You won’t believe the buzz I’ve been hearing lately … that content just seems like hard work!
And then you may wonder, do I really need to do it?
Believe
Hard work? It can be! The statement usually comes as a result of these main issues:
- You are spending a lot of time creating content that isn’t getting a lot of attention (no engagement).
- You don’t have a lot of time to create content so you might be inconsistent.
- You aren’t getting results you want from your content. Hence, the time you are putting into it isn’t giving any form of return on investment (ROI).
You must remember one thing about content and social media; when you put content out there (content marketing in general) it’s a slow burn. It can take time to get traction … especially, if you don’t have the right words.
Content marketing is there to provide value, build trust, allow your audience to fall in love with you, to build a connection and relationship with you.
That is its primary focus.
Everything else is a bonus and requires a strategy.
These bonuses might include getting more conversions (so more people are downloading, signing up to an email list), or getting more sales and clients. That is absolutely possible and doable with your content, but always remember its main primary purpose is to engage, educate and entertain first and foremost!
THE GOLDEN RULES OF CONTENT
1. Your content
There are different strategies for each form of content:
- Video has a different strategy to podcast
- Podcast has a different strategy to email marketing,
- Email marketing has a different strategy to social media marketing.
It’s all very similar but they do all have their own place and strategy.
2. It’s something you have to schedule into your week
I wouldn’t suggest doing your content
It helps to know what you are putting out there and what your business besties want from you because it works to overcome and alleviate the problem of not getting a return on your investment (ROI).
If you know what they want, they will see your value and invest in that.
3. It’s important to know why you’re even doing content
What is your goal? Why are you putting this stuff out there? And are you excited about it?!
When you know that, it makes creating content so much easier.
If your self-talk is like: “Ugh, she told me I have to put out posts every day” and that’s the goal for you,
If you come at it with a goal of getting more engagement (increasing likes and followers), more inquiries coming through, more sales coming through, getting new clients – or at least the opportunity to chat to people to enroll them as a new client – how much more excited are you going to be about sitting down to create your content?
When you have a goal for your content you will see the difference it makes.
My goal is always to get more engagement from social media. I try to find out ways that will spark interest, be funny, be different or share something I know is trending; then I KNOW that will get more engagement.
This comes through knowing your business besties and what they want from you. Try different things, take risks and put something else out there that you generally would not have done in the past.
4. Do it with great energy
I wrote a great post about how to “Marie Kon” your content recently. Marie Kondo, the Japanese de-clutterer and life organizer, says that
It got me thinking that if we went into writing our content with so much joy and great energy, imagine what the outcome would be.
Imagine; people reading it and how they would feel. They would hang off your every word and want more from you!
CHALLENGE: Try changing your energy towards your content and see how it makes a difference!
5. Have a plan
Content would be so much easier if you knew what you were going to write about, right?! If you know who it’s to, why you are doing it, how you want to step it out and the required call-to-action, it will make all the difference.
I’ve been doing it for quite some time so forgive me if I make it sound like it’s super easy. It will be really easy once you get these things nutted out. But it does take practice!
I was talking to one of my beautiful clients recently and she told me:
“Sometimes I feel that my work is just not good enough to put out there”.
I reassured her that, “Yes, it is good enough, and it just takes practice to put yourself out there and feel good about it!”.
6. If things don’t go according to plan…
If you don’t get the result or the type of engagement that you want; that’s fine, you chalk it up to experience! You either say “Okay, that’s something I’m not going to do again” or “I’m going to check my words and try again next time”.
You will get better at it, I promise.
When something doesn’t work out the way you would have liked … There might be certain feelings that come up, including for myself:
- You feel your content writing is getting in your way or you feel you’re not a good writer.
- You don’t think people will want to hear from you.
- You are concerned with being good enough.
When I first started, some of the content I put out there was, my gosh, I have no words! I really didn’t think anyone would want to hear from me; let alone be interested in what I had to say.
But now, I can sit down and write a post in minutes and people engage! I know my topic, I know my audience, what I want to say, my call-to-action and all of the other important elements that spark interest and engagement.
My friends, don’t let that get in your way.
All these feelings are very natural and sometimes it’s not going to be your best work and that’s simply because you’ve got so many things on the go, you’ve got heaps of projects or not feeling very well today. That is fine.
Let me tell you:
“Done is better than perfect”
“Prolific is better than perfect”
“Progression is better than perfect”
It is good enough, even if it’s just 80% good enough, post it.
7. Have a template to follow
This will make content writing so much easier. There are plenty of structures out there. But I stick to a structure I have used for 5+ years to get engagement, leads
It’s the Word Styling Hour Glass Figure and its job is to make content writing easy and fun!
And speaking of templates, I’ve included the link to my Free Content Writing Pack. It has some frameworks to follow, a blog writing template, and some simple mistakes to avoid. It’s a valuable starting point. It’s free – it’s 10 pages!
Meanwhile,
Take a look at my 8-week online experience called Content 2 Ca$h where I will take you through the 7 strategies and 7 pieces of content you need to get that WOW FACTOR online to grow your profile and business.
