Blogging to Show How the Land is Really Shaped

“Spook hills”, such as the one in Moncton, New Brunswick, Canada have become tourist spots, because in those locations, objects appear to move uphill on a slightly downward road. Paranormal believers have their own theories about this, and scientists once assumed a magnetic anomaly was at play. However, advanced physics now shows that “magnetic hills” are nothing more than optical illusions due to “visual anchoring of the sloping surface.” What actually occurs, we know understand, is that if the horizon is either not seen or not level, people’s eyes are fooled by objects they expect to be vertical but aren’t.

Debunking myths requires an understanding of how misinformation works, according to theconversation.com. “First and foremost, you need to emphasize the key facts you wish to communicate rather than the myth. Otherwise, you risk making people more familiar with the myth than with the correct facts.” Next, you need to replace the myth with an alternative narrative, “fighting sticky ideas with stickier ideas.”

Interesting. As far back as 2009, in Say It For You’s second year of creating marketing blogs for businesses and professional practices, I understood that while one of the functions of a marketing blog is debunking myths in that abound in every profession or industry, we needed to “give the camel a coat”. I’d read in Zoo Vet, of all places, that camels build up resentment towards their human handlers, who can calm the animals by handing over their own coat to the beast to jump on and tear to pieces.

From that article on camel behavior, I learned a valuable metaphoric lesson about blog content writing – readers don’t like to be “made wrong”. As content writers, then, we need to “throw them a coat” in the form of intriguing, little-known information about the company’s products and services, about the company founders, or about the industry or profession. While addressing misinformation shines light on the practice or business owner’’ special expertise, the technique must be used with caution, so that readers feel smarter, not “shown up”.