If there’s one modern name in the marketing world that all marketers must know, it’s Seth Godin. He’s everywhere you look: books, podcasts, articles, social media. He’s filled with incredible, tweetable quotes, and this one above is at the heart of what we do. Content marketing is the only marketing left.
“Content marketing is the only marketing left.”
~ Seth Godin, bestselling author and marketer
We start every design with the content that goes on the page, and we’ve done this from day 1. That’s incredibly important, but what is often overlooked is the quality of the content. Are you assuming people know the lingo you use? Are you just selling, or are you sharing, offering advice and support and a story? You will not get anywhere if you don’t start with content: engaging, compelling, vulnerable content.
If your Grandma doesn’t understand what your talking about, chances are your clients won’t either.
Match the Content to Your Audience
You must match the content to your audience. And then, make sure your grandma understands it, too. Don’t assume that your lingo will work for people outside of your industry.
Case In Point
A premier client of ours is a senior living client based in the Hill Country of Texas. Jen has a wealth of knowledge in Senior Living as she has worked directly in the industry in both marketing and creative capacities for 12+ years. This has meant a lot of trial and error, especially back in the days when no one knew what SEO (getting your site to appear in search rankings such as Google or Bing) or keywords (using the correct words on your site that match what people search for) or WordPress (the platform that most developers now use to build websites) even was.
In the senior living world, no company uses the term “facility” to describe their centers – they always, always use the word “community”. Back in the day, everyone used the word “facility” – it wasn’t until a leading senior living company changed that term around 2006 that other companies started changing as well.
But guess what? People still search for the term “facility”. Big time. And so what does this mean? That you can’t just put the word “community” on your sites. As much as you might despise the word “facility”, the people looking for you use it. So you have to, too.
Engage Your Audience with Engaging Content
Going back to the senior living example, years ago on print ads and direct mail pieces, to save space and get to the point with bulleted lists, we’d list services that the communities offer; something like this: “chef-prepared meals, dedicated associates, salon and spa, heated swimming pool, golf course”.
And then, we realized, this serves no value to the people reading this ad. What if we changed it to something like this: “our chef-prepared meals are inspired around the Mediterranean diet which has been selected to ensure your mom will not only eat delicious meals, but will enjoy foods that are proven to reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s disease.”
What does this do? It not only puts the audience in our client’s shoes, it tells them why their foods are the best. It creates a story that they can identify with: they can literally see their mom eating these foods, and can see the care that goes into every meal. People want to feel valued, and they want to feel engaged. It’s just like holding a conversation: instead of saying I do this, and this, and this, you’re not just going through the motions; you’re including the other person in the conversation by making it more about them.
How Can We Help?
We love creating stories, and we love helping our clients find better and more unique ways to share their stories. We’d love to meet you to discuss more, either in person or via phone or video chat.
