How to Create Content in a “Boring” Industry

Let’s face it: Certain industries have it much easier than others when it comes to creating interesting content.

Companies with celebrity customers or tons of user-submitted material, for example, can naturally attract attention from wide audiences.

But some businesses have to work a little harder to get noticed, and that’s especially true for those who operate on a B2B model. Fortunately, it’s still possible to create content that attracts traffic and links – it just takes a little more creativity.

So if your business’s offerings are less than glamorous, read on to learn how you can find your niche and start getting the attention you want online with niche SEO and beyond.

Find your niche online

First, let’s establish the fact that your business isn’t boring.

Sure, it might not be what the general population would consider exciting, but if you have customers, what you do matters to those people. (And if you’ve chosen it as your own career path, I’m assuming you find it at least somewhat interesting, too.)

This means that you have an audience, even if it’s not a gigantic one.

And the first step to reaching them is to find out where they spend their time online. If you’re already active in a few online communities in your industry, you’re off to a great start.

If not, it’s time to look for forums, Facebook groups, Twitter chats, and active blogs. And if you’ve never ventured onto reddit, you may even find an audience there, too.

There are subreddits for virtually every topic you can imagine, and many of them are full of active members.

Once you find these communities, take time to learn what the members are interested in. And don’t just listen, either – ask questions, leave comments, and get involved.

Create content based on your audience

As you spend time in these online communities, you’ll start to build relationships with members of your target audience.

This means you’ll not only have a better grasp on what kinds of content they’ll be interested in, but that you’ll also have a group of people to bounce ideas off of. That being said, I don’t recommend that you attempt to use online forums solely for marketing purposes.

But if you’re an active participant, other members will likely be more than happy to tell you whether something sounds interesting, like the members of the entrepreneur subreddit did for this user:

With 904 upvotes and 111 comments, it’s safe to say that this idea would be well-received.

Experiment with different formats and styles

Once you have a topic in mind, you need to decide how to present it.

In some cases, the information you want to convey will necessitate a certain format, but for most, you have a variety of options to choose from.

Blog posts and articles are the most common examples because they’re typically the easiest to create. But if you really want to stand out, experimenting with other content formats is definitely worth a shot.

Visuals like infographics, videos, and interactive content all tend to perform well with a variety of audiences and can give your “boring” business a unique angle.

Allstate does a great job with this. Although you might not think an insurance blog would make for a riveting read, their interactive map of the “best drivers in America” is an interesting take on customer data:

And in addition to the map itself, they took some of the more interesting stats and reorganized them into an infographic:

Not bad for an insurance blog, right?

But even if your company isn’t a nationally-known corporation with a wealth of customer data, you can still find success online by following the next step.

Share your content within your niche

After you’ve created your content, be sure to share it with the people who gave you the idea in the first place. Logistics company Cerasis did this with their infographic about manufacturing trends:

When posted in the economy subreddit, it received 121 upvotes and 94 comments, which is pretty impressive for a company that specializes in freight management.

By combining an interesting format with an already interested audience, they were able to attract traffic and generate brand awareness. And by following the same process, your business can do the same.

Is your business in a “boring” industry?

Contact WebFX online to learn more about marketing for all industries!