Tag Archives: content development

Six ways to dial up marketing in 2020 (without breaking the bank)

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The new year is upon us and so are many fantastic opportunities.  To turn these opportunities into reality will require the same consistent, thorough and robust online marketing efforts as before, and at the same time, businesses will need to continue innovation in messaging and sales pipeline strategy.  The effectiveness of new marketing strategies from 2018 and 2019 will begin to fade as clever new approaches start to take over. 

Our approach at Content Savants is to continuously innovate online marketing while building – step by step with proven effectiveness – on tried and true methods that have made sustainable business growth possible for ourselves (including our internal products and services) and our clients.

Trends

First off, there are some key trends in areas that are near and dear to our hearts that we will briefly mention.  These trends are in four key areas, which are areas that Content Savants specializes in regarding our customers and helping them to achieve their business goals. 

  • Content Style:  the first category is content.  It is in our name!  While some businesses which focus on specialty advisory or traditional services such as audit and advisory may continue with their persona of formality and traditionalism – which is what clients tent to expect from these types of companies, most other businesses will do best to follow a more conversational style and approach to messaging.  This style can be applied to imaging (imagine people in relaxed settings with non-staged scenes), short-form descriptions, headers and bylines, as well as long-form descriptive text.  Vocabulary should remain within a list of 2,000 commonly-used words, and verbiage written to replicate a conversational tone, of the type that a business people would have at a coffee shop, but not at a formal dinner or conference.
  • Content Substance:  flowery language and scare tactics popular with so many sales funnel developers will not be enough.  In continuation of long term trends, as information becomes more easily and readily available, consumers will continue to expect specific examples and data to back up assertions.  That is why the research portion of your online messaging development will be ever more crucial in the coming years.  2020 will be a great chance to get ahead of the curve without significant expense in custom-tailored research requests. 
  • Content Types:  video content will continue to grow, as will the online platforms which enable video content creation.  Facebook has already launched their Video Creation Kit, which enables advertisers to create “mobile-first” video ads which draw upon images already uploaded into your Facebook account.  We have seen Facebook do similar types of automated video production in the form of commemorative and anniversary videos.  With the Video Creation Kit, users can choose templates for basic customization and to adapt the advert according to your end goals, such as selling products or building brand value through unique messaging or stories.  These can then be applied use in both Facebook or Instagram ads.
  • Leveraging Content:  along with a rise in competitive efforts needed to push ahead of your competition, a key priority for 2020 should be to leverage your existing content into other channels.  By this, we mean going beyond just online marketing opportunities, but also making sure that your business gets the broad range of exposure that will be critical to giving your business an added advantage.  Print more business cards, attend more conferences, and get out there in a way that uses the content assets you have already generated.  Here, we’re speaking involvement in speaking engagements, making guest posts on popular forums, and obtaining media coverage for your expertise.  Use what you have and leverage that to the max!

These are just a few of the many developments that are shaping up to make 2020 an amazing year for online and social media marketing.  These were selected based on their importance to small and medium-sized businesses, with a prioritization based on areas where Content Savants can be of direct service. 

Six dial-up strategies

Now, as promised in the header, here are six actionable steps your business can begin to take right now, which can help boost your online presence and convert viewers to customers. 

  1. Use your email lists:  have you asked customers to join your email list?  Aside from the advertising funnel strategy, it is amazing how many businesses fail to take advantage of information they already have right in front of them.  Email is still an extremely powerful means of communicating directly with customers.  The key here is to offer them value.  Customers see commercial email and will automatically assume it is junk.  Or they see a newsletter and automatically assume that it will have no relevance.  Why do they make these assumptions?  Because that is what we have all come to learn and expect from the rash of absolute junk that comes to our in-boxes.  Rather than promoting your business, give your customers real information that they can use, and write it in a way that sticks in their minds.
  2. Up your blogging game:  is your business a once-per-week blogger?  (Even us, we try to be, but customers come first!  …and lately we’ve been very busy – but that’s NO EXCUSE, not for us, not for you or for anyone).  Time to ante up and increase your messaging.  Let customers know that you are serious about building a relationship with them, increase their trust in your brand, and let them know that you are an ACTIVE business.  One more blog per week goes a long way.
  3. Entice interaction:  a quick and simple step you can take now is to ask your customers about their experience with your product or services, either through a photo or a short paragraph.  Encourage their participation through a reward for the best entry, and posting that (and all of them) online.  This approach gives them value and helps to build your own set of testimonials, while creating a fun and interactive engagement.
  4. Speak to customers directly:  while you’re at it, combining this step with the previous one can enable you to receive vital feedback on your business activities directly from your most valued customers.  Choose a handful of customers (as your time allows) and get them on the phone.  You can tell them you are the owner, tell them how valuable their business is, and ask if they can answer a few survey questions – or just start asking them some basic questions about their experience.  The most important part here is, among those who are positive with you, ask them kindly to post a (honest) review.  A kind, personal request can stretch miles beyond an email reminder in terms of getting their attention and earning their active support of your business.
  5. Expand your business:  of course that is always the objective.  In this context, while you’re working on steps 3 and 4, go ahead and take the next baby step in the conversation and ask them for a referral.  While not all businesses offer products which lend themselves to referrals (you can think of your own examples), you can at least solicit their idea about the type of customers they think that you should be targeting.  Some people will respond by saying “well, I don’t know it’s not my business,” but if you have already developed a positive rapport, take advantage of the fact that people love to give advice and to be an expert.  They have already bought into your service or product, so they must know something about who is your best target.  At the very least, from this type of question, if they respond by giving you a profile of someone that does not match their own profile (as in, “someone else would be more interested in this product than I am”), that can give you a new perspective on what your selling, who your selling it too, and what value customers are getting from your offer.
  6. Annual review:  take a couple hours and write down successful efforts and lessons learned from the past year.  So often it is easy to forget an idea that we thought about pursuing and then got distracted, or a mistake that lent itself to some important lessons, or otherwise small but important goals that got lost in the shuffle.  Take some time to reflect on the past year, identify some opportunities that may have fallen through the cracks, and put those back on the list for 2020.

Have a great year in 2020 and look forward to working with you to make your business ambitions a success!

New FB feature can improve business targeting

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Facebook is currently in a phase of testing a new capability that will allow page owners the ability to share and reveal content specifically targeted at pre-determined contact groups.  This capability will be connected to Facebook Stories and Messenger. 

Companies that use Facebook as a way to communicate to their customers – most frequently being entertainment, retail, fashion and specialty businesses – will typically develop content that is relevant to the wide body of users and followers.  With the opportunity to narrow content broadcasts to a select few, businesses can better target their messaging and hone in on key interests to the defined customer audience. 

The content development process typically begins with profiling either the existing base of users via key interest and demographic indicators, or profiling the specifically the target audience that the business aims to develop and convert to sales.  Having the ability to better target content is something that businesses have long been waiting from Facebook.  This current testing effort is indication that Facebook is further responding to these requests, and enabling businesses to better leverage their promotions on this increasingly critical marketing platform.

This development would be par for the course in a social environment that aims to reflect and complement the way people naturally communicate.  On a social level, we all have friends, family and contacts with different interests.  Our communication to each group is different, and tailored to their interest, or our common interests.  In a similar fashion that perhaps a college student wouldn’t discuss details of last weekend’s frat party with close family (or maybe they would?), the message to new versus existing customers may be very different.  Social media communication can reflect real-life communication, and with that, increase our engagement overall. 

We believe that is the best foundational view for content development, and hope to see Facebook and others continue to replicate a natural social structure in their social communication platform.   

Five content tricks to boost social media performance

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Content Savants aims to continually enhance and improve upon social media content, and as such, we are ever in search of tips, tricks and hacks that help to boost performance of social media postings.  By “boost performance”, we mean increase social engagement, likes, comments, and… most importantly, grow sales for you and your business.

Use Video Content

Research on social media marketing says again and again, videos perform better than stills.  According to research by online content consultant BuzzSumo, Facebook video posts enable over 70% more engagement than posted photos.  For the same set of clicks it takes to post a meme, the video content will outweigh the benefit by far, according to this and many other research reports. 

The challenge with video content isn’t imagining why or how it draws better engagement, nor is it in the effort of posting.  The challenge is in the development, requiring much more time and complexity.  The good news is that still, video content represents a minority of postings (~10% on Facebook and Instagram).  Your business can stand out better, enabling much greater value for the work you put into video content. 

Use the right language

While it remains true that nearly any content posted on a regular basis can have a positive result for engagement with potential customers, what makes content development a professional art is the fact that there are some patterns which can distinguish a “good” post from an “average” post.  We’re not even talking about a “bad” post – in this context, meaning one that works against your business interests.  Offensive material would, for most industries, count as a bad post.  What we’re looking at here is the opportunity to optimize postings from simply “Product x available” to “Shop now for your new Product x”.  The former is a rather bland statement that merely announces availability, compared to the latter which touches on enthusiasm and personality.  Here are some other examples:

“OK”“Great!”
See our new Product XCheck out Product X
Top 10 new productsThe most sought-after products
of the year
You’ll love…You’ll be amazed… or You’ll be inspired…
Let us show youCome and explore
Be sure to check out our latest productsDon’t miss out on limited-time offers

Leverage built-in features

Instagram has a great sticker as part of Instagram Story called the countdown, making it possible for individuals and businesses to set a countdown clock for publishing new content.  This feature is brilliant for generating curiosity and interest, particularly for product launches, business openings, special events and live streamed content. 

Use quizzes

Through a Facebook lead gen campaign, you can also set up quizzes by using the lead form.  Typically this feature is used to interact with the audience after they have clicked on your Facebook ad, and is meant to help categorize customers by obtaining their initial feedback on an offer or opportunity.  Giving customers a quiz enables more active engagement and begins the customer on a journey.  Questions that are on-topic (relevant to your products or services) while invoking common knowledge can give the prospective customer a good feeling for being smart and knowledgeable, effectively creating a positive association with their first experience. 

Avoid the mistakes

As mentioned earlier, there is a way to place “bad” content online, and defeat the purpose of your own efforts.  That’s why we recommend playing it safe from the start, avoiding political, religious or other potentially contentious issues.  A quick search on Google will reveal gargantuan mistakes made in the past by well-known global brands.  While they can buy their way out of a PR disaster, small and medium-sized businesses wouldn’t have the resources. 

More subtle mistakes that many marketing teams make is to focus on branding.  Brand and image are important, but the leveraging of good branding at the early stages of a marketing campaign is far outweighed by the need to educate your customers and raise awareness of the business.  That’s why content rules the day for fast-growing businesses, enabling posted messages to reach more effectively into the customer’s needs and motivations for seeking out your products and services. 

Closely related to an excessive focus on branding is a more practical mistake that is all-too-common, not giving customers a way to respond.  Clever memes and stories are great to entertain your audience (and that has value), however give your customers a link, a phone number, a web address… anything that allows them to initiate a connection and reach out directly. 

And finally, the most impactful mistake that companies make is to start a social media campaign and quit too early.  Real results take time.  At the heart of social media marketing is an effort to connect with customers, and to make your business a part of their thinking.  Specifically, the aim of a social media campaign is to trigger action, preferably immediate action, but if the customer is not ready to respond, the posting must set a trigger which reminds them of your business at a later time.  In this way, consistency and perseverance are everything when it comes to sustainable success.

Inspiring Word of Mouth through Social Media Posting

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In academic marketing jargon, social media is often considered to be a variation on word of mouth marketing.  This view is a flattering portrayal of social media platforms in all their variations, and conforms to the standard approach to what these platforms would have its users believe, that social media posting is like a person-to-person conversation, but done through a digital platform.

While we know social media networks and the postings that are shared have a sort of conversational look and feel, particularly where comments and chat sessions are involved, the sort of mindset that is required of making an effective social media posting is entirely different from that of a personal conversation. 

Consider the following:

Conversation Social Media
Look them in the eyes and make yourself immediately vulnerable to their opinions (expressed verbally or expressed through gestures) While the social vulnerability remains, the sense of your listeners’ opinions are delayed, there is no split-second feedback that you get from a conversation
Often spontaneous, with thoughts transferred to communication near instantly While many social media postings are indeed an instant reaction to a thought (and then regretted later) social media by nature allows people to think about what they write or public in advance, and gives people time to cultivate a well-thought message (not that many people use that opportunity)
Generally unrecorded – the memory of the conversation is reliant on the other person’s ability to internalize messages, which in turn often depends on their emotional reaction to not only the words, but also the tone used to express Recorded, for all posterity to see – therefore the memory of the message is also influenced by ways external factors can influence and change the meaning through a different context than the one originally intended.
In your face – it is nearly impossible to ignore someone who is speaking directly to you, the listener therefore has nowhere to hide The audience may or may not regard anything you say

So conversation and social media are totally different.  What of it?

We know the value of word of mouth marketing, or referral-based marketing.  Social media’s greatest strength is in enabling a mass marketing message to be communicated at little cost to those who have spent time (and money) in developing and cultivating their online social networks.  Prioritizing this type of network has brought amazing success to many businesses.

Focusing only on this aspect of social media may doom the businesses which fail to obtain maximum leverage from their social media investment.

How to maximize the investment?

The key here is to remember that everyone who sees your post not only has their own followers, but also has individuals in their network with whom they have actual – real, live – conversations on a daily basis.  Breaking through the digital realm into the organic, analog world is an amazing feat in terms of the value-for-money impact it can have on your marketing campaign.

How can that be done?

There’s no magic to making it happen.  We’re talking about hard-core messaging that is designed to elicit a human reaction that is so strong, that the reader or the viewer wants to walk away from their desktops or smartphones to tell someone else about what they just read.

While that precise scene rarely happens – ie., someone jumping from their desk and talking about what they just read – we know that people like to talk.  What they talk about is highly influenced by what catches their attention and gives them a way to garner attention from others. 

What kind of attention do people seek?

Tools of leadership (otherwise known as manipulation) are a key driver in relaying messaging.  Therefore, social media content which conveys authority and knowledge are those which are most useful to the type of people who influence others. 

Few companies have a plan to develop word of mouth marketing.  Part of the reason for that reticence is that there is no budget for word of mouth marketing.  As said by Jonah Berger in his book Contagious: Why Things Catch On, speaks about difficulty of developing a plan of action.  As he has said, “You can shape it, you can encourage it, you can drive it, but you can’t buy it.” 

That’s why Content Savants is pleased to present what may be your company’s first word of mouth advertising campaign strategy, in these succinct steps:

Step 1 – Shape it:  More than what you want someone to talk about, decide how you want someone to feel when mention of your company, or your product, or service comes up in conversation.  What feelings do you want to associate with your business?

Step 2 – Encourage it:  The key here is to ensure that the messaging is relevant to the viewership.  Implementing this strategy often means that social media campaigns must be more finely targeted.  Rather than mass distributions to a large list of followers, narrowly-defined lists to followers with similar characteristics are often critical to the success of a message or posting.  In this step, relevance is everything.

Step 3 – Drive it:  Make people want to recount the message.  Driving references, or more specifically referrals, requires that the content give the referring person a way to enhance their standing or stature vis-à-vis the ones they are conversing about.  In the world of social media, memes which sound smart are top priority.  Here are general content themes for driving word of mouth discussion:

  • Data which offers explanatory insights about which products/services work well and which ones do not
  • Information which succinctly explains why designs or works of art are better than others, with a bonus for characterizing admirers of competing works of art (thinking of fashion designs) as being inferior in terms of class and taste
  • Anecdotes which explain how things work, in a social or political context especially – and these tend to work better if they are cynical in nature
  • Funny messages which have a dual use in explaining human behavior
  • Comments which explain the universe and human nature in a way that someone who got in trouble should have known better.

Great ideas, now what?

Remember that investment into social media is not just about frequency, timing and the audience.  It is also about content, and ensuring that the messaging has the intended outcomes. 

This article is about driving word of mouth marketing into your social media marketing strategies.  Will it have the intended outcome?