Digital marketing in 2021 is warfare. Social platforms, advertising channels, algorithms, and tech conglomerates are all vying for your attention while budgets continue to grow every single day. Marketers somehow need to stay on top of the shifting sands and create lasting value for their prospective and existing customers. No easy task.
Digital Content Transformation
All of this is happening while engagement rates across organic social media posts have been declining, and more users are opting to detach themselves from social media altogether. One of the primary driving forces of content distribution is becoming a true battleground for attention. Not to mention Google, the de facto search engine for discovery and organic traffic, has made several changes that keep eyeballs on their own results pages instead of diverting that traffic to brands’ websites.
1. It’s harder than ever to gain the • attention of your target customer
What We know
It’s no longer enough to roll-out cookie cutter content strategies and take an, “if we build it they will come” mentality. It’s imperative that marketers transform the way they think about creating content, and re-engineer the kind of content they actually create.
Next Page: Defining Immersive Content
2. It’s harder than ever to keep that • attention once it’s acquired
2nd edition
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Defining Experiential Content
Creating Experiential Content
On-Boarding Experiential Content
Scaling Experiential Content
Conclusion
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Defining Immersive Content
Creating Immersive Content
On-Boarding Immersive Content
Scaling Immersive Content
The Guide to Immersive Content
2nd Edition
It’s time for marketers to embrace immersive content.
Often, when marketers hear the word “immersive” the first image that jumps to mind is an event, installation, or activation — in person moments where true connections can be made between individuals and brands. Nowadays however, immersive is no longer just for in-person interactions, but also for digital touchpoints.
This doesn’t explore what truly makes immersive content… immersive. For that, we need to peel back the layers of what makes up engaging digital content.
The 5 Layers of Engaging Content
Narrative
The underlying copy, script, text, data, and other story components.
Visual
The visual framework of the story which includes images, graphics, photos, videos, and other visual components.
Integrated
The integration of third-party tools like forms, maps, chat services, and other apps.
Interactive
The components that respond to user actions, like click states.
Immersive
The components that add depth to visual content like triggered animations, sounds, and other dynamic layers.
These layers can be used to construct the exact type of experience you are looking to create and trigger the specific actions or feelings you are hoping to elicit. The combination of these layers can transform ordinary, static content into truly memorable, immersive content.
Immersive content is digital content that is purposefully designed to create a memorable experience for its consumers. By encouraging active participation through interactive and immersive elements, experiential content aims to form deeper, emotional connections between the consumer and the brand or creator.
Create more immersive digital content.
Looking to stand out from the competition by creating memorable, immersive digital experiences? Ceros can help.
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The Guide to Experiential Content
Next Page: Creating Immersive Content
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Go to defining experiential
These tactics will help you create more engaging, immersive content that visitors love to interact with. Making engaging content a significant part of your operations, however, requires a detailed plan of attack and a clear understanding of how to bring this type of initiative into your organization.
Consumers engage with content differently today than they did even five years ago. They are used to getting information on-demand and in bite-sized chunks. Brands need to adapt to this new normal or risk their content getting relegated to the obscure corners of the internet.
Some key points to keep in mind:
1. Content should to be written with the user, where they can dictate the terms of consumption 2. Content should be an active, two-way conversation between the brand and consumer 3. Content should be aligned with, and optimized for, the medium in which it’s being consumed
Storytelling
User Experience
Design
Your story is your foundation. Understand what makes a good story work and use those mechanics to your advantage. It doesn’t matter whether your content is for business professionals or consumers - human beings connect with stories.
Key Take-aways:
Use relatable language: Speak like your audience and tell stories they relate to. Period. Add twists and conflict: Every story needs tension to keep the audience’s interest. Resonate emotionally: Use emotion and tug at visitors’ heartstrings when appropriate.
Copywriting
How you present your story through copy has an immense impact on the experience someone has with your content. Long, in-depth paragraphs will tire out visitors and disconnect them from the story. Understand how people read online content and format your copy accordingly.
Less is more: Use less copy and more visuals to make important points stick. Get creative: Entertain your audience quickly and write in memorable sound bites. Tell the truth: Don’t trick your audience, tell them the truth - then make it interesting.
Good user experience is foundational to ensuring your audience understands how to engage with your content. The principles of impact, efficiency, and psychology are especially important when asking an audience to make decisions and interact with an experience.
Start with structure: Use logic and structure to design your user’s journey upfront. Align your strategy: Define your goals, key messages, and distribution strategy. Focus on usability: Make sure your content is visually clear and easy to understand.
Strong visual design not only enhances the narrative in your story, it provides logic and cues visitors into what they should focus their attention on. Good design improves clarity and comprehension in a way that’s difficult with text alone.
Establish a hierarchy: Typography and image choices should clearly create hierarchy. Vary up your visuals: Use photos, videos, and animations to keep viewers engaged. Add effects tastefully: Animations and interactions are great... when used sparingly.
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Next Page: On-Boarding Immersive Content
Competitive brand differentiation.
Product and features alone aren’t enough to make your brand stand out. Bespoke digital experiences tailored to your audience will separate you from the pack.
Here are the three biggest benefits of using immersive content to engage audiences:
Types of skills needed
Doing interactive content well requires both a certain mindset, as well as certain skill sets. While these don’t each need to be individual roles on your team, it’s important to have knowledge and experience in these areas:
Graphic & Web Design
A keen eye for layout and design help structure and draw attention to visual stories.
Demand Marketing
Demand generation experience helps craft content that converts visitors into subscribers or leads.
Web Development
Custom experiences may require javascript or CSS to deliver certain functionality.
Just as important as having the right skills, identifying the right tools, resources, or partners is vital to delivering memorable digital experiences. The main consideration is whether to hire an agency -or- create experiential content in-house. There are several tradeoffs for each of these that we’ll explore further here:
In-House
Agency
Pro
Con
Toggle to see pros and cons
In-depth product and business knowledge
Full creative control over delivered product
Resources become more efficient overtime
In-depth creative expertise
Able to apply learnings from other clients
Highly scalable with increased spend
It’s also important to evaluate what technologies can help you achieve your content vision. An interactive content platform like Ceros can take the development burden off your team, putting full creative control into the hands of the designers and allowing them to push contents straight to the web.
Ultimately what mix of skills, resources, and technologies are right for you will depend on your business, your budget, and your ability to execute. With these steps figured out, you’ll be well on your way to scaling your immersive content program across the customer journey.
Allocate Resources & Fill Your Toolbox
The benefits of immersive content are many, and usually determined by the use-case and type of organization creating the content. There are, however, certain benefits that any team can expect when creating and deploying content an audience can truly interact with.
Need to create interactive, immersive digital content but don’t have a full-time developer or know how to code? Ceros can help.
Create immersive content at scale.
Strengthened brand experience across digital touchpoints.
Prospects have many digital interactions with your business before they decide to buy. It’s vital to create memorable experiences at every one of these touchpoints.
Improved marketing and sales metrics.
Immersive content drives increased engagement, longer dwell times, and higher conversion rates compared to traditional content types and promotion methods.
The Value of Immersive Content
A single project can prove the power of immersive content. One project, however, won’t automatically transition into a full-fledged content program. On-boarding next level content as a strategic initiative requires clear goals, an understanding of how to communicate the value, and a plan on how to resource and fuel your output.
Steep learning curve when beginning
Requires specialized resources or tools
Scaling requires more headcount
Not experts in your product or business
Cost per project can be higher
Extensive back-and-forth to get it right
UX Design
Pro's
Next Page: Scaling Immersive Content
Experiences can be defined on a couple of different levels. The interaction a visitor has can be a discrete experience they have with a brand. That visitor can also look across every interaction they have had with that same brand and let that inform their broader perspective, or experience, as the sum total of those interactions. Which is why it’s so important for marketers to think about the specific interactions they are crafting for their visitors, as well as the full brand experience that a visitor will have with their company. They need a holistic view of the customer journey and how immersive content can be deployed across that entire journey.
Immersive Content Across the Customer Journey
Immersive content can take many forms and be used for entirely different purposes depending on where in the customer journey the visitors are. These examples provide an idea of the types of experiences that can be created across that journey.
Whether B2B or B2C, there are countless opportunities to improve the experience for your audience with immersive content. Deploying this type of exceptional content across the entire customer journey, however, takes a lot of time and effort — so it's important to identify those first key use cases and then scale out from there.
Business-focused audiences are used to engaging with tried and true content types, like:
· Ebooks
· White papers
· Reports
· Sales decks
By playing on those familiar formats but layering in surprising interactions, animations, or embedding rich media, marketers can provide a superior business content experience.
View B2C Examples
Create memorable touchpoints at every stage of the customer journey to close more customers and keep them engaged.
AWARENESS
Blog posts, articles, and thought leadership are meant to build awareness and drive traffic. By making them more immersive you can engage that traffic for longer and convert visitors into fans, subscribers, or leads.
Editorial
Not all stories need to be lengthy. Adding small-format interactions or other immersive microcontent, you can keep readers on a page for longer, improving overall content performance.
Microcontent
Ebooks are a staple of B2B content marketing programs, but many marketers have no idea whether their audience actually consumes their content. Interactive ebooks better engage readers and provide deeper analytics on reader behaviors.
Ebook
Reports and data visualizations help build understanding around a story, product, or need. Making reports more immersive through interactions and animations help put a deeper narrative into your reports.
Report
Case studies put your most successful customers front and center for the world to see. Create more engaging customer stories with interactive layouts and help those stories connect with a broader audience.
Case Study
Any sales professional using decks in their pitches would benefit from interactive formats that allow for non-linear presentations that follow the flow of conversation, not lock prospects into an irrelevant talk-track.
Sales Deck
Organizations that create proposals can scalably deliver custom packages to their prospective customers. Those using immersive, interactive proposals have improved win rates and seen increased revenue from the same services due to their premium packaging.
Proposal
Newsletters keep customers engaged throughout their lifecycle, delivering important information and resources to help make them more successful. This opportunity to increase advocacy is amplified through immersive formats.
Customer Newsletter
Some of these formats are already more interactive than their business-focused counterparts, but by integrating content with inventory to create shoppable experiences, marketers can create effective digital destinations.
Consumer goods audiences expect different types of branded content, including:
Immersive Content to B2C
· Event pages
· Editorial
· Lookbooks
· Quizzes
View full experience
Immersive Content to B2B
View B2B Examples
Experiential Content for B2B
Create experiential content at scale.
Experiential content can take many forms and be used for entirely different purposes depending on where along the customer journey the visitors are. These examples provide an idea of the types of experiences that can be created across that journey.
Blog posts, articles, and thought leadership are meant to build awareness and drive traffic. By making them more experiential you can engage that traffic for longer and convert visitors into fans, subscribers, or leads.
Ebooks are a staple of B2B content marketing programs, but many marketers have no idea whether their audience actually consumes their content. Experiential ebooks better engage readers and provide deeper analytics on reader behaviors.
Reports and data visualizations help build understanding around a story, product, or need. Making reports more experiential through interactions and animations help put a deeper narrative into your reports.
Case studies put your most successful customers front and center for the world to see. Create more engaging customer stories with experiential layouts and help those stories connect with a broader audience.
Organizations that create proposals can more scalably deliver custom packages to their prospective customers. Those using experiential proposals have improved win rates and seen increased revenue from the same services due to their premium packaging.
Newsletters keep customers engaged throughout their lifecycle, delivering important information and resources to help make them more successful. This opportunity to increase advocacy is amplified through experiential formats.
ADVOCACY
Unify your customer journey with immersive content.
Next Page: Conclusion
Go to scaling experiential content
Immersive content can also take different forms depending on whether the audience is consumer, or business, focused. The types of content that the audience expects can influence the forms of immersive content marketers create.
Experiential content can also take different forms depending on whether the audience is consumer- or business-focused. The types of content that the audience expects can influence the forms of experiential content marketers create.
This guide delved into the concepts around immersive content, it’s underlying structure, and how it manifests for different types of audiences. Understanding what immersive content is amounts to a critical first step on the journey to transforming your digital content program.
It’s also important to:
1. Make sure you have the skills (or a good partner) to creat immersive content 2. Figure out how to effectively on-board an immersive initiative in your organization 3. Identity touchpoints across the customer journey to deliver memorable experiences
From microcontent to microsites and everything in-between, design and publish interactive, immersive digital content at scale with ease.
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Immersive content is the future of digital marketing content, delivering a more memorable, interactive experience for your audience. The perfect cure for declining engagement across marketing channels and lack of differentiation from brand to brand. Marketers - it’s time to get started.
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