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Yes, I Do Want to Hop on a Call — After You’ve Read My Blog Post

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Your colleague asks you a reasonable question.  You could take five minutes to write a cogent reply, but instead you say “Let’s hop on a call”.  What you’re really saying, Wes Kao opines in Entrepreneur Magazine, is that “I don’t want to do the work of clarifying my own thinking”. (It’ll be easier, you reason, to think out loud.) The problem isn’t calls, Kao explains; it’s defaulting to calls. When you draft a written reply and your audience takes time to read it and consider the content, everyone is in a better position to move forward, he emphasizes. By writing, Sarah K. Peck agrees,” you’re giving information that is helpful, documented, repeatable, and shareable”. In Rob’s Notes, the reviewer’s “take” is that Kao “encourages readers to invest in thinking and in crafting responses.”

As head of a content marketing team, I found this discussion in Entrepreneur especially interesting. At Say It For You, I’m always talking about the “training benefit” of blogging and content creation in general. While our business purpose is to present our clients as subject matter experts, a “side effect” for the business owners and practitioners themselves comes about in the process of conversing with us!  In essence, a blog is about giving readers information that is “helpful, documented, repeatable, and shareable”. The planning and exploratory conversations between owner and writer are, in effect, “training” entrepreneurs to better understand their own core business principles and practices

One very practical aspect of that “training” benefit accruing to entrepreneurs as they engage with their ghost writers has to do with the competition. Although one aspect of creating content about a business is comparing their products and services to others’, we “coach” our clients to emphasize the positive rather than “knocking” their competitor.  Rather than creating content about what the competition is doing “wrong”, we teach, the content needs to demonstrate what you value and the way you like to deliver your services.

And, for the very reason that Wes Kao encourages thoughtful written responses to workplace questions that arise, the process of creating content that will be “documented” and shareable, the process of owner/”ghost” collaboration results in productive self-examination and “training”.

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The Hero-With-Setting-With-Problem Content Marketing Model

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This week, our Say It For You blog is focused on different content marketing approaches, or “models”. In our last post we discussed the “I-Did-It” model, in which past failures are recounted as a jumping-off point for advice to readers on avoiding problems and overcoming obstacles. Today’s post presents a different content marketing approach….

 The default template for novels, Michael La Ronn explains, is very simple: – hero with setting with problem. Bestsellers “hook readers and never let go,” he explains, using the three parts of that template:

  • Hero – Readers must relate to the protagonist as a fellow human being and care about what happens to him or her.
  • Setting – In instructional nonfiction, La Ronn says, setting the scene ensures readers know why the information matters.
  • Problem – As a science fiction and fantasy author, La Ronn loves to tell stories about characters whose odds are stacked against them.

Each of the elements in the “hero, setting, problem” template is directly applicable to content marketing, we realize at Say It For You.  

Hero:
As Corey Wainwright of hubspot.com explains, “When your audience is reminded there are real life humans behind the scenes,” he says, “it becomes easier for them to trust your product or service.”  Two specific tactics he suggests are infusing a sense of humor into the content, and publishing photos of your team “being themselves”. Readers may be connecting with your content digitally, but it’s up to you to foster the human connection. 

Setting:

In content writing, the opening lines need to establish that readers have come to the right place to find the information they were seeking. Those opening lines establish the general “setting” for the specific focus of that day’s post. Establishing the setting includes clarifying the “slant” of the post – will readers find “how to” information? A list of sources for products? Some cautions and “don’ts? General definitions and categories?

Problem:
Friend and sales training expert Tim Roberts encourages finding before solving. While a salesperson needs to develop good problem-solving skills, finding a problem that the customer hasn’t considered is what makes a salesperson truly valuable, he teaches. What if, rather than simply answering online searchers’ queries, your content were to raise important questions? When content marketing really works, readers feel part of the process of solving, not only “asking”.

The hero-with-setting-with-problem model can be a very good fit for content marketing.

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The How-I-Did-It Content Marketing Model

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“Why don’t you introduce your business and tell us what’s so great about it?” The editor of Start Your Own Business 2025 suggests to the founder of London-based ‘Go Car Shine’, posing three specific questions to guide the entrepreneur’s response:

  1. What made your business perfect for crowd funding?
  2. How was the experience?
  3. What advice would you give somebody with a great idea and a need for funding?

Score.org’s Rieva Lesonsky offers entrepreneurs some dos and don’ts about crowdfunding:

Don’ts include overpromising, launching a campaign before forming an actual entity, and forgetting to pay taxes on monies raised. Must-dos, on the other hand, include:

  • storytelling, sharing why you created your product or service
  • knowing your audience
  • setting realistic goals and timetables

Storytelling is an essential element in content marketing. However, as Seth Godin points out in his book All Marketers Tell Stories, not all stories succeed. The ones that do, he reminds us, are never aimed at everyone, only at an audience that already wants to believe. At Say it For You, we realize, knowing our target audience is the key to marketing success. The “Go Car Shine” story becomes the jumping-off point for offering advice to cash-strapped entrepreneurs, along with advice about marketing auto care services.

Whether recalling the start of your own business or professional practice or creating content for a client, it’s important to remember that recalling past failures can often turn out to be an indispensable tactic. Here’s why:

  • True stories about mistakes and struggles are very humanizing, adding to connection readers feel with the people behind the business who overcame tremendous odds on the road to success.
  • By sharing tales of their own struggles, owners and practitioners demonstrate they understand the obstacles their readers are facing.
  • As Jamie Gutfreund once suggested in Forbes, “Gen Zs consider taking risks an important part of life and mistakes as badges of honor.”

The How-I-Did-It content marketing model is all about past failures ultimately leading to success.

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Writing About What Almost Never Was

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Long before the Masters golf tournament became what it is today, Augusta National overcame serious financial woes. Although co-founders Clifford Roberts and Bobby Jones had had extensive plans, many never panned out, David Owen explains in Golf Digest. In three years of trying to build membership, the pair had sent out thousands of postcards, had hired salesmen to travel the country, and had bought membership lists from country clubs. Despite all those efforts, when the first National Invitation Tournament was held in 1934, the club had enlisted only 76 members. Then, just as, in 1939, they were beginning to realize some modicum  of success – the country was entering a war!

As a content marketer, I absolutely loved reading this “failure-turned-success” story. There’s an important lesson here for content creators for business or practice owners:  Writing about past failures is important. In fact, true tales about past mistakes and struggles are very humanizing, adding to the trust readers place in the people behind the enterprise. What tends to happen is the stories of failure create feelings of empathy and admiration for those who overcame the effects of both outside forces and of their own errors.

 

Because the Masters Golf Tournament story relates to people no longer living, the story is told in third person by the club’s historian In posting marketing content today,  I recommend using the personal pronouns “I”  and “we”.  As Brandon Royal explains in The Little Red Writing Book, first person is personal and specific.  Readers appreciate knowing how a situation relates to the business owners or practitioners in terms of their personal experiences.

There’s another important aspect to recalling past failures, I explain — demonstrating that you understand the problems the online searcher is dealing with. To the extent you can truthfully say, “I know how frustrating the problem is, and that’s why I’m devoted to solving that problem through my business or profession,” you are infusing your content with more power.

 

While our Say It For You content writers are often the voice behind the “I” or “we”,  we know that “writing about what almost never was” can help make things happen for our clients – and for their readers!

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Nice Try. Do it Again.

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(image by Mike Hindle)

I invited friend and writing colleague Myra Levine to contribute a guest blog post for the enjoyment of  our Say It For You readers (and my own, of course!)  …

 

 

We were reading A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens, and Mrs. Painter pointed out that when the author wrote dialect, he wrote the way his characters spoke.

“When you write dialogue,” she said, “the reader
wants authenticity, not perfect grammar.”

Naturally, I wrote my next assignment (Discuss three ways in which Dickens develops the theme of self-sacrifice) as a conversation between two semi-literate high school students.  Mrs. Painter handed it back to me with these words in big red letters:

Nice try. Do it again.

I didn’t mind. The smile on her face was a drug. I had entertained her. And the freedom to ignore comma rules? Intoxicating. The smartest thing I did was tell everybody my new life goal—to write novels. It’s harder to give up on a goal you’ve made so public. Enthusiasm comes and goes; pride is eternal.

But writing a good novel turned out to be HARD. I spent ten summers taking writing classes at the University of Iowa to learn what I hadn’t been taught in high school and college creative writing classes.

Inspiration turned out to be everywhere. The germ of the idea that turned into my first novel came from a bunch of gossipy mom friends. The idea for my second novel came from a health scare. It turned out to be no big deal, but the thought How do you raise your kids after you’re dead stayed with me.

Whatever you do for a living might give you inspiration. Think John Grisham. Or you might be one of those “What if…” writers, like Stephen King. Going through a terrible breakup? Get your psychic revenge by writing a murder mystery. I slip people who annoy me into my novels. No lawsuits yet.

And you know more than you think you do. When I had my first hip replacement, I was surprised to learn that you don’t hold a cane on the side of your bad leg. (If you test this, have someone nearby to catch you when you tip over.) It occurred to me that someone could catch a suspect who’s faking a limp when he holds his cane on the wrong side.

What have you learned in your years as a ________ that would make a character feel real? What personal demons could you turn into inspiration? And what did you never learn in English Class that you can ignore… or hire someone else to fix? Think about it.

 

      Myra Levine is a novelist, memoirist, and writing coach. Her free online writing seminars on Eventbrite have attracted over 2,000 writers from all over the world. She publishes as M. E. Levine on Amazon.com & Audible.com.

Find her at www.MyraLevine.com

 

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