The New Rules of Marketing and PR, 7th Edition

12Strategies for Creating Awesome Content

If you’ve read this book starting from the beginning, I hope I’ve been able to convince you that web content sells. (If you’ve skipped ahead to this chapter, welcome!) An effective online content strategy, artfully executed, drives action. Organizations that use online content well have a clearly defined goal—to sell products, generate leads, secure contributions, or get people to join—and deploy a content strategy that directly contributes to reaching that goal. People often ask me: “How do you recommend that I create an effective ______?” (Fill in the blank with blog, video, white paper, e-book, email newsletter, webinar, or other product.) While the technologies for each form of online content are a little different, the one common aspect is that through all of these media, your organization can exercise thought leadership rather than simple advertising and product promotion; a well-crafted white paper, e-book, or webinar contributes to an organization’s positive reputation by setting it apart in the marketplace of ideas. This form of content brands a company, a consultant, or a nonprofit as an expert and as a trusted resource.

To create awesome content, the first thing you need to do is put away your company hat for a moment and—you guessed it—think like one of your buyer personas. The content that you create will be a solution to those people’s problems and will not mention your company or products at all! Imagine for a moment ...