content strategy (2)

Posts Tagged ‘content strategy’

What Makes A Good Customer?

Thursday, March 11th, 2010

In a word: Fit.

Businesses used to go for low margins and high volume, which meant anyone fit the model. It made sense for business to appeal to the widest number of people it could.

Customers aren’t like they were. The crowds that used to line up to buy are now overloaded with the number of choices they have. There’s no way you can undersell the internet.

So why try? It makes more sense to charge for originality. And that’s where customer fit plays such a crucial roll.

If you’re paying attention to your entire online presence, you can tell who’s responding to you and who’s not. Take a look at your posts. Are more people reading about vacations than about adventure? Those are the people who want a good fit.

When the big kid on the block starts to take over your market, you can try to compete. But what if you don’t? There are lots and lots of people out there that don’t want to play with the big kid. They want a company that will hand deliver, that will call them by name. They want to find the business that fits.

On reason people want fit is because it’s just as easy to find a quality experience as it is to find a low priced experience. The lowest price tour is a click away. But so is a list of customer reviews. Read some reviews, find a product that fits, and you know what happens next. They buy.

And still, fit is at a premium. People that make products that fit can charge more than the ones that try to sell to everyone. Everyone is cheap. The people who want a good fit will pay for it.

It pays to find customers that fit.

What are your thoughts? Exceptions?

Tags: business relationships, business trust, content, content marketing, content strategy, Digital Marketing, Marketing
Posted in Digital Marketing | No Comments »

Who Gets To Say “I Don’t Get It” ?

Friday, March 5th, 2010

If your customer doesn’t get it, you have three options:

1. You can try to make them understand, and explain why they should be interested in you.

2. You can reshape your product to fit them.

3. You can write the customer off.

Number one can be done with a lot of work ahead of time. With a good content strategy and a clear idea of your vision, you’re heading off most of the problems at the gate.

Number two usually has the worst results. The customer is rarely satisfied if your product is changed, even at their request, and here’s why: You do it the way you do it for a reason. Because it’s the best. You’ve found the product that will deliver exactly what you propose to offer. When you change that around to fit everyone’s needs, an essential element of your business breaks down. It’s what made you you.

Number three should be done a lot more to avoid number two.

Tags: business relationships, business trust, content, content strategy, marketing strategy
Posted in Digital Marketing | 1 Comment »

A Brief Post About Content Brief Contents

Friday, January 15th, 2010

Content should be central to your projects.

The cool thing is, that’s happening more and more.

And I have to say that I really, really like that. Thinking about marketing strategies from a content POV has always been important. It’s how I got started working with Matterhorn in the first place. I’m saying that the focus is changing.

Not just around here. Out there.

Why is that? One reason is search. Google is rolling out new SERPS that are heavily influenced by content quality. And quantity. Well, one begets the other. Creating a lot of quality content is going to help your ranking, plain and simple.

That’s not news. But the fact that that content can come from anywhere, like facebook or twitter or urbanspoon or yelp, is. Or at least, the extent to which social content matters is news. It’s becoming more important every day.

Another reason to focus on content, and we’re mainly talking written content here, is because text is messy as hell (a direct quote from Content Strategy For The Web).

Meaning, if you leave content out of your plan, or think that you’re including it by writing the word “content” somewhere on a mindmap, you’re going to wind up a week away from the day you launch your site saying something like, “Man, we need to put some content up, quick.”

If no one “owns” the content you’re creating, you’re looking at no content. Or crappy content. That’s a terrific way to fail.

And this means that your (content) briefs need to contain more than just deliverables. They need to contain plans. They have to identify why you’re writing what you’re writing. There has to be a measurable element to your work that tells the rest of the team how this piece of content fits.

There are a lot of good reasons to focus on content. What are yours?

Tags: content, content marketing, content strategy, google social search
Posted in Content Creation | No Comments »

Why Audit Your Online Content?

Monday, January 11th, 2010

Because you can.

Meaning, digital content is easier to manipulate than other forms of content. So use that to your advantage when you work on your digital marketing by going through an audit.

That doesn’t mean it’s easy to do. A content audit can be a bear of a project to tackle. Some people even recommend a continual audit, if your assets are big enough to demand it.

And just for clarification, we’re defining an audit as building a spreadsheet that lists your assets by going through everything you’ve got, and IDing it all. You inventory the category, the keywords, the meta data, the traffic, the strength of the writing, the consistency of the writing, and on and on. The more info you account for, the better you’ve audited.

A content audit can be like a bit of light housekeeping, or a spring clean where you have to rent a dumpster. It all depends on the kind of maintenance you do, and what condition your content was in when you moved it in.

Why (Really)

So, a bit beyond “because you can”, here are some reasons to audit:

-You’re getting a new site. Don’t take all your junk with you; audit before the move, and only take what’s useful. Same goes for a site overhaul, where reasons for an audit don’t need much explaining.

-You’re looking at your analytics. Amazingly, very few small businesspeople are actually paying attention to where their traffic comes from, where it goes, and what it does while it’s there. If you’re one that does, do an audit to see what people are actually doing on your site. Then, make more content like that.

-You’re organized. It’s one thing to have a site map, and quite another to have an audit. It’s the difference between the TV you have now and something like this. It’s easier to see what you’ve got.

-You want to find out what you need. An audit is just as good at showing you the holes in your content strategy as it is at showing you where your strengths are, especially if…

-You’re doing keyword research. It sure will be nice to have an at-a-glance reference at where you can put your research to work. Tweaking keywords can be tedious, but usually because there’s not a good enough map to follow. Your audit will take care of that.

It’s about time for an audit of the Matterhorn site. I’ll let you know what we find.

Tags: content, content marketing, content strategy, marketing strategy
Posted in Content Creation | No Comments »

Thoughts on Content Strategy

Thursday, January 7th, 2010

This is what I’ve been reading lately: Content Strategy For The Web by Kristina Halvorson.

It’s a great book. I wrote a quick review of it on Amazon, though it’s the kind of book that I’m not even close to taking full advantage of yet. I love those.

Content Strategy is about creating and implementing a plan that uses all of your digital goods (your content) to support the best online experience you can. And it’s really hit its stride lately.

It’s no fad. Or, at least, it shouldn’t be. CS is a new ontology, a smart way to prepare our most important digital assets.

What I also like about CS is that content (especially text) is finally getting its due. What used to be the mongrel of the web development world now has the pedigree status it deserves. As a writer, I’m happy to see it, if only because so much content, especially written content, sucks.

Okay, so I’m biased. Doesn’t matter.

For a little more overview, there’s a skimpy wikipedia entry and a bulging google knol on CS for some overview. The knol authors all have blogs worth reading. Also on the overview side of things, there’s this post on A List Apart, also by Kristina Halvorson. Here’s your definition of CS in 1000 words or less. Can you tell I’m a fan?

So, what’s been most helpful so far?

Well, aside from creating a way to talk about content not being neglected, it’s got to be the process that comes along with taking good care of content. In the past, I had always kept my process for creation pretty close to what I had learned way back in the creative writing days. I research. I outline. I draft. I revise.

I’m now creating a much, much wider scope for the process than I’m used to. I’s not just writing. More like a strategy for content, if you will. I’m still working on a smaller scale than, for example, Richard Sheffield’s mindmap for CS. Most of what I’m doing in in the Creative and Process arms of that structure, and I’m in the process of building a mindmap of my own for my particular workflow.

So if you meet with a wordy-type like myself in 2010, and they start talking Content Strategy in capital letters, you’ll know what the landscape looks like.

Oh, and if you’re really interested in CS, you should definitely make plans for this.

Tags: blogs, books, content, content strategy
Posted in Content Creation | No Comments »

Spoiler Alert: Social Media Dies In 2010

Monday, December 28th, 2009

Kind of. It’s a semantics thing. Talking about “social media” will ID you as an outsider. More on that in a bit.

I love end-of-year lists as much as I love new year’s predictions. I think it’s worth a little reflection -hey, we just went around the sun- and history’s a great teacher. Plus, you can check in on what brilliant people are thinking, which is always a good way to spend time.

Now’s the time to make (spot on) preditctions for the new year…

-”Social Media” will lose it’s distinction. In 2010, the internet is social media. The medium thrives, but the name will distinguish active participants from newbies.

-Content Strategy will be a touchstone for good digital marketing. If your content is the substance of who you are online, your strategy determines how it will all walk and talk in any online medium. Why is this new? Because before 2010, very few people planned for it.

-Video is going to be more important than it used to be, which is to say, pretty damn important. Good marketers are going to have interesting video to post, in lots of places.

-Search engine optimization is going to be more varied, more interesting, and more demanding than ever. With all of the avenues that social search is opening, SEO once again will be the digital discipline that’s needed by everyone, and understood by few.

-Nearly every online business will have some sort of regularly refreshed content. Either blogs or microblogs will define how well business know their customers. More determined businesses will create more ways to connect (podcasts, slidesharing, or the aforementioned video).

-The biggest challenge for businesses online will be how they’ll use those tools to distinguish themselves. The ones that try to please everyone will fail, or at best, not improve. The ones that create their own voice in a space that’s crowded with voices will reach their goals.

-Whoever gives the most will win. This has long been the information age; it’s now becoming the free information age. It’s not a huge stretch from where we’ve been. Everyone wants to give away good information about what they do. The success of your information will be determined by how easy it is to get, and how reliable you are when you give it.

Well, that’s what’s on my mind. What’s on yours?

Tags: content, content strategy, Digital Marketing, online reputation management, Social Media
Posted in Digital Marketing | No Comments »

A Blog About Digital Marketing…

Stay in Touch

Receive Our Email Newsletter

Archives

Categories

Matterhorn Marketing

Posts Tagged ‘content strategy’

What Makes A Good Customer?

Who Gets To Say “I Don’t Get It” ?

Why Audit Your Online Content?

Thoughts on Content Strategy