Massaging Your Message – Get Your Content Write

When it comes to your marketing message, getting it right is as important as any other area of your business. In fact, massaging your message properly may be the MOST important. (Certainly, getting it wrong will have lasting consequences.)

Since we’ve addressed the issue of messaging before, we thought it might be a good idea to also look at the how of it, not just the why. For us, it begins with content marketing, which is the process of identifying your target market’s pain points and creating content that helps your target audience address them. It’s not a sales pitch. It’s high-value information that benefits them!

Messaging and Content Marketing

It was more than a century ago – well before internet marketing (or even the use of computers) became a thing – that the concept of content marketing was developed and implemented.

That’s right. As early as 1895 John Deere published a lifestyle magazine for farmers called “The Furrow”. What was it about? The one thing it was NOT about was Deere company products. “It did, though, increase brand loyalty. Increased sales were just one happy byproduct (of many) from the valuable content John Deere provided for its customers.” (SearchEngineJournal.com)

Fast forward to 1900 when the tire company Michelin published its first “Micheline Guide”. Again, the Guide was not published to sell tires. Although, “While it included tips on changing your tires and where to refuel your car, it also featured a list of places that hungry travelers could eat. And it was a massive success. It’s a great example of a business targeting their audience with content that they would find helpful without overselling their products.” (DreamHost.com)

As a slightly more contemporary example, and one which some of us may actually remember, Betty Crocker became the “feminine” face of the food company that would eventually become General Mills. The cookbook that bears “her” name has sold more than 75 million copies since it was introduced in 1950. And, while the book known as “Big Red” frequently suggested the use of the company’s products, it has always been the recipes that most consumers have valued. (Wikipedia)

Appealing to Human Nature

Are you beginning to get a sense of how content marketing works, and how it can also benefit you? Even though it’s not all about you and your business, and it’s not solely about your products. No, it’s about helping your current or potential clients.

• This is how you build a following.

• It’s how you inspire trust and loyalty.

• It enables you to engage with prospects and build relationships.

• This generates leads and leads can become conversions.

Yes, it’s a process but that is how effective marketing is done in the internet age. For example, our blog. It’s not always about the product – or even how cool we are! It’s about helping you become the best interior designer or furnishing retailer you can be.

When it comes to massaging your message, getting it right can be challenging. That’s why getting in touch with Ted for business consulting to the trade can be so valuable. To find out more… Contact TD Fall today.

High-Value Website Content not Attracting an Audience? Repurpose It!

Do you have a long piece of high-value content on your website that visitors are ignoring? Is it something you spent hours (or days) creating to make your furnishing client’s and design prospect’s lives easier? Why the heck won't they read or view it?

Well, the first thing to know is that everyone’s attention span seems to be shrinking. For example, in 2015 the average time spent on a website page was about 58 seconds. Today, that metric has shrunk to a scary 36 seconds or so.

While these time-on-site numbers look ridiculously brief, take a moment to reflect on your own online behavior. What happens when you search for “interior design trends 2021”? For us, Bing returned some 4.5 BILLION results! Then we had to choose between sites offering “38 trends”, “10 hot trends”, “the 25 hot looks for 2021”, “videos of trends”, a “what the experts think” piece, and, and, and… ad infinitum.

Clicking on a couple of them, the first thing we noticed was that we had no idea who was telling us what the hot trends were. In fact, some of the articles didn’t even identify the author! There went 36 seconds of our lives wasted.

Next, we struggled to uncover where these trends were so trendy. This is disconcerting because – as we’ve said so many times – interior design is local and things that are super trendy in one area of the country may be behind the curve or thought of as just plain yucky where you come from.

Needless to say, we didn’t spend much time on any of them. Instead, we rely on our own experiences and guidance from our suppliers and clients. Why? Because they know what’s going on in their markets better than some anonymous blogger ever will!

Repurpose Content for Short Attention Spans

With all of this in mind, the question remains, how do you keep visitors on-site when they have the attention span of a four-year-old?

Well, here’s the thing. That wonderful piece of content we mentioned in the opening of this post may simply be too long for your audience to read. After all, no one can absorb a 5000-word article in one to half a minute. Heck, most of your visitors will see how long it is and run for the hills (virtually speaking).

The solution? Cut, cut, cut it down and turn it into a series of posts. Then, as you reconstruct your genius-level content, use eye-catching headings for sections, and add bullet points, bold text, and underlining. These techniques are used by professional copywriters to stop the reader from scanning content, and actually take it in.

You see, the idea is to sort of “play to your audience” and give them what they need in smaller doses using tricks that slow them down so they take the time to absorb your content.

·         Or watch all of a video.

·         Or listen to a podcast.

·         You get the drift.

·         (See what we did there? And here?)

Again, the goal here is to refine your delivery in ways that your audience is comfortable absorbing. You can't take it personally that they don’t appreciate the effort you’ve already put into creating something that should be valuable to them. Instead, it’s your job to find a format for presenting content that makes it easier to digest and which will ensure they recognize the value.

Getting Your Content Right Isn’t Always Easy

Creating valuable website content that draws traffic, encourages engagement, and produces leads may be the most challenging aspect of online marketing. We work hard on it every week and, while we hope our audience – you – finds the information we share valuable, we also know we can't please all of the people all of the time.

That’s why we bounce back and forth between subjects. We jump from business building tips to design trends or from new products or new lines we carry to news about production and shipping delays. Our thinking in doing this is that different people look for different things from us and if we stay on a single subject week after week, we may lose you. (Or, at a minimum, bore you.)

We recommend you do the same on your business website. Share your thoughts and experiences in ways that will appeal to your audience, not in ways that appeal to you. Keep focused on their needs rather than your own and do everything you can to make sure the content you offer addresses a need or solution your audience is looking for.

Well, that’s about it. We’ve passed the 750-word threshold and we know from experience that’s about the limit for our audience. So, if you have questions or comments about creating or repurposing your best website content, let us know. All you have to do is… Get in touch with TD Fall today.