THE internet has become increasingly cluttered since its development. Studies say that an average consumer is exposed to over 10,000 brand messages per day through social media. With that much content being targeted at consumers, it can be difficult for your message to stand out and be seen by your audience.

Unfortunately, there is no secret formula to make social media posts go viral, but we do have some advice to better your chances of standing out from the crowd.

From Facebook to Snapchat, and all of the platforms in-between, there is a plethora of platforms your company can utilize to target your customers. Studies show that 94% of small businesses and 93% of B2B’s use content marketing on these platforms, that’s a lot!

The average attention span of any consumer cannot physically handle the amount of content that  is driven towards them on a daily basis. To produce content that brings value to your company, you’ll have to stand out among the millions of advertisements and brand messages your audience is already exposed to.

Why is content overload an important aspect to consider while you develop your digital marketing strategies? According to data from DOMO, there are 347 blog posts published every single minute on WordPress alone. There are also 200 million emails sent and 48 hours of videos uploaded to YouTube. With statistics like that, it’s more likely that your content will go un-seen by your consumers than it is that they will receive your message and respond to it. If you haven’t been considering content overload before, you definitely should now!

At this point, you may be wondering, “What can I do? How do I develop a successful content marketing strategy?” Let’s find out.

One thing that successful content marketers all have in common, despite the various platforms and unnerving amount of content within them, is their knowledge of their audience. Not only do they know exactly who they’re trying to target, they develop separate pieces of content that targets each of their potential users.

Although it may be difficult to hone in on the various segments of your audience, it’s not impossible. There are a few different avenues where you can gain valuable understanding on what type of content to create.

This is simple, what is your competition doing? Have they shared videos, posts, or blogs that have gained great traction from their audience? If so, your mutual target audience responds well to such content and it might be a good idea to develop similar content that can achieve similar results.

Feedback is valuable at any stage during marketing strategy development. What’s the best way to get this feedback? Ask! Reach out to your audience and ask what type of content they’d like to watch on YouTube or read on your blog. Building surveys is easy! Pick a simple tool such as SurveyMonkey and administer them through your social media platforms, apps, newsletters, or website!

Most websites or hosting platforms offer some sort of analytics page, even on Facebook and Pinterest! Take time to review these and discover what your users do on your website. What section of your website is most popular, which page yields the most utilization from your customers, and which pages tend to have a high drop-off rate? All of these analytics are clues to what your target audience is interested in. Build content around these topics and keywords to increase the amount of times they’ll land on your page, rather than your competitions!

Formatting can make or break the success of your content. Simple details, such as the font type you use, can impact how effective your content marketing is. There have been hundreds of studies that show most consumers respond well to interactive images or videos that are well-researched and are relatable to the consumers they’re driven towards.

Images have clearly been the most effective form of content marketing on social media. Turning a long winded paragraph of information turn into a, highly-shareable, infographic can yield powerful results for you and your company. Proof of this can be seen in the mass amount of social sharing sites that revolve around images, such as Pinterest, Instagram, Tumblr, and recently, Facebook!

Did you know that a post that includes an album or picture receives 120-180% more engagement from consumers than text-based posts. On Twitter, Buffer has reported that tweets with images received 18% more clicks, 89% more favorites, and 150% more retweets! Images are clearly preferred by consumers, utilize them!

Another frustrating aspect of information-overload and the ability to publish on the Internet is the amount of false information that can (and is!) published. Consumers know this, consumers see this, and consumers think about this as they’re exposed to digital marketing strategies. It’s important to prove your credibility to your consumers; it allows them to feel confident in sharing and quoting the data later. An easy way to break through some of the content overload clutter is by researching and sharing valid information!

Interactive games, activities, and content are naturally appealing to our brains (and your consumers’ brain too!). This is why content like interactive infographics and quizzes gain so much traction among audiences.

You don’t need to design a quiz or develop a game in order to be interactive with your customers, but if you want to give that a try, Apester is a great resource! You can also try your hand at interactive videos through Zaption!

Similar to interactive design, videos are also known for getting positive results from target consumers. YouTube has been popular but we’ve also seen an increase in video popularity as Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and Periscope have developed more video-friendly platforms!

Axonn Media recently conducted a study on 600 consumers and found that 75% of users shared video content more than any other type of content. 7 in 10 of those people stated that their perception of brands becomes more positive after consuming video content from brands!

One of the most important aspects about content marketing is relating to your customers and your audience. One thing, that has been proven time and time again, is real and relatable content that sparks some sort of emotion from your audience. Credibility of brands is more important now than it has ever been before, and adding personal touches and personality to your content is key.

One great example of this is the Facebook page for Humans of New York, which continues to see follower growth and user engagement like no other.

The reason this page has become so popular revolves around the emotional vulnerability that each photo and post brings out.

Content marketing is difficult; there is no secret recipe to building content that will immediately go viral. Making your brand stand out takes research through analytics, well-crafted content and effective delivery methods.

Already have some fantastic content crafted and need to be sure it gets exposure? Use PushConnectNotify to share content with your audience.

Combine your carefully crafted content with an effective delivery method, like push notifications, to stay in touch even when you may not be the first thing on a potential customer’s mind. When used correctly push notifications help your content stand out, rather than contribute to the information overload.

And what could be better than that?