Content marketing can seem like a tough assignment for anybody — especially if you’re in, say, the furniture business. You’re not Ted Turner, you just want to sell chairs.

But don’t sell yourself short.

You might not have a staff of correspondents filing dispatches from all over your store, but you’ve already got a key component: a knowledgeable source. (That’s you, of course.)

Who better to turn to for content that will keep your audience interested and primed to do business with you? You know your business and your products better than anybody — now you just need to find effective ways to communicate that knowledge to your customers.

Here’s an exercise: When someone at a party asks what you do, what do you tell them? We bet you wouldn’t be tongue-tied with an opening like that.

So think of that setting when you’re planning your content marketing. Consider it a conversation — maybe just small talk — with your clients. They want to know what you do, and you already have the answers. Just tell them — point to current trends, social and web media postings, or whatever else helps illustrate the message you’d like them to take away.

You can do that, right?

All that’s left now is to think of some creative avenues and angles for reaching your target market.

A new post in Business Insider’s Small Business Trends blog offers suggestions to get you started in 2012. Here are some content marketing ideas:

• Start a free course on a topic related to your business and invite people in your neighborhood to attend. So in your case, maybe you host a workshop on arranging living room furniture, color schemes or how to keep fabrics clean. Create some buzz ahead of time on your website or social networks.
• Compile your 20 best/most trafficked/most commented on blog posts into an ebook and offer them as a free download.
• Put together a buying guide related to your industry. If potential customers see your unbiased expertise and better understand what they should be looking for, they’ll remember you and trust you when purchase time comes.
• Start an industry-specific Twitter chat. There’s always something worth passing along.
• Create a video interview series in which you visit with influential people in your industry or community, then post the videos on your website. Invite the mayor to talk about how the city chose the seats for City Hall’s new auditorium — or have a doctor come on to explain lumbar support or something.
• Start an email newsletter. Include photos of furniture you’re featuring, seasonal tips and so on.
• Write case studies or customer-success stories for your website. You know: The guy who’d suffered with a sore back for years … until he found the perfect easy chair at your store.

See how this works? Not quite as intimidating as you think, eh?

If you get stuck or want to kick around some ideas, contact us. We’d love to talk.

But like we said, you’re the top expert when it comes to your business — don’t sell yourself short.