5-Step Content Cluster Framework to Boost Your Manufacturing Company's SEO
Does your manufacturing company have a robust content and SEO strategy? Many of the manufacturers we've met lack a solid content strategy. Many get by with rudimentary websites and random blog posts, but this kind of shoot-in-the-dark SEO never works.
If you're committed to making inbound marketing work for your company, start by implementing a proven content framework. Such a strategy helps you organize your content into related topics to help users and Google access them more easily.
Content clusters guide you into exploring each topic deeply, creating authority and trust among site visitors. Most importantly, such a strategy helps manufacturing companies target more keywords on search engines, rank high, and ultimately draw in more traffic.
But before we get into content clusters, you must evaluate your entire content creation approach.
A Content Framework Guides Your Content Approach
David Ogilvy, widely regarded as the father of advertising, once said, "The consumer isn't a moron, she's your wife." You insult the consumer's intelligence if your marketing and content strategies fail to address their most pressing needs.
The Jobs To Be Done (JTBD) framework is one the most powerful content ideation frameworks you can use. You may already be familiar with it in product development, as it's widely used to help product developers understand what users want to achieve when they buy a product.
The JTBD framework removes the spotlight on the product and its features and places it on the customer and their needs. For example, a customer who buys a pencil doesn't do so just because they need one.
JTBD goes deeper by exploring the higher reasons why customers buy a product. What are the emotional forces behind buying a certain pencil brand? For example, buyers may prefer one with a firm grip or a design that reminds them of childhood.
Thousands of small yet significant differentiating factors help to differentiate your product from the competition. They affect consumer decisions to buy or not to buy from you, as this HBR article beautifully explains.
Once you understand what problem consumers are hiring your product to do, you can tailor your content to target those jobs. In JTBD, a job is the most basic force driving the decision to buy or not buy. You have to dig deep and understand customer behavior and motivation.
This necessitates in-depth market research based on real customer feedback, data analysis, and a deep understanding of market dynamics.
As a manufacturing company, this work is vital to help convince consumers to buy your products. The JTBD framework best helps you visualize the complete picture of what topics your content needs to cover.
Organize Your Content Into Clusters
David Ogilvy stressed that brands must provide customers with all the information they want about a product to help them choose. Content marketing is the best way to achieve this because it relies on highly informative blog posts and articles.
Content clusters are a contextual way of organizing web pages and blog posts by topic. That way, related pages are clustered around a single "pillar" page, with internal links connecting all related pages.
That way, readers and Google crawlers can find their way around and easily find relevant pages and information. Content clusters help you build authority on specific topics and give your site a better chance to rank high on related keywords.
What are Topic Clusters?
Topic clusters, or the cluster model, is a radial content structure consisting of a central pillar page supported by lots of linked cluster content. The pillar page is a hub from which the cluster content radiates like spokes on a wheel.
By definition, the pillar page is broad and shallow, while the supporting cluster content allows you to explore each related subtopic more deeply. This is a powerful strategy for building topical authority and quality. In doing so, it boosts SEO rankings by Google's E.A.T. guidelines.
Topic clusters take time, patience, and resources to build. However, it's been proven time and again to be the most effective long-term growth strategy for any business.
As a manufacturing company, it's particularly important to stand out as a trustworthy voice of authority in your industry. That's what allows you to gain more search traffic and increase conversion rates.
Let's explore this practical and proven five-step strategy to help you get started with the cluster framework.
Use This 5-Step Content Cluster Framework
If you're following the content cluster framework, you need to create the following five types of content for every core service you provide.
#1. Guides to Show You Can Solve Your Customer's Main Problems
More content isn't always better content. The content readers actually want to read is what helps them solve their problems. That means content that gives your readers a complete behind-the-scenes look into your product design and manufacturing process.
Let's say your manufacturer auto spares. Your product guides should cover every part of the design, engineering, and manufacturing process. You could explain how acoustic design factored into the design of exhaust mufflers to reduce loudness.
Doesn't this expose your manufacturing secrets out there? Yes, but giving customers an in-depth look into your processes is what gives them confidence in your brand.
This is how you can address your customers' pain points. You get to address issues like:
Whether your products are environmentally friendly
In some cases, it proves whether your products are truly vegan, conflict-free, or fair trade
Addresses licensing concerns, especially in sensitive markets such as healthcare
Differentiate your products from competitors
Create familiarity and common ground with customers
Such high-value guides stand out instantly. Few manufacturers adopt this bold strategy, which can help your brand grow through external mentions, backlinks, affiliates, and independent reviews.
#2. How-to Articles to Solve Secondary Customer Challenges
In addition to the main customer problems, your customers also face ancillary problems along their journey. The HBR article we referenced earlier provides a powerful example of how JBTB identifies these problems.
A Detroit-based building company was finding it tough to sell retirement condos, despite customizing them for seniors downsizing into smaller homes.
After a detailed study, the innovation consultant investigating the problem discovered that:
The retiring seniors didn't want to part with their big dining tables
Those tables were important symbols of the family life they had, and the seniors couldn't leave them behind
The main problem was providing a dining area large enough to fit a large dining table, which the company achieved by slightly reducing the size of the guest bedroom
The secondary problem was that clients needed help moving, as well as storage services for all the extra stuff they had
The building company was able to provide these services at a fee, made a profit on it, and soon sold all the remaining condos
This is a perfect example of helping customers solve their problems. According to the JTBD model, the building company was not in the business of selling homes; it was in the business of moving lives.
In a manufacturing context, this type of thinking is vital. For instance, a company that produces office furniture should address problems like providing adequate lumbar support and adjustable armrests to support more productivity.
#3. Create Useful Self-Help Tools and Templates
Let's say you're a paint manufacturer. One of the problems your customers have is finding the right shade of paint to buy, which requires them to visit your stores or agents to pick up samples.
You can create an online tool that automatically detects paint colors and compares them with your inventory. This is a quick way to help customers match the paint they want with the exact one they have to order online without ever visiting your store.
Such a simple but powerful tool creates an instant emotional connection with the customer. You have helped them solve a problem, and that's a golden opportunity to convert a cold audience into a responsive audience.
More importantly, you can use such a tool to collect customer emails using a contact form, thus collecting more leads and increasing the chances of conversion.
#4. Make Client Case Studies Prominent
Case studies are a priceless marketing tool that helps brands create social proof and trust among customers. Social proof is a psychological phenomenon that makes customers think, "If so and so is using this product, it must be good; I should too."
The problem is that many brands make case studies about them rather than the customer. As we so often have to remind our clients, neither the company nor its products are the hero of the story. The client is, and every story has to be focused on the customer.
Case studies offer an in-depth review of your products in action, demonstrating how they helped meet customer needs and achieve positive results. In this sense, case studies are even more powerful than reviews and testimonials.
A case study breaks through the process of solving a chosen client's problem. A good case study follows this structure:
It starts with an introduction of the client and gives a brief background
It presents the challenge in question
Then, it outlines the thought process and analysis that went into determining a solution for the problem, including any other options used previously
It explains how your company's solution was superior and helped solve the problem entirely
Finally, it describes the results the client achieved in return
The power of case studies is that they're highly relatable and compelling. They provide proof that your product is credible, reliable, and valuable. You can have a dedicated case study section or have one for each type of product your company sells.
The beauty of case studies is that you can get creative with them. You can request customers to record videos of the product in use and their reactions to it. In turn, this provides precious user-generated content that you can share over social networks to drive brand awareness.
#5. Invest in High-Level Insight Pieces
Insight pieces, commonly known as roundup posts, are a collection of expert insights on a broad topic, usually published regularly. They often carry lots of links, so they are also referred to as link roundups.
No matter what you call them, insight pieces are a highly curated and impactful type of content that you can leverage to drive traffic and establish authority. Since they're usually high-level, roundups are easy to skim and digest.
Even better, expert roundups are incredibly easy to produce since 98% of the work comes from renowned experts in the field. All you do is curate the content, which makes them easy and affordable to create.
Done right, these expert insight pieces can bring a lot of traffic to your site and encourage organic backlinks. They also help to grow your reputation and authority by association with established voices.
There are endless possibilities when it comes to roundups. The best advice we can offer is that you should choose the right topic. It should be relevant to your industry but generate lots of interest to make it worthwhile.
You should also choose the experts you want in the post carefully, ensuring that their expertise and opinions are useful to your target audience. Finally, tie in a powerful message to connect all the expert insights and sell your brand.
Digital Marketing for Manufacturers, at Your Service
As a manufacturing company, leveraging this 5-step content cluster strategy gives you a unique advantage in your digital marketing efforts.
At Fractional, our experience is that many manufacturing companies adopt a "spray and pray" content ideation and publishing strategy with no concrete goals or methodology. Our team of digital marketing veterans is skilled in SEO for manufacturers to help them succeed in this unique industry.
Let's help you implement this powerful strategy and be on the path to online marketing success.