What Is a Content Asset?
A content asset is any piece of content—for example, a blog post, a white paper, or a video—that a business deploys in service of a greater marketing goal. Content assets have the most value when they are created and used strategically, after carefully considering the content’s audience, purpose, and goals.
Content assets can be longform (an ebook) or shortform (a checklist), or they can be multimedia, such as a video or podcast. They can be ungated—that is, freely available in order to generate brand awareness—or they can be gated behind a lead generation form. In the latter case, you’re offering the content in exchange for information such as a customer’s email address, industry, and job title, which will allow you to continue a conversation with them and build a relationship over time.
Whether a content asset is gated or ungated, and whatever the format, it’s important to integrate it into a cohesive content experience, making sure that it supports the customer journey. A content asset with no relationship to anything around it doesn’t provide value—it’s just a random act of content.
Some content marketers don’t love the term “content asset,” because they see it as devaluing and commoditizing the strategic content that you’ve worked hard to create. The key is to always keep your content marketing strategy in mind.
Examples of Content Assets
As you probably realize by now, it’s crucial to consider your content strategy when deciding what content assets to create. Don’t write a blog post just for the sake of publishing a blog post; instead, ask yourself what you want to accomplish with your content, and go from there. With that in mind, here are some examples of content asset types to consider:
- blog posts
- ebooks
- white papers
- research reports
- tipsheets or cheatsheets
- checklists
- tools and templates
- case studies
Content assets also encompass multimedia formats:
- podcasts
- graphics and infographics
- videos
- slide decks
- webinars
Why It Matters for B2B Marketing
Content assets are the tools you use to put your content marketing strategy into action. Whether you’re gathering leads for an email nurture campaign, trying to boost your brand awareness using social media, or angling to hook customers at just the right time with information they’re seeking, you can’t do it without content assets.
Given the complexity of B2B products and buying cycles, buyers are constantly seeking this information, performing extensive research as they consider a purchase. If you meet that hunger for information with useful, high-quality content assets that consider your customer’s context and goals, you’re making sure your customers see you as a trusted resource and setting yourself up for future success.