Currently there are 115 million small businesses on a global scale. There are nearly twenty-seven million small businesses in the U.S contributing to the 50 percent of the GDP. The biggest source of creating employment is done by small business owners. On an average - nearly 100 to 1500 employees are hired by every small business.

This reiterates a fact that the contribution of small business to the economies and enabling employment opportunities is extensive.

It is also important that the interests and requirements of these SMEs are protected and safeguarded for collective benefit. The startups and entrepreneurship must be encouraged to inspire more innovative businesses for the final benefit of end user.

After the emergence of Internet, advertising and marketing have massively driven the sales growth through content marketing.

The second era of content marketing began in 2004 which consists of eBooks, articles, blogs, reports etc., has brought a plethora of opportunities to the small businesses to promote products and services online. Additionally, it has been proved that content marketing is an affordable and cost-effective method especially for micro units.

The goals of brand management, traffic, leads, sales and customer service are aligned and accomplished successfully while saving costs with the implementation of content marketing.

Specifically discussing about generating sales which is the primary mission of every business, it is easily scaled through social media marketing, video marketing and content marketing. This also signifies a fact that audience are more knowledgeable online and aware of making quality decisions about the wants and needs with a variety of choices made available online.

Despite competition, content marketing leads and delivers success for marketers to reach its customers generating sales. The e-commerce market is worth $22 trillion and the contribution of small business segment is expected to grow continuously. 

Amidst of all these benefits – it is essential to know how content marketing works sophisticatedly online and the support it receives from content strategy and content planning. 

These three terms are integrated and interlinked for producing positive results for a small business.

Content Strategy planning checklist:

• Enables the identification of business goals.
• Segregated as primary and secondary goals, these are both quantifiable and measurable.
• Based on content strategy, content marketing strategy planning is developed.
• Content strategy planning being the prime most important area to determine business goals, it requires specialized expertise.

Content Marketing strategy planning checklist:

Following the goals laid out by the content strategy, content marketing strategy planning undertakes the bifurcation of primary and secondary business goals and prepares worksheets of objectives, sales targets and determines audiences.

It lays emphasis on the following:

• What are the objectives?
• What are the proposed achievements and targets?
• Who are your audiences?
• What are the primary and secondary marketing channels for advertising and marketing?

Content Planning

Followed by content marketing strategy, content planning is created. This includes editorial calendar, customer journeys, buyer personas, SEO keyword tools and CMS (Content Management System) software for best results.

Lead Generation

The entire lifecycle of content strategy, content marketing strategy and content planning is primarily aimed at growing sales apart from enhancing traffic, brand management and expansion programs. Through various content formats - blog post, SEO article, infographic, white paper, case studies, free trial offer, eBook, email newsletter, press release, video advertising, ad campaign etc., audiences are invited to visit the website click CTA (Call-to-Action).

Conclusion

The process of content strategy and content marketing strategy require expertise and thorough knowledge to ensure that these are implemented successfully and prove productive for growing sales. Thus, small business owner finds this modus operandi of content marketing as most profitable and cost-cutting while giving a boost to sales.