Once you have leads in your pipeline, how do you nurture the leads? With so many industries cutting back on field sales, creating content that answers buyers’ needs and questions throughout their buying process is an effective way to nurture leads and speed up sales cycles. This is content marketing.

For your content to work, you have to be strategic. Your content needs to add value. And to create value for prospects, you have to get inside their heads. Map out the process your prospects go through. Understanding what information they’re looking for and filtering accordingly is critical to determining what content you’ll create for lead nurturing.

As you’re thinking about prospects’ buying journey, focus on content that:

• Changes or shapes their perspective
• Helps them build a case for moving in a certain direction
• Educates them about their options and how to prioritize their needs
• Gives them insight into how other people like them are solving the same kinds of problems

Here are five ideas for types of content that can accomplish these goals by drawing in and engaging prospects with information they crave.

1. Original research reports

You have access to knowledge your prospects want through your own client base. Conducting research through a survey and sharing the results can be a successful way to hook prospects. Make sure your research report has a narrative, a point of view and an easy takeaway for your readers. And be careful about publishing research that comes across as self-promotional or skewed. Focus in on research and best practices that help a customer succeed.

2. A video or podcast chat with a customer or expert

Video and audio are opportunities to provoke thought and bring in new perspectives. Do a conversational interview with a customer or an industry expert. People love hearing from their peers, and if you package these chats to be short and substantive, prospects will eat them up.

3. A market brief

People are busy, and it’s hard to keep up with everything happening around them. A market brief — a “brief” summary of an issue and how people are addressing it — can be a welcome update about how technology is evolving or a regulation is shaping how people do business. Prospects will be grateful for this fast and easy way to get up to speed on an issue, without having to dig around for information online.

4. A slide deck

Slideshows have become valuable currency in the social media world now that event speakers regularly share their slides online. Develop content into an easy-to-consume slideshow, and share it on SlideShare and other social channels, post it on your website, and promote it through email. Avoid product or sales decks; make your slides fun, visual and full of “quick bites” of knowledge or insights.

5. A decision guide or tool

If buying your product is a complex process, you can simplify pieces of it for prospects by creating a decision guide. It might be an infographic leading them through steps or a simple checklist. Or you might explore building an interactive decision tool. As your prospect moves through the funnel toward a decision, this guide or tool will become a valuable resource.

Remember it will take some time before they’re ready to buy. Content marketing should consistently add value as they read, weigh options, win allies, build budgets, and look skeptically at data and solutions. You can’t hit them over the head with “buy, buy, buy!” Slow and steady wins the race — as long as you’re delivering quality, relevant content to them at every turn.