Marketing is essential for building a brand, and this is why small businesses need to have some great marketing collateral ideas to impress the customer. Digital marketing is a huge challenge for the uninitiated, as it is increasingly important to make the right moves to guide the customer on their journey. Marketers should be ready with tools for content marketing, as well as a large supply of ideas.

What is Marketing Collateral?

In the simplest terms, marketing collateral is any material or assets that are used for marketing purposes. This includes any brochures, flyers, or posters that take physical form, as well as the various types of digital content. Online collateral materials range from blogs, articles, and social media posts to whitepapers, ebooks, podcasts, and videos.

Of course, the use of marketing collateral is very different from the days before widespread digital media. Content can now be reappropriated into different formats and channels to maximize visibility. Different collateral pieces may also be more suitable for different stages in the customer’s journey and the sales funnel.

Marketing Collateral Checklist

To help you on your journey, here is a marketing collateral list to bring you ideas and examples.

Visual marketing collateral ideas

• Infographics: This is a great form of mixed media that has a wide appeal. Infographics combine text, stats, illustrations, icons, graphics, and design to deliver a medley of visual information. Here you can emphasize the figures that interest you the most in a stylish and snappy visual presentation.

• Digital reports: This format presents information in various charts, graphs, and other types of annotation. These documents are usually stored in PDF format, although other file types allow numerical data to be interactive and mobile responsive. This content format is commonly used for annual or quarterly reports.

• Customer magazines: These are short and long-form stories that cover a range of topics related to a brand. These can be used for various stages of the funnel, and they can include information relating to products in a fun and friendly way. They can also feature different types of micro-content for specific purposes.

Video marketing collateral examples

• Animations: These have many options and types, with variables to play with that include storyboarding, scriptwriting, 2D/3D, voiceover, and music. They can appear in many places, such as a landing page or a social media post, and they can be used to convey information or tell a story.

Animated video from Slack

• Vlogs: This is a great way of providing a personal view on a particular topic. They can vary in length and be more accessible than forms of written content. You can also spend as much time and effort on making them as you have available – they can be short and simple or go into depth and apply post-production.

Adobe Creative Cloud Vlog

• Webinars: These are a great way of engaging your target audience and gathering leads, and they are especially popular in the time of the pandemic. You can email the recording to users after the event, which is another way of staying in touch and getting people to sign up.

AWeber Writing Web Content Webinar

Textual marketing collateral ideas

• Blog posts: These are important forms of content that can be shared across different platforms, third-party websites, social media, and newsletters. There is the opportunity to target keywords and bring in a wider audience and use blog posts for the purposes of affiliate marketing.

• Whitepapers: If you want to share technical information in a presentation of written content, a whitepaper is the best way to do it. These can be presented as downloadable documents on your landing pages, or they can be distributed to your contacts via email.

• Ebooks: If you want to go into even more depth and demonstrate your expertise in a particular topic, ebooks are the way to go. These are mainly in written format, and they can include illustrations and branding. Ebooks usually try to be more entertaining and less technical than whitepapers, and they are a way of engaging customers through an enjoyable read. These can also be available as PDFs and distributed by email.

• Newsletters: An excellent way of keeping in touch with your email subscribers. Newsletters are a friendly digital magazine for keeping your audience up to date. They can include news, stories, blog posts, and images.

Other marketing collateral ideas

• Social media posts: Just about everyone on the internet uses social media in one way or another, so this is a great way of reaching the widest audience across all social media platforms. There are no limits on the types of content you post on social media, so it can be anything from GIFs and memes to jokes and captions. You can also interact with your audience and encourage their engagement.

• Brand stories: People respond to a meaningful narrative. Telling your brand’s story creates a context that your audience will remember, especially when it is done in a funny or enjoyable way. This should also gain a connection with your customers, so they think of you before your competitors. Your brand story can also appear in various locations and channels.

There is undoubtedly a wide range of marketing collateral ideas to choose from, and no brand should be without all the options for getting themselves heard. Once your marketing plan is in place, all you need to do is put all your great ideas into action, review your results, and make improvements.