The Friday Fix: July 14, 2017
Crickets chirping—the sound you hear when someone tells you they’re cutting their content marketing budget.
“So, how do you plan to attract new customers?”
More crickets. Awkward. Maybe we shouldn’t be having this conversation in a field, but we do need to talk about how your business needs marketing and what you should budget for (regardless of its size). It takes change ($$) to make change.
What else has been buzzing this week? Dig into the Friday Fix and catch up on the content marketing hot topics list.
Isn’t that the same outfit you’ve had on for a week? Let’s hope not. You need to change your content like you change your clothes. Forbes contributor AJ Agrawal’s social media marketing advice serves as a style guide for brands. First, update your content regularly with things your audiences are interested in. Search Twitter hashtags relative to what your brand offers. Secondly, diversify your content with videos, images, memes, gifts, and the like. Lastly, use images to make your brand pop. Bam. Makeover complete.
The most interesting brand alive is all audiences want according Social Media Examiner’s Michelle Krasniak’s new research on consumers’ responses to brands on social media. To do to get customers to take action just: be humorous, be responsive, offer promotions, be educational, share interesting visuals, offer something exclusive, and show your behind the scenes side. Basically, you have to be the perfect man to every woman ever. No pressure.
“But do you think I should buy it?” This is what your audiences are asking when they look to influencers and is why influencers should be part of your marketing strategy; however, they key word is strategy. As JumpStart’s Thabiso Makhubela explains in Media Update, paying a champagne influencer to promote your craft beer brand will do nada for you. Pick your influencer wisely. Select someone with real credibility with your audience, who will share a real, meaningful message, and who you can really collaborate and build a relationship with. With this contract, I thee hire.
The smell of baking apples and cinnamon remind you of autumn weekends at grandmas and are the kinds of pre-suasion strategies that Search Engine Journal’s Mindy Weinstein says make your content marketing better. Pre-suasion relates to preliminarily and strategically guiding an audience’s attention before they experience the actual message. Pre-suasion strategies should always be person, create mystery, and invoke positive emotions. Just like grandma.
“Just take it for a spin.” This is what the Knight Foundation, Google News Lab, and the Online News Association said to journalists when they launched the Journalism 360 Challenge to advance using virtual reality and other immersive storytelling approaches. Jennifer Preston and Nina Zenni co-report on the funded projects. For example, one emerging storytelling tool makes it easier to create VR photo experiences that include interactive navigation using smartphones. Dizzyingly cool.
Same story, different media. Stories are already awesome, but why not take storytelling to the next level with artificial intelligence? Huffington Post contributor Davar Ardalan shares some best-case uses for AI in your storytelling strategy. The technology will enable storytellers to reach audiences in different settings and to enable audiences to interact with content in customizable capacities. Talk about having it your way.
Are you hot or not? Take our quiz! Content Standard’s Liz Alton reveals how to know if you’re on content’s cutting edge based on Mary Meeker’s 2017 Internet trends report. Savvy brands are: shifting from ads to content, digging into VR, moving from Internet to smartphones, timing when they seek their audience (& being channel-specific), and embracing immersive storytelling. Tres chic.
Don’t let being out of the loop slow you down. Tune in each Friday for The Storyteller Agency’s Friday Fix and stay on top of what’s hot in content marketing.
