5 Interactive Content Myths That Are Holding Your Content Strategy Back

No matter what challenges we face in life, there are always a million reasons why it might be easier to give up than persevere.

Humans are creatures of comfort – and getting out of our comfort zone has a tendency to scare us. This holds true in both our personal and professional lives, which is precisely why it’s often easier to stick with what we’ve always done rather than try out a new plan of attack.

Too often, we let our fears or the myths we’ve heard from others discourage us from diving into the latest trend or process. One of the biggest campaign trends in recent years has centered on creating interactive content. All of the world’s most successful brands, from Nike to Netflix, have been utilizing interactive content in order to drive engagement and increase brand awareness. But many of the smaller brands have been scared.

Just because you’re not a big multinational company doesn’t mean you should let fear or perceived obstacles hold you back. I’ve compiled five of the biggest myths about interactive content and plan to bust them in this post to prove that you can succeed with interactive content, no matter what roadblocks you may think are in your way.

MYTH #1: ‘It’s too expensive’

While it is indeed easy to sink your whole marketing budget into an overly elaborate interactive campaign, it’s definitely not essential! You can incorporate interactive content into your marketing plan today with very little investment.

Thanks to advances in software and platforms, you won’t need to sacrifice quality either. There are many options available for all kinds of businesses and budgets. International marketing trainer and speaker Michael Leander refers to affordable interactive options as ‘little apps’.

“Little apps are solutions that do a very specific thing – you can call it a niche thing – that anyone can implement if they want to,” Leander explains.

So-called ‘little apps’ such as Zembula, Wheelio and Gleam all offer affordable ways to incorporate interactive content into your marketing strategy without breaking the bank. Some of them even come with a free trial, so you can try before you buy and make sure you get the most out of what each one has to offer.

Here is what an experience from Zembula looks like:

MYTH #2: ‘It doesn’t really affect engagement levels’

For marketers, engagement is always the end goal. We know that an increase in engagement equals a boost in brand awareness and customer loyalty.

It’s been proven that interactive content fosters more engagement than static content. In fact, interactive content drives 2x the number of conversions as passive content.

So, why is interactive content more effective at driving conversions? Well, key psychological principles associated with interactive content, such as curiosity and conditioning, ensure that your recipients are neurologically motivated to respond to your call-to-action.

If your brand can figure out how to use interactive content to create a fun experience for your customers, you will not only increase engagement levels, you will also increase brand loyalty.  62% of Millennials, 55% of Generation X and 44% of Baby Boomers say that ‘fun’ is an important factor that impacts their brand loyalty. Brand loyalty, in turn, drives increased revenue from each customer. It’s a win-win!

MYTH #3: ‘Interactive content is just a lot of polls and quizzes’

In certain circles, interactive content has developed a bad reputation as the lazy marketer’s way out. It’s true that today’s customers are getting sick of polls and quizzes. However, there are a lot of different kinds of interactive content that many marketers are just now hearing about.

Stay ahead of the curve and offer unique interactive experiences to keep your customers interested in your content.

While there are many types of interactive content, make sure you pick the format that works best with your campaign goals. You could try your hand at interactive video, calculators or interactive white papers – just remember that whatever you chose, there is likely a software solution to help you.

MYTH #4: ‘It requires a lot of development time’

As busy digital marketers, our time is spread thinner than rice paper. From daily tasks like responding to emails to long-term activities such as boosting engagement, our minds are always torn between 10 different directions at once.

Many marketers shy away from experimenting with interactive content because they’re afraid of the development time associated with such tech-heavy campaigns. Not to fear! One of my favorite tips for saving time is to repurpose an existing campaign by adding an interactive element. It requires little to no creative development hours, and the easy-to-use interface of many interactive programs means it won’t spend forever passing through your development team either!

One way to experiment with this idea is to take a long-form piece of evergreen content that is already developed and pull a couple of pieces of trivia out of it. You can use your preferred strategy, like quizzes or ‘snackable’ reveal experiences, and wrap your trivia in interactivity. For instance, if you have an ebook or white paper, why not make a quiz from the contents? Or, try incorporating swiping, tapping, or scratching on an interactive experience to really make the questions stand out!

These techniques not only create fun, gamified experiences, they take very little time to think up and create.

MYTH #5: ‘It isn’t right for my industry’

Why leave all the fun to the online clothing retailers and the millennial TV networks? Interactive content is suitable for brands of all shapes and sizes! From manufacturing giants to B2B software companies, interactive content can provide a boost in your ROI regardless of your industry.

In fact, check out this example by GoToMeeting, and take a gander at this example by subscription service Bistro MD that got them 20x the conversion rate over their static content.

The bottom line is that you are marketing to people, even if you are a B2B company. The psychology behind the success of interactive content includes curiosity, the endowment effect, and FOMO, to name but a few. These are consistent across the board for all industries. All you need is a little creativity and motivation to create something truly awesome for your brand.

Wrapping up

Now that you know five of the most common myths about interactive content, I hope you’re feeling motivated to try something new and go in with guns blazing. After all, they’re just myths!

Go ahead and make the jump in your marketing campaigns. Interactive content can help you stand out from your competition, create a loyal and engaged customer base, and ultimately increase your bottom line.

Guest Author: Nicole Cordier is a marketing writer for Zembula. A journalism graduate from the University of Oregon, she is a Portland native who loves coloring, dogs and all things outdoors.

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