Enterprise Content Strategy: 7 Steps to a WINNING Content PLAN for 2024

A solid enterprise content strategy can bring you more visibility, qualified traffic, and sales.

The problem is that only 33% of enterprise companies say their content plans were very or extremely successful.

This article will teach you how to be part of that 33%.

We’ll discuss what enterprise content marketing is, a 7-step strategy, plus best practices. 

Bonus: We’ll help a real enterprise company improve its content strategy in real-time.

Let’s begin.

TL;DR:

Objective: Teach how to create a successful enterprise content strategy to increase visibility, traffic, and sales.

Target Group: Large-scale businesses with a broad and segmented audience.

Core Concept: Enterprise content marketing involves strategic creation and distribution of valuable, relevant content.

Strategy Overview:

• Set Goals: Define specific objectives for organic traffic, lead generation, brand reputation, and conversion rates.
• Content Types: Use a mix of blogs, social media, videos, white papers, case studies, interactive content, and email newsletters.
• Keyword Strategy: Develop a robust keyword strategy aligned with business goals, using tools like Ahrefs for research and analysis.
• Pillar Pages: Create comprehensive guides on core topics to enhance user and search engine experience.
• Content Creation and Distribution: Coordinate production, utilize social media, and manage through a detailed content calendar.
• Measure Results: Track performance using analytics to gauge content effectiveness and adapt strategies accordingly.
• Continuous Improvement: Regularly update and refine content strategy based on analytics and feedback.

Best Practices: Includes generating editorial links, aligning content with sales goals, improving existing content, creating a content hub, selecting the right CMS and content channels, and choosing a competent SEO agency.

Expert Tips: Emphasize the importance of documented strategies, dedicated teams, and professional engagement to overcome common challenges in enterprise content marketing.

What Is Enterprise Content Marketing?

Enterprise content marketing means creating and distributing valuable, relevant content for large-scale businesses.

But the point is to use a strategic approach. You’re not just producing random pieces of content; you want to create a cohesive and, thus, effective enterprise content strategy.

However, the problem is just 49% of enterprise companies have a documented content marketing strategy.

Warning: It’s not going to be easy.

Enterprise websites have specific content challenges compared to smaller ones.

Challenges of Enterprise Content Marketing

1. Budget: Enterprise-level content marketing requires substantial investment. You need a significant budget to use advanced tools and produce high-quality content.
2. Audience: Your target audience is very broad and has distinct segments. Catering to all these different segments with relevant content requires thorough content planning and a deep understanding of your potential customers.
3. Complexity: It’s not unusual for a startup CEO to write and publish content themselves. That doesn’t happen with enterprise businesses. The scale of operations means you can't handle content creation alone. You'll need a dedicated content strategy team, including content strategists, writers, designers, and analysts. However, just 32% of enterprise websites have a content team with six or more people. 17% of these companies have no dedicated content person.
4. Roles and coordination: Managing content efforts across multiple internal teams is a massive challenge. Marketing, product, and sales teams should collaborate to create content that aligns with your business goals. This type of content best responds to your customers’ needs.
5. Expertise required: Creating a successful content marketing campaign isn't straightforward. It requires expertise in SEO, understanding search intent, and the ability to produce content that stands out in search engines. Conversely, only 50% of enterprise companies agree that their content marketing strategy is sophisticated.

Insider tip: Engage professionals to ensure your content marketing efforts are strategic, targeted, and effective.

That will help you get better conversion rates and higher keyword rankings.

And you won’t have to worry about hiring more people in your content production department.

How to Conduct Your Enterprise Content Strategy

Here’s how our agency builds solid content strategies for enterprise websites.

We’ll explain our entire MO step by step, so feel free to steal it.

1. Set Enterprise Content Marketing Goals

Setting clear goals is the foundation of your enterprise content marketing strategy.

Also, remember that a large enterprise website will have different goals than a smaller one.

Here are some essential goals to consider:

1. Increase organic search traffic: Improve your keyword rankings to drive more quality traffic from search engines. High-quality content that matches search intent will boost your visibility in search engines. That means you’ll get more qualified traffic.
2. Generate leads: Create content that attracts potential customers and guides them through the sales funnel. Effective funnel content should address each customer journey stage and convert visitors into leads.
3. Enhance brand reputation: Building a reputation as an enterprise-level company is essential to stand apart from your competitors. So, develop educational content and thought leadership pieces that position your company as an industry authority. This builds trust and credibility with your target audience.
   • Pro tip: It also builds credibility with potential link partners, who are more likely to want to publish your guest posts or discuss your tools.
4. Boost conversion rates: You want to create compelling content that encourages your audience to take action.
   • Pro tip: That’s why a great idea is to focus more on transactional keywords than your run-of-the-mill website. You can also include long-tail keyword strategies focused on niche terms to ensure your content drives conversions.
5. Increase visibility: Use a wide range of content formats, such as video and interactive content, to reach a broader audience. Expanding your content types can attract diverse segments of your market. We’ll discuss all that—and more—in a second.
6. Drive engagement: Use social media platforms to distribute your content and interact with your audience. Increased engagement helps build a loyal community and amplifies your content’s reach.
7. Improve customer retention: Create relevant content that addresses the needs and interests of your existing customers. High-quality content helps maintain customer loyalty and encourages repeat business.

Insider tip: Your content creation efforts should support your objectives, whether increasing market share, launching new products, or entering new markets. 

Setting these goals ensures your enterprise content marketing efforts are strategic, focused, and aligned with your business objectives. That’s how you drive better results and higher returns on investment.

2. Choose the Right Type of Enterprise Content Strategy

Choosing the right mix of content formats helps you address different audience segments, enhance your content marketing campaign, and achieve your business goals.

Here are some content formats to consider:

Blog Posts

Creating regular blog posts will improve your keyword rankings and drive organic search traffic in a sustainable way.

Of course, these posts have to be centered around relevant keywords.

The point is to address search intent and provide valuable information to your target audience.

Social Media Content

Use social media platforms to share engaging and relevant content.

The goal isn’t just to increase visibility and attract potential customers.

You also need a space to engage with your prospects and loyal customers in a more relaxed way.

That’ll consolidate your relationship and increase brand recall.

For example, Grammarly understands that people buy from people. 

So, presenting the brand’s human side will help them attract more views and connect with their potential customers better.

Unfortunately, 57% of enterprise companies didn’t establish an online community, and 81% aren’t likely to either.

Videos

Video content is highly engaging and can convey complex information quickly.

It’s great for tutorials, product demos, and customer testimonials.

You can even embed it on your website to gain more SEO points.

That’s because people spend 1.4X more time on pages with videos, so you’re strengthening an important ranking factor: dwell time.

White Papers

Detailed white papers can establish your authority in the industry.

They provide in-depth insights and data, appealing to potential clients looking for expert knowledge.

Insider tip: This type of content asset can attract link partners, too.

Take this example. Google published a white paper about Google Cloud’s AI Adoption Framework in December 2023.

In June 2024, the white paper already has 136 backlinks from 86 unique referring domains:

And that’s in a world where 95% of web pages have zero backlinks.

Case Studies

Showcase your success stories with case studies.

They demonstrate your ability to solve problems and deliver results, which is compelling content for potential clients.

Interactive Content

Engage your audience with interactive content like quizzes, calculators, or interactive infographics.

This type of content can enhance user experience and keep visitors on your site longer.

Email Newsletters

Enterprise websites need email newsletters because they keep your audience informed.

Share updates, new content, and valuable insights to nurture leads and maintain engagement.

In fact, 59% of marketers admit that email newsletters are more important as a lead-generating channel than social media.

Syndicated Content

Extend your reach by syndicating the same piece of content you published on your website to other platforms.

This can help you tap into new audiences and drive more traffic back to your website.

Translated Content

Reach global markets by translating your content into multiple languages.

This ensures your message resonates with a diverse audience.

Product Comparisons

Create content that compares your products with competitors.

Highlight your strengths and unique features to persuade potential customers to choose your services.

For example, Ahrefs has written this in-depth piece comparing its own SEO tool with two competitors, SEMrush and Moz.

Insider tip: Build a solid content calendar that includes more content pieces.

Plan your content marketing efforts with a detailed editorial calendar.

This ensures consistent content publication so you can stay top-of-mind with your audience.

The problem is that 28% of enterprise websites don’t have such a content calendar, so it’s tougher for them to keep track of their content efforts.

3. Develop an Enterprise Keyword Strategy

A robust keyword strategy is the cornerstone of your enterprise content strategy.

That’s because it helps you understand what your target audience is searching for.

When you create content around the target keywords your audience is using, you improve your visibility on search engines and drive relevant traffic to your site.

Here’s how we develop an enterprise keyword strategy:

1. Identify business goals: That’s step 1. So, you want to align your keyword strategy with your business goals. Whether you aim to increase sales, generate leads, or enhance brand visibility, your keywords should support these objectives.
2. Conduct keyword research: Use SEO tools like Ahrefs to find relevant keywords. First, enter broad search terms related to your industry. Ahrefs’ AI tool can also help you find a list of keywords based on a specific angle you’re looking for. And you’ll see their search volumes, keyword difficulties, and related terms, too.
3. Analyze competitors: Look at what keywords your content competitors are ranking for. Use Ahrefs to analyze their top pages and identify keyword opportunities they might be missing.
4. Select long-tail keywords: Focus on long-tail keywords because they generally have lower competition and higher conversion rates. These keywords are more specific and cater to a targeted audience.
5. Assess search intent: Ensure the keywords you choose match the search intent of your audience. Understand whether your prospects are looking for information, ready to make a purchase, or comparing products.
6. Prioritize keywords: Prioritize your keywords based on search volume, difficulty, and relevance. To balance your strategy, create a mix of high-volume and low-competition keywords.
7. Integrate keywords into content: Once you have your keyword list, integrate these keywords naturally into your content pieces. Use them in titles, headings, and throughout the content to improve your organic search performance.
8. Monitor and adjust: Monitor your keyword rankings and content performance. Use Ahrefs to track changes and adjust your strategy as needed to stay ahead of trends and maintain high keyword rankings.

For example, the corporate real estate website Daniel Corp could use a content revamp because only 28 of their keywords rank in their Top 3.

Also, 68.1% of their web pages have no traffic.

Only 1.1% of their pages have a traffic of over 100 people per month:

Ahrefs shows you some good ideas.

After simply inputting a seed keyword – commercial properties – you get to an easier key term to rank for: “commercial properties for lease.”

And even this key term has multiple suggestions in the “matching terms” and “questions” sections.

Now, let’s look at their competitors.

Daniel Corp has the least organic traffic and organic traffic value:

A content gap analysis can reveal potential content opportunities for Daniel Corp based on its competitors’ content:

Implementing a solid keyword strategy like this will help Daniel Corp attract the right audience, improve your content's visibility, and achieve your enterprise content marketing goals.

4. Choose Pillar Pages

Pillar pages are essential for a successful enterprise content strategy.

Think of them as comprehensive guides on a particular topic. They offer in-depth information and link to other content pieces on the same topic. 

Choosing the right pillar pages means you can organize your content better.

And that enhances both the user experience and search engine crawler experience on your website. Basically, both people and crawlers find information better:

• Your visit depth metric improves: People will spend more time on your website and will read different pieces.
• Your search ranking improves: Search engines will understand your website better and rank it higher for the keywords you’re targeting.

Here’s how to choose pillar pages:

1. Identify core topics: These should be broad subjects that are relevant to your business and audience. And they should encompass various subtopics.
2. Conduct keyword research: Use tools like Ahrefs to find high-volume keywords related to your core topics. Focus on keywords that reflect the primary themes of your enterprise content strategy.
3. Analyze your competitors: Look at your content competitors to see what pillar pages they have. Identify gaps in their content and opportunities for you to create better, more comprehensive pillar pages.
4. Map out subtopics: Break down each core topic into subtopics. These subtopics will become the cluster content that links back to your pillar page. Ensure each subtopic addresses a specific aspect of the main topic.
5. Create comprehensive content: Develop high-quality, detailed content for your pillar pages. These pages should serve as the ultimate resource on the topic, covering all relevant aspects and linking to related subtopic content pieces.

5. Create and Distribute the Content

Creating and distributing content effectively is also key when building your enterprise content strategy.

You need a lot of coordination here to make sure you publish the content correctly an on time. 

Here's how to do it:

• Content creation: Start by developing high-quality content that meets the needs of your target audience. Focus on creating a mix of blog posts, video content, case studies, and educational content to keep your audience engaged. You want your content writers to develop outlines first and the editors to supervise the entire process.
  • Pro tip: Have a separate team for interlinking purposes and one for producing high-quality visuals. 
• Content calendar: Plan your content marketing efforts with a detailed content calendar. This ensures a consistent flow of content and helps you stay organized. We use a simple Excel sheet that looks like this:

• Leverage social media: Use social media platforms to distribute your content widely. Tailor your posts to each platform to maximize engagement and reach.
• Email newsletters: Send regular email newsletters to your subscribers. Share your latest content, updates, and exclusive insights to keep them engaged and informed.

6. Measure Results

Measuring the results of your content efforts is essential to understand what's working and what needs improvement.

Follow these steps:

• Content performance: Use analytics tools to track the performance of your content pieces. Monitor metrics like page views, time on page, and bounce rates to gauge effectiveness.
• Conversion rates: Measure how well your content converts visitors into leads or customers. Track form submissions, downloads, and other conversion points.
• Search engine rankings: Monitor your keyword rankings on search engines. Use tools like Ahrefs to track changes and identify opportunities for improvement.
• Engagement metrics: Analyze engagement on social media platforms and your website. Look at likes, shares, comments, and other interaction metrics to assess audience interest.

7. Adapt Your Strategy

Adapting your content strategy based on results is key to long-term success.

Here's how to do it:

• Analyze data: Review data from your content marketing campaign regularly. Look for trends, patterns, and areas for improvement.
• Update content: Refresh and update existing content to keep it relevant and high-performing. Add new information, optimize for current keywords, and improve readability.
• Content trends: Stay informed about the latest content trends. Adapt your strategy to include new types of content and innovative formats that resonate with your audience.
• Feedback loop: Create a feedback loop with your content strategy team. Regularly discuss what’s working, what’s not, and brainstorm new ideas to improve your strategy.
• Business goals: Ensure your content strategy aligns with evolving business goals. Adapt your content efforts to support new initiatives, product launches, and market expansions.

When you continually create, measure, and adapt your content, you ensure a dynamic and effective enterprise content strategy that drives ongoing success.

That brings us to the next point:

Best Practices to Win at Your Enterprise Content Strategy

Here’s what our SEO team considers when building an enterprise content strategy.

And no, we’re not just creating individual pieces of content; we’re looking at how each type of content piece can serve a greater purpose to help you achieve your business goals.

1. Generate Editorial Links

Generating editorial links can significantly boost your SEO.

Here’s how to attract them:

• Build free tools: Create useful free tools that provide value to your audience. Tools like calculators, checklists, and templates attract backlinks naturally.
• Develop awesome content: Focus on high-quality content that stands out. In-depth guides, original research, and compelling content pieces are more likely to be linked by others.
• Outreach: Reach out to relevant sites and influencers. Share your content and explain how it can benefit their audience to increase the chances of getting those links. In fact, we have a very professional outreach team that’s built solid relationships with key opinion leaders in different niches.
  • Pro tip: Read our piece on how to do link-building outreach without being boring.
• Guest blogging: Write guest posts for authoritative sites in your industry. Include links back to your content where relevant.
• Social media: Share your content on social media platforms. Increased visibility can lead to more shares and links from other websites. LinkedIn is a great place to start.

Here’s an example from our experience.

We advised the influencer marketing platform inBeat to build a slew of marketing calculators.

Side note: That’s one of the content strategies we used to increase their monthly traffic from 500 to 300,000 visitors. 

Basically, they’re now getting many backlinks because these calculators are incredibly useful.

So, other websites in the marketing niche are telling their audiences about them.

Here’s one example for their fake follower checker:

2. Follow Your Sales Goals

Align your content strategy with your sales goals to drive revenue.

Here’s a step-by-step plan:

• Identify goals: Start by identifying your sales goals. Think whether you’re next objective is increasing lead generation, boosting conversions, or upselling. As we said before, your content should support these objectives.
• Map content to funnel: Create content that addresses each stage of the sales funnel. Use educational content to raise awareness, case studies to encourage consideration, and product comparisons to inform decision-making.
• Collaborate with your sales team: Work closely with your sales team to understand their needs and challenges. This helps you create content that supports their efforts and addresses potential customers’ questions.
• Track metrics: Monitor key metrics like conversion rates, lead quality, and sales pipeline impact. Use this data to adjust your content strategy as needed.

3. Improve Existing Content

Improving existing content can boost its performance because Google realizes your content is valuable.

That’s because you can remove outdated information, include newer examples, or discuss more recent updates. 

For example, Siege Media got a 50% traffic increase from content pruning:

Follow these steps to get equally good – or even better – results:

• Identify declining traffic: Use analytics tools to find content with declining traffic. Focus on updating and optimizing these pieces.
• Low-hanging fruit: Look for quick wins like fixing broken links, updating outdated information, and improving readability. These small changes can have a big impact.
• Optimize for snippets: Identify opportunities to optimize content for featured snippets. Use concise answers, bullet points, and relevant keywords to increase chances of being featured.
• Redirect content: Redirect outdated or underperforming content to newer, more relevant pages. This helps preserve link equity and improves user experience.
• Improve internal links: Strengthen your internal linking structure. Link related content pieces to each other and ensure your pillar pages are well-connected.

For example, a quick SEO audit for Daniel Corp shows us three important content-related issues we could fix instantly: thin content, image alt attributes, and tags:

4. Create a Content Hub

A content hub organizes your content and improves SEO.

Here’s how to create one:

• Choose a core topic: Identify a broad topic relevant to your audience. This will be the central theme of your content hub.
• Develop pillar pages: Create comprehensive pillar pages that cover the core topic in-depth. These pages should serve as the main resource for each subtopic.
• Create cluster content: Develop related content pieces that link back to your pillar pages. This creates a network of interconnected content.
• Optimize navigation: Ensure your content hub is easy to navigate. Use clear categories, tags, and internal links to guide users through your content.
• Promote your hub: Use social media platforms, email newsletters, and other SEO tactics to drive traffic to your content hub. Regularly update and expand it to keep it relevant.

5. Pick the Best CMS

Choosing the right CMS is crucial for managing your content.

Here’s how to pick the best one:

• Identify needs: Assess your enterprise content management needs. Consider factors like scalability, ease of use, and integration capabilities.
• Evaluate options: Research different CMS options. Look at features, user reviews, and case studies to determine which ones meet your requirements.
• Consider SEO features: Ensure the CMS has strong SEO features like customizable URLs, meta tags, and internal linking capabilities. This helps improve your search engine rankings.
• Test usability: Test the usability of each CMS. Ensure it’s user-friendly for your content teams and supports efficient content creation and management.
• Check support and security: Ensure the CMS offers robust support and security features. This is crucial for protecting your content assets and maintaining smooth operations.

6. Choose the Best Enterprise Content Channels

Selecting the right content channels is key to reaching your audience.

Follow these steps:

1. Understand your audience: Identify where your target audience spends their time. Use this information to choose the most effective content channels.
2. Diversify content formats: Use a mix of content formats like blog posts, video content, and interactive content. Different formats can attract different segments of your audience.
3. Leverage SEO: Focus on channels that improve your organic search performance. Prioritize platforms that help you rank higher in search engine results.
4. Use analytics: Analyze each content channel’s performance regularly. Use data to understand what’s working and adjust your strategy accordingly.
5. Integrate channels: Ensure your content channels work together seamlessly. Use a unified content calendar to manage and distribute content across all platforms.

7. Choose the Right Enterprise SEO Agency

The right SEO agency will help you build a solid content strategy according to your business goals. 

We wrote an entire piece on how to choose an enterprise SEO agency, but here’s the gist of it:

1. Define goals: Clearly define your business goals and what you want to achieve with SEO. This helps you find an agency that aligns with your needs.
2. Research different agencies: Look for corporate agencies with experience in enterprise content marketing strategy. Check their case studies, client reviews, and industry reputation.
3. Evaluate expertise: Ensure the agency has expertise in key areas like keyword research, content creation, and SEO analytics. They should also understand your industry.
4. Ask for proposals: Request detailed proposals from shortlisted agencies. Evaluate their approach, strategies, and how they plan to achieve your goals.
5. Check communication: Ensure the agency has strong communication skills and can work collaboratively with your internal teams. Effective communication is key to a successful partnership.

And we can help you with all of that.

So, if you want to optimize your enterprise content strategy for better performance and higher returns on investment, let’s get in touch.

We’ll discuss your pain points and build a personalized plan that skyrockets your traffic, just like we took inBeat from 500 to 300,000 monthly visitors.