As a final assignment in my Content Marketing course at St. Lawrence College I created a Content Marketing Plan. This plan was based on the client Catitude, with a strategy including the objective/purpose, target market and buyer stage, the tactics, and tone of messaging. I will share with you my strategy as well as the three pieces of content I developed for the plan.
Background
Catitude is a fairly new e-commerce, monthly subscription service, that provides cats with toys, treats and catcessories, and a gift for their human, hand-selected based on the individual personality of the cat. The concept of the company is that we as humans should embrace that cats have attitude and celebrate their unique personalities.
The pet supply subscription market is highly competitive and Catitude must use its unique selling point of embracing individuality in a humorous, relatable way, to set the brand apart from its competitors.
Plan Purpose
The purpose of the content marketing plan is to support the launch of the new e-commerce website by using brand storytelling, with a humorous appeal technique. Overall the purpose is to build brand awareness for consumers and increase engagements through social media conversions (likes, follows, shares, etc.), and to increase website visits.
The target Market and Buyer Stage
So who are we selling Catitude to? Cat enthusiasts either cat owners or those looking to give Catitude as a gift are the primary and secondary target markets. They are at the awareness stage in the buying cycle as they may not know of Catitude or other pet subscriptions, but do understand that there are benefits to purchasing pet supplies online. Here is the breakdown:
Primary Target Audience
The primary target audience of cat owners are cat enthusiasts. They treat their pet as a member of the family and will do anything to protect them. They are openly known as cat people and will often sport cat inspired clothing and accessories. They feel a sense of community when discussing their cat with other cat owners. These cat owners are tech savvy and you can often find these people looking online at funny cat memes or watching videos of cats and their antics. The follow influencers like Grumpy Cat and Taylor Swift to get a candid, authentic look at the lives of the sarcastic cat and celebrity’s daily life with her feline. These people care that they are getting a good quality product for their purchase and that the company has good corporate social responsibility, donating a portion of the proceeds to animal causes.
Secondary Target Audience
The secondary target audience is of those people who are looking for a gift for a loved one. They know that the pet owner thinks of that pet as a member of the family. The believe the person the gift is for is as cat person and will often wear cat inspired clothing and accessories. These people care that they are getting a good quality product for their purchase and that the company that they buy from has good corporate social responsibility. These people are tech savvy and may choose to purchase gifts online because of convince in shipping.
The Tactics
The primary goal of this content plan was to create content that will drive engagement while providing consumers valuable content that is authentic, brand storytelling consistent with brand values.
Themes within the content are present to provide consumers with a variety of content that is compelling and worth seeing. One theme throughout is embracing your personality. The videos are a cat personality series that will each feature one cat and the characteristics that make up who they are. These videos use a humorous appeal and border on cat shaming. The purpose of the video series is to introduce the fact that each cat has their own personality and that it is okay to showcase the uniqueness that is a cat’s attitude.
Another tactic is to showcase that the brand has good corporate social responsibility and is heavily involved in charity work. Catitude supports several cat rescues in Ontario by donating a portion of proceeds to animal charities and helps to provide cats with the opportunity to find their forever home. Targeted blog posts and an infographic are used to communicate a strong company corporate social responsibility.
How-to’s are also a theme within the content plan. Cat owners often adopt cats to save them from lives on the street or in shelters and do not always have the knowledge on how they should raise their pets, who are usually a lot more work than the the owner anticipates.
The overall goal is to produce a content that is relatable to the target audience and communicates Catitude’s brand values. Catitude’s content will effectively deliver the USP of embracing individuality making the brand stand out amongst the competition.
The Tone and Style
Catitude relies heavily on a brand storytelling style and uses a blunt humorous tone in its messaging. The brand looks to portray honesty in its messaging and is inspirational in the way that it is an authentic, unbiased reaction to cats and their attitudes. The brand embraces the fact that its okay that cats have attitudes, and we as humans can mock them for it, while accepting that each cat is truly an individual.
The Content
Video
Infographic
Blog
Kirsten Walt 