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Content Marketing Must Make Readers the Winners

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“Shark Tank likely would not be the household name it has come to embody had it not been for Clay Newbill, Daymond John admits. “it was Newbill who pitched the idea and his choice of ideal cast members to a team of writers and editors”. In his book Powershift, Daymond John recalls a key change to the seating arrangements on the set that Newbill had made in the show, putting the Sharks at eye level with the entrepreneurs instead of on a raised stage. John’s advice to entrepreneurs is to “hone a win-win negotiating style”, striking a deal that works to the benefit of both parties.

In order to bring about a successful result in negotiating any deal, John elaborates, you need to do your homework, set the tone for the discussion, make the first move, and play to win-win. Understanding that people are people, just like you, bring value to the table without expecting anything in return, he advises. Always consider the needs of the buyers, not only those of the sellers.

Think like a buyer in your blog, I tell content writers. As Keith Rand, my late friend and co-member of Circle Business Network put it, achieving success in business means understanding – and focusing the conversation on – not what you have to offer, but on what the other party is seeking. Keith would explain that in a business transfer, the focus needs to be not on why the seller has decided to sell, but on what on what’s going on inside the buyer’s head as he or she pictures owning and running that business going forward. 

In advising professional speakers on ways to drive revenue, Aussie consultant Peter Sheahan advocated being buyer-centric, doing everything with buyers’ needs in mind. Your content marketing, I tell business owners and professional practitioners, will succeed only if two things are apparent to readers: 

  1. You understand their concerns and needs.
  2. You and your staff have the experience, the information, the products, and the services to solve exactly those problems and meet precisely those needs. 

The content  marketing principle emphasized ten years ago in a piece by socialmediatoday.com remains true: “Content marketing should be beneficial to your customer, reflective of your brand, and optimized for Google, in that order.

Content marketing must make readers the winners!

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Focusing on the Reader of the Story

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“Here’s how to introduce yourself to a reporter so that you will be a source for a news story on the subject,” consultant Janet Falk writes. The five W’s, she advises (who, what, when, where, why) should serve as the framework for your pitch.

In blog marketing, the “Who”, of course, denotes narrowing down your audience in order to “target” the content to those you most hope will be reading your post. “Be as specific as possible,” Falk cautions.

The “what?” has two components: What idea or concept will you present? Then, what will they do next with that idea? Think of readers’ situation before they learned this information; compared to after they hear about it, Falk writes.

Translated into content marketing, the “what” relates to the “where”. In the Call to Action, what alternatives are you offering for next steps? There should be more than one: those ready to buy should be enabled to do that right away (link or phone number). Those who need more information before making a decision should be able to message you. For those not quite ready for any of those steps, provide a link to a video or white paper. Navigation to that “where” needs to be very easy.

The “Why” is the most important question of all, Falk explains. “How will your idea help someone save time, save money or make more money?”

When it comes to blog marketing, there’s a lot of talk about “traffic”. Yes, blogging is part of business owners’ and professional practitioners’ “pull marketing” strategy, designed to attract readers’ eyeballs. In practice, however, fewer might actually prove better, I explain to Say It For You clients. The real goal is attracting readers of “the right kind“, customers who have a need for and who will appreciate the services, products, and expertise being showcased in your content.

 

In the scenario Janet Falk describes, you are introducing oneself to a reporter as a source for a news story, In content marketing, the “reporter” is the search engine algorithm, which serves as a “gateway” for you to tell your story to the target reader. “Social media algorithms can be a powerful ally in growing one’s online audience. Think of them as virtual matchmakers designed to match users with content that suits their interests,” sproutsocial,com explains.

Whether you’re introducing yourself to a reporter or to an algorithm, define your five W’s, always focusing on the ultimate reader of the story.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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In Content Marketing, You’ve Gotta Do More Than Rubbing Harder

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Earlier this week, we discussed the importance of infusing the unique personality or “esthetic” of the business owner or professional practitioner into their marketing content in order to “make things happen”. Ironically, the instruction label on a household product reminded me how often this good advice is apparently ignored….  

Preparing for the upcoming Passover holiday, I realized that my silver candlesticks had become tarnished and were in need of polishing. At my favorite hardware store, after selecting a packet of “polishing cloths for fine metal”, I began reading the instructions on the back of the package.. The first of seven bullet points of instructions read as follows (so help me!): “Rub tarnished objects gently. For tough jobs, rub harder.”  

”Writing a blog with relevant content proves to your audience that you’re a knowledgeable resource on the subject,” Mailchimp explains. “The content in your blog posts should be helpful and informational as that shows your customers you understand them and want to help them….How-to’s are a very popular type of blog post, explaining to a reader how to do a specific task.”

“When you teach your readers how to do something, it demonstrates three very important qualities about you and your business: You want to help 2.You can help 3.There is more help where that came from”, Linda Dessau writes on LinkedIn. Instructional posts are educational, offering advice and tops onn tackling either common complaints or niche problems, bigstarcopywriting.com observes. In fact, the authors add, instructional blog posts tend to be more successful than others in increasing landing page visits over time.

The thing to avoid, though, in creating content that helps and instructs, is exemplified by the inst4ructions on my silver polish package: talking down to your audience. (As Prince is quoted as saying “When you don’t talk down to your audience, they can grow with you.”)  The secret to success in instructional content marketing is making complex topics digestible without sounding as if your talking down to the reader.

Do I need the manufacturer to advice me that polishing my candlesticks effectively is simply a matter of rubbing harder? In creating how-to content, the one reaction you never want to elicit from readers is the one I had – “Duh!”

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Connecting With Buyers A’ La Ford

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“Ford Motor Co. set out to put the world on wheels with the Model T.  Here’s how the company attempted to brand itself through advertising and how it pitched its product to early everyday drivers including women,” USA Network writes in the special section of the March 10 issue of my newspaper.

As I analyzed the Model T ad reproduced  in my Indianapolis Star (an ad created fully one hundred years ago!) I noticed a number of smart marketing principles at work, guidelines we content marketers can put to use today…

Market with the end in mind

“To the woman at the wheel of a Ford car, every road seems straight and smooth; hills melt away and rough places are easy.”  The goal of content marketing should be to leave readers absolutely knowing why they need to care, not about your product or service, but about the way they are going to feel after using it! 

Your Unique Selling Proposition

“Don’t tell them what you do.  Tell them what you do for them,” Certified Business Coach Andrew Valley advised in a guest post years ago in this Say It For You blog. “You must tell the listener how your product or service can benefit that person, and how you can do it better or differently than others who do what you do.”

 

Understand buyers’ concerns

“When a woman hesitates to manage a heavy car, when she needs an extra one for personal of family use, or when her means forbid the drain of high upkeep cost…” In content marketing, making claims such as “least expensive, or “most affordable” are totally ineffective compared to communicating that you understand and are ready to address buyers’ deepest concerns.

In his business skills and development book The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs, Carmine Gallo reminds marketers to focus on results. “Remember, your widget doesn’t inspire,” he reminds us. Ford marketers obviously knew how to address potential buyers’ deepest concerns. – “She should have the easily handled, easily parked, reliable service of a Ford,”

Aim to inspire

While a company’s website, brochure and blog typically explain what products and services are offered, who the “players” are and in what geographical area they operate, the better content pieces give at least a taste of the corporate culture and some of the owners’ core beliefs.

As the author of the piece on the Model-T observes, “This ad uses the automobile as a symbol of freedom”.

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Grounding Yourself in Purpose

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“Some ideas just stick,” Laura Spence-Ash tells writers in Poets & Writers magazine. It’s important for writers to pay attention and find patterns and concepts that they themselves find pleasing, using those patterns to “find a way forward” in expressing ideas to their readers, the author explains.

“Sticky” ideas are important in content marketing, because they help the different elements – social media posts, blog posts, web pages and newsletters – “fit together” as components in an ongoing strategy. At Say It For You, we use the musical term leitmotifs. “The leitmotif is heard whenever the composer (of, say, an opera) wants the idea of a certain character, place, or concept to come across,” Chloe Rhodes explains in A Certain “Je Ne Sais Quoi.

In planning content marketing strategy for your business or professional practice, one important step, we explain to our clients, is to select four or five themes that are important to your point of view. As their marketing consultants, we will then make sure those themes appear and reappear in all their marketing communications.

Not to be confused with “keyword phrases”, themes express desirable outcomes resulting from successful use of a product, a service, or a methodology. For example, a residential air conditioning firm might use keywords such as “air conditioning”, “HVAC”, and “air conditioning repair”. The recurring themes, in contrast, might be “comfort” and “a healthy home environment”.

When owners express doubt about their ability to keep generating new content, I often remind them of late CEO of Apple Computer, Steve Jobs. Biographer Walter Isaccson noted that Jobs owned more than a hundred black turtlenecks.  Not only was this convenient, but it conveyed Jobs’ signature style. For much the same reason, defining “sticky” concepts about your industry, your products, and your services, helps, not only in keeping content focused and targeted,  but keeping it going! 

“Grounding yourself in purpose” means focusing on the ideas and the phrases that you find “stick in your mind”, on principles so valuable to you that you feel compelled to share them with your audience.  Use those “sticky” word patterns and concepts to “find the way forward”, feeling compelled to share those ideas with readers.

 

 

 

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