a completely different genre. A web syndication example, is how manufacturing companies usually host their website page on product categories, features and pricing on other sites for promotion.
ViBÂ is a B2B demand generation marketing company that offers content syndication services exclusively targeting high-technology markets. With us, your content will be shared with a massive community of over 10 million technological professionals. Each of these audience members are carefully vetted to ensure that they are engaged and actively searching for solutions to their problems.
Content syndication examples
Let’s go through a content syndication example to show you the benefits you can get from making it an integral part of your content marketing strategy.
Siemplify, a Google cloud company was looking for vendors to approach content syndication. Unfortunately, not every vendor could deliver the results. Out of the 15 content syndication vendors they tried, ViB was the only provider they’ve worked with who exceeded expectations, and was consistently working to improve performance.
“We use four content syndication providers per quarter. We always recycle at least one to two [underperforming] vendors. But in two years together, we haven’t experienced any audience exhaustion with ViB and we haven’t rejected a single lead in more than a year.”
Siemplify also invested in appointment settings program and experienced tremendous success. Of the first ten appointments the program generated, they earned eight meetings — six of which became opportunities.
Types of content syndication
There are many different types of content syndication.
Social media syndication refers to getting your content published specifically on social media platforms that are most relevant for your business. They help you reach a wider audience and gain more exposure. Just pay close attention to the type of businesses, or people you serve, as the type of social media platform may, or may not, fit your needs.
Free content syndication refers to reposting your content to appear on someone else’s news site or blog free of cost. Some of the free content syndication platforms used by marketers are Quora and Flipboard. If your goal is lead generation free content syndication may not be the best fit for you as there is no ability to specify your audience or collect leads.
Paid content syndication. While free content syndication is great for getting the word out there, paid content syndication is not just about a reposting for traffic. It can be far more effective, especially in the B2B space and will usually come with a lead generation guarantee by content syndication partners/vendors.
Explore our in-depth guide to find out whether paid versus free content syndication will work better for your business.
Generate 4x more pipeline with content syndication
Content syndication providers
Different content syndication providers are going to provide you with varying levels of service. It’s important when comparing content syndication vendors to look at the options you’ll get with each service. Here are just a few tips for things to keep in mind when choosing a content syndication partner:
How big is their network? For instance, with B2B content syndication vendors, you should be looking for them to offer access to a large audience that fits your target criteria, as well as the capability to refine the target criteria to address specific product or geographical needs.
Who is their target audience and does it match your ideal customer profile? Content syndication platforms can leverage wide audience segments and sometimes that means the leads you get won’t match your needs. Pay close attention to the type (B2B/B2C) of customers they have worked with and the successful campaigns they have run.
What technologies do they use for targeting? A multi-channel approach is the best in terms of the reach that can be achieved through promotion. For example, will they only post your asset on one page? Or will they amplify that post across multiple marketing channels as part of the service?
What do their customers have to say? What about reviews? You should also read reviews of content syndication agencies to understand if the company is good at what they do and if they have consistently delivered results.
It may be cheaper to go with a smaller company, but if they don’t have a proven track record, you may not get much of a return on your investment. What you need is a content syndication specialist who knows how to effectively target a market segment and generate leads that match the persona you are trying to target with your asset.
Good content syndication providers will also provide other services to facilitate your marketing efforts. In addition to content syndication services, ViB offers a host of other services that can help you achieve your marketing goals.
Get started with a trial offer
Content syndication strategy
In order for your content syndication strategy to be effective, you’ll need to ensure that you are following content syndication best practices. Here is a quick list of content syndication 101:
Repurpose your content across different assets:Â Use your content for other valuable assets. For example if you have similar topic, use some parts of it within an infographic, or create templates combined with other topics to gain more exposure.
Use content syndication regularly: If you have created high value assets, like thought leadership content to show case your expertise, you should always be thinking about ways to use those assets to generate leads. Don’t assume posting/promoting once will do the trick.
Define your ideal outcome: How will you know if your syndication program is successful? First you need to have specific target criteria and results in mind.
Carefully choose your content syndication vendor: If you are using a paid content syndication service, evaluate them on the basis of their network and their customer reviews. Content syndication lead generation is easy if the vendor has a large network to promote your content.
Content syndication backlinks: When your content is published on other websites that link back to your website this will help you increase the number of back links. You will get more traffic to your website when someone downloads your content and visits your site.
Benefits of content syndication
There are many benefits of content syndication, but how much does content syndication cost? Honestly, some providers can be pretty expensive. If you’re on a budget look for cost per lead services so that you only have to pay for each download when the campaign is successful. For instance ViB Syndication is reliable, affordable and is priced on a cost per lead basis. Plus, at ViB content syndication can be bundled up other services in order to get the most results out of each and every asset.
