5 European Brands Doing Magic With Content Marketing Content marketing is a powerful tool when you want to promote a brand, grow awareness or increase sales on a product.

Content creation is one of the most important aspects of today's digital marketing industry. What's changing is the way we create and deliver the content.

So let's take a look inside the European market and some of the most lucrative strategies that were adopted by brands active in this market. Let's take note of the similarities and the differences and hopefully, we will provide a solid ground of inspirational material for companies that want to share this market and adapt to it in the near future.

1. Storytelling is and will be important.

Swiss beverage brand, Schweppes, has covered immersive territory with the digital culture and lifestyle magazine Villa Schweppes, which features articles on music festivals, Parisian bars and fashion trends along with cocktail recipes. DJs, designers and mixologists designed to inspire readers to adopt the brand's hip nightlife vibe.

This is a no-fail approach that will allow you to get closer to your audience and at the same time, it will ensure a no-fail campaign. It does not matter the industry you work with. As long as you are capable to tell stories and at the same time, to sell your stories to the audience, you are good to go. They will love it. They will understand it. They will dig it.

2. Create news-worthy content.

You have to always keep yourself informed and learn everything there is to learn, especially when it comes to changes brought forward by technological evolution. This is where our next example comes into place. Bitdefender, the Romanian antivirus software producer, is one of the most successful and reliable security resources available today.

How does it manage to nail this content marketing thing? Well, it created a website that is aimed at spreading news related to its main activities: security threats and other related topics. It is a great source of valuable content for people who share an interest in this kind of information.

3. Build a community around the brand.

There are many ways in which you can build a community, starting with social media and up to releasing content that is able to trigger the formation of a community around it. In this case, follow the example of Lego, which managed to buld a community with content creation and used these tools to increase sales and market value.

Lego invested a lot. It worked on building a young community around the brand via video games and movies. For instance, The Lego Movie was a huge box office hit. Besides the box office hit, Lego invested in micro websites, a web-based miniseries, community digital platforms and an official magazine.

4. Create video experiences for your audience.

Global video traffic is expected to reach 82 percent of the overall Internet traffic by 2012. You can achieve great things in content marketing by creating and delivering videos to your targeted audience, whether they are advertisements, presentations or vlog series. A great example comes from Hornbach, a popular European brand in the hardware store market -- here's an example.

Apart from its popular YouTube channel, Hornbach was able to create a website that is also video based. Each piece of the visual collage presented on the first page features a promotional video that can serve as an inspiration to any marketer who seeks to perform on a diversified and competitive market such as the European one.

5. Change a culture with your content.

Always, one of the most powerful brands among women, created #LikeAGirl, which breaks through the traditional approach in marketing and comes with a new type of social message.

"For more than three decades, we've empowered girls worldwide by educating millions about puberty and their cycle, so they can feel confident. Join us in our epic battle to stop the drop in confidence girls experience at puberty by encouraging all girls to Keep Going #LikeAGirl," the official description states.

The campaign featured static and video ads to educate girls on a specific topic. For instance, the last phase of the campaign talks about emoji and their failure to celebrate female achievements.

Conclusion

Content marketing is a powerful tool when you want to promote a brand, grow awareness or increase sales on a product. As we've seen so far, the European market is no different from any other digital market when it comes to promotion. Of course, there might be some minor differences created by the diverse demographic criteria and the local laws available in each country.

Nevertheless, what can we learn from the above examples is the specifics of the European market and the exact strategies that are more likely to work here. If you are operating in Europe or plan to expand your business in this geographical area, it is recommended to study these brands and learn from their successes.

Are there any strategies you are using and consider worthy to be mentioned in this context?