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Content syndication can work wonders for your B2B marketing.

When executed with careful consideration, you can generate more leads than you’ll know what to do with and turn yourself into a mini-celebrity.

However, there’s also a dark side to syndication. With higher stakes in B2B, you also run a higher risk of damaging your credibility – and even visibility.

The Pros of Content Syndication for B2B

Some B2Bs may not feel comfortable with other media outlets “taking” the content they worked so hard to produce. The truth is, all marketers can benefit from a well-integrated content strategy. Here’s how syndication can help.

Develop New Audiences

Think you’ve already nailed down your target audience? Think again.

While it’s good to focus on a niche, it’s also essential to keep in mind that your industry and market are in a constant state of evolution. New corners pop-up and people discover new problems they need solved.

Syndicating your content lets, you throw a wide net.

Reach Influencer Status

Every industry – no matter how mundane it may seem – has its own mini-celebrities and influencers.

You know them when you see them: they write guest blogs on your favorite websites and always float to the top of your Twitter feed.

If you put special care into your syndicated content and develop a personal thought leadership style, people will start seeking out your writing everywhere they can find it.

Your retweets and mentions will grow, and the leads and conversions will follow.

Generate Leads

With content syndication, you can catch prospects when they have their guard down. Since you’re focusing on spreading knowledge rather than promoting products, readers won’t feel like they’re being “sold to.”

By choosing the right outlet, carefully crafting a piece of content, and optimizing your bio and links, you can generate countless leads over an extended period.

The Cons of Content Syndication for B2B

Fortunately, you can easily avoid (or at least minimize) most of the downsides to content syndication by following a few good practices.

Possible Low-Quality Leads

How many times have you heard, “quality over quality” in regards to generating leads?

Well, it’s true. Low-quality leads who aren’t anywhere near a purchase decision can skew your data and pull time away from other leads who really deserve your attention.

You can minimize low-quality leads by creating and syndicating content for specific audiences.

It’s also a good idea to avoid gating content on your website. By making your blog posts and PDFs accessible to everyone, people will only hand over their email when they truly want to stay in contact with you.

Even if low-quality leads slip through, hope isn’t lost. Planting a seed and creating brand awareness is always a good thing.

SEO Police

If you care about SEO (who doesn’t?), you’ll want to pay special attention here. Duplicate content online can damage rankings.

It’s not necessarily a violation. However, when the Google bots see multiple pieces of content coming from different places, they don’t know which one is the most important.

In most cases, this damages the ranking of both websites. However, it can also backfire for your website and push the syndication outlet above your original work in the search results. Yikes.

Unfortunately, there isn’t a surefire way to avoid this. Instead, only syndicate your content on websites where the benefit of referral traffic outweighs the risk of a slight SEO hit.

You can also ask your developers to include special pieces of code in your posts that tell the Google bots “hey, this is the original piece” but it’s not a guarantee.

Damage to Credibility

For the most part, this is completely in your realm of control.

First of all, anything you publish for content syndication shouldn’t promote products or talk about your company. Instead, focus on writing something thought-provoking for readers.

However, you also want to pay special attention to outlets before you ask them to publish your content. Follow their social accounts. Read their emails. Do they publish click-bait and spam? Alternatively, do they only provide readers with authoritative content? Do your homework.

Create Content that Matters

Driving traffic and creating brand awareness with syndication isn’t worth a thing if you don’t personalize each experience. 65% of B2Bs say they have no problem switching brands if a company doesn’t personalize its communication with them.

Creating content isn’t enough. Marketers need to create meaningful and interesting content and present it to visitors at the right time with tools like content bingeing. Create a personalized experience for every lead and watch your conversions skyrocket.

Hushly can help. Check out our Content Bingeing feature in action!

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