Mastering Digital Content Creation: How To Stand Out From The Sameness

By Clementine Jones

Mastering Digital Content Creation: How To Stand Out From The Sameness

Digital content is everywhere. It’s all over your social media feed, in your email inbox — even in your favorite music app (Spotify Wrapped, anyone?). But how do you create standout digital content that speaks to your audience without losing out on quality or overburdening your marketing team? This blog will dive into the basics of digital content creation, examples of how to use different digital content formats for specific use cases, and best practices for a smooth digital content creation process. 

What is digital content creation?

Digital content creation refers to the process of producing content to connect with your audience online. Digital content is a broad category, including all sorts of media and formats, including white papers, blogs, videos, social media posts, and more.

For marketers, digital content usually aims to build brand awareness, generate leads, and connect with prospective customers before they start looking for a solution. But digital content has the potential to be so much more than just a marketing tool. There are some great examples of how other departments, such as sales, HR, or corporate communications, have used digital content to help them achieve their goals, too.

Why is digital content creation important?

Digital media consumption is on the rise. According to Statista, US consumers are spending an average of nearly eight hours a day consuming digital media — almost double the time spent on traditional formats like print or television. So, if your digital content creation is not up to speed, you’re missing out on valuable opportunities to connect with your online audience. But it’s a bit of a double-edged sword; the fact that there’s so much digital content out there also means it’s harder to stand out from the crowd and capture your audience’s attention. That’s why it’s crucial to invest in creating engaging, tailored content and establish a content creation process that lets you produce a high volume of assets without skimping on quality.

Digital content types for specific use cases

There’s no one-size-fits-all when it comes to digital content. Finding the perfect format for your digital content depends on a number of factors, like your target audience, the goal of your content piece, and your industry. To illustrate this, we’ve gathered a few examples of brands using different digital content formats to fit a specific use case.

Discover: How to Get Started With Creating Digital Content: Explore Thirteen Use Cases

Digital content creation for Marketing

Content marketing is a fantastic way to capture your audience’s attention and establish your brand as an industry thought leader. Here are a few examples of Foleon customers who got digital content marketing right: 

Dentsu creates brand awareness with digital thought leadership content

Dentsu is a perfect example of a brand using actionable thought leadership content to stay top-of-mind. Their fantastic media trends report is a top forecasting resource in the media and communications industry. And the easy-to-navigate interactive report format makes even complex data readable and digestible.

Differentiated drives pipeline with ABM assets

Differentiated agency decided to get hyper-personal for their recent campaign for their client Vodafone. Taking an Account-based marketing (ABM) approach, Differentiated created a 1-1 campaign for Royal Mail, one of Vodafone’s priority accounts. They sent customized interactive documents to key personas at Royal Mail, complete with personalized messages, outlining how Vodafone could provide technical support in the postal service’s transformation into a parcel delivery service. And their digital content strategy worked! Within weeks, the Royal Mail CEO asked for a meeting with Vodafone — and Differentiated won an award for best use of ABM in B2B marketing. 

Foleon connects with customers with a personalized Year-In-Review

At Foleon, we like to drink our own champagne — and toot our own horn — every now and then. And our 2024 annual report was no exception. Our customer marketing team created our 2024 Year-In-Review to give our customers a personalized roundup of their year in Foleon Docs and reader insights. The annual report highlighted specific metrics like the number of docs created and how many active users engaged with the platform. Plus, the report gave customers tips to help them get more out of our platform in 2025. By connecting on a deeper level with our audience, our personalized Year-in-Review achieved a conversion rate of 5.26% — a 168% increase compared to the generic version. 

Digital content creation for Sales

Digital content can be a game-changer for sales teams looking to shorten buying cycles, close deals, and improve win rates. It’s a great way to make complex information more accessible for prospects and sales reps and convince prospective customers of your value. Here’s an example of a Foleon customer creating standout digital content for sales: 

Forbo enables buyers with digital product catalogs

Great buyer enablement content needs to be relevant, timely, and free of fluff. Digital content for buyers should also be shareable and easily accessible so prospective buyers can refer back to it when they need to. Forbo’s digital brochures achieve both, showcasing their diverse product collections in a sleek format that’s easy to share.

Digital content creation for HR

Long gone are the days when marketing teams had a monopoly on digital content. HR teams need to create a range of content assets from engaging employee handbooks, to benefits guides, to personalized internal newsletters. Here’s how one brand took their recruitment to the next level with digital HR content:

Simmons & Simmons attracts top graduate talent with stunning brochures

International law firm Simmons & Simmons created a stunning interactive recruitment brochure aimed at graduates, using video and slick animations to get graduates excited about working at the firm.

Discover: Our ultimate guide to creating HR content. 

5 best practices for digital content creation

Great digital content comes in all shapes and sizes. But there are a few key best practices to bear in mind when it comes to your digital content creation process: 

1. Know who you’re creating content for — and why

Remember: You can’t be everything to everyone. And your digital content is no exception. Creating detailed buyer personas makes it clearer exactly who your target audience is and what kinds of content they consume (and on which channels). And, of course, you need to establish clear goals and objectives for your digital content piece before you start creating it.

2. Experiment with different content formats

There are so many ways to deliver content nowadays. So, don’t just stick to the traditional formats — even if they’re more familiar. (We’re looking at you, PDFs). Research modern digital content formats like the ones that Foleon offers, find one that aligns with your target audience’s preferences, and see how it performs — you might be surprised at the results.

3. Empower non-designers to create digital content

As we've established, marketing isn’t the only team using digital content. So, why should content creation be the responsibility of the marketing team alone? Modern content creation platforms like Foleon enable business users throughout the organization to produce on-brand digital content themselves, without having to rely on designers or developers. Plus, governance features and user controls allow admins to set parameters to keep all content on-brand and in line with security requirements. 

4. Measure, measure, measure

Understanding how your audience interacts with your content is essential to creating digital content that resonates. Analytics are your friend here. Make sure to track your content’s performance, looking at metrics such as read time, engagement rate, and heatmaps to understand what’s working — and what isn’t.

5. Optimize based on content performance

With reader insights in your pocket, it’s time to improve your content based on how it performs. Digital content creation is an ever-evolving process, so be agile and treat each new content piece as an opportunity to experiment and learn.

Final thoughts on streamlining digital content creation

With the right approach, digital content can be a powerful tool that people throughout the organization can use to drive business goals. To stand out in the overcrowded content landscape, you’ve got to find the right format for your use case, experiment with different digital content formats, understand your audience, and optimize your content based on performance. 

Ready to get started with creating digital content?

Foleon’s digital content creation platform smoothens the content creation process by empowering business users to create interactive digital content themselves. Our platform supports a wide range of content types, making Foleon an ideal solution for departments such as marketing, HR, and sales to create digital content that supports their objectives.

Curious about which digital content type best suits your use case? We’ve created a Content Compass to help you find the perfect format for any situation. 

Clementine Jones

Clem is a Content Marketer here at Foleon. With a background in B2B SaaS and copywriting, she’s all about providing audiences with actionable, relevant content — minus the buzzwords.

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