For many years, FATFREE crafted huge volumes of educational content for Roche Diabetes Care. The online diabetes community was in its infancy, so the Accu-Chek brand stepped in to provide authoritative information and reassurance to people who wanted to understand their diagnoses and how to live better.

Did this massive undertaking pay for itself? Our guts always said yes. But beyond looking at time spent on a site or engaging with email, you can’t always draw a straight line from educational content to sales and loyalty. Gartner, however, has made the link.

A recent survey found that 73% of customers appreciate educational content, with 62% saying they’re more likely to buy from a brand with helpful content. They do warn, however, that you can’t expect an immediate conversion. Instead, it’s important to recognize that educational content aids recall and builds trust, so you’ll be the choice when it’s time to purchase.

Beyond looking at time spent on a site or engaging with email, you can’t always draw a straight line from educational content to sales and loyalty.

A few brands that I believe do an amazing job with educational content:

• King Arthur Baking. A search for “sourdough recipes” turns up 56 million hits. So does King Arthur really need to be in that space? Probably not. But their friendly voice and no-nonsense instructions during the pandemic helped triple their site traffic and led to a lasting increase in business, even though their product commands a premium price on supermarket shelves.
• REI. Just getting into kayaking? REI will tell you how to choose the right paddle. Moving a little more slowly? They’ll get you the right hammock. Sure, it’s all pointing to products they sell, but you can select those products with much greater confidence.
• Lowes. I can’t tell you how many things I learned to fix or install from this site. And, to be honest, Home Depot does a good job of this, too. But between the video and step-by-step how-tos and the detailed buying guides, Lowes devotes a lot of effort to content creation. You could find an explainer on YouTube, but who are you going to trust? And now you trust them even more.
• PNC. As a bank that serves big, commercial accounts, PNC doesn’t need to teach teens how to invest or retirees how to draw down their investments. But they do. Why? Because it builds lifelong connections (and 6X the search traffic). Full disclosure, I’ve worked on a fair amount of the stuff on their site, and it’s rarely tied to a specific product or service. Virtually every video and article is targeted at filling knowledge gaps. And it’s working.

Whether delivering information about your products, your industry or a challenge shared by your audiences, educational content can help turn confused prospects into appreciative customers. You just have to be patient and look at the long game. We’ve worked with clients in just about every industry to educate and inspire. See what FATFREE can do for you.