Marketing Expert Series: Ann Handley

My name is Ann Handley. I'm Chief Content Officer of MarketingProfs. I'm the author of Everybody Writes, your go-to guide to creating ridiculously good content. What I talked about here at Content Norway, Epic Content Marketing, was really about the idea that we need to challenge our assumptions as content marketers. And what do I mean by that? I mean that there's lots of things now that we've been doing for a couple years. Content marketing is increasingly at the heart of what we are doing to attract customers to us. And so I think that we are now at this inflection point. I think we're now at this point where we say, okay, we're sort of understanding how marketing or content marketing works. We're understanding what it means to be a, quote, unquote, publisher. And so I'm challenging marketers to then just iterate, to improve, to take it to the next level. And by doing that, I think that you'll take your business to the next level. So that's really the bones of what I talked about today. There's a lot of content that we're producing now that isn't necessarily meeting its objectives. So I shared a stat on stage today that talked about how a lot of us are spending lots of money on content that we're producing. A lot of us are using content marketing, yet just one in four of us, or 25 percent of all content marketers who are using content marketing, at least in the UK, really know that that content is meeting their objectives. They term it, quote, unquote, successful. And so what I wanted to do is say, let's get that number up a little bit. Let's take it from 25 to 40 to 50 to 60. I think there's great opportunity there, and I think that's why so many folks that are going into content marketing are using content marketing. But at the same time, I think there's tremendous opportunity to do more with the content that we're producing. So I talked about challenging our assumptions a little bit, challenge the way that you've always done things, with an eye toward doing it better. Creating content that actually will drive business for your company, creating content that your customers want, that they love, that they'll value, and also thinking through more strategically, when should we maybe slow down a little bit and actually talk to customers, create a sort of slow marketing mindset at certain points where we think it's important to connect with our customers. There's lots and lots of technology solutions out there. You never have to talk to customers if you don't want to, but I think marketers need to talk to customers, and I also think that we need to look strategically at our businesses and say, what are those key points when we maybe don't need a technology solution? Maybe we need to just have a conversation with a customer, or maybe we need to do a little hand holding. Maybe we need to surprise them a little bit with something. So there's no real prescription, but I think there is a mindset that says we're going to look for those moments to surprise and delight people and to really think about those points when it matters most. I think that marketers are still very much in the marketer mindset and not in the customer mindset. I think a lot of us are still thinking about starting a piece of content when we say we need a piece of content for something. We need to send out an email, or we need to produce a video, or we need new frequently asked questions for the website, or we need some new copy for here. It's the wrong place to start any kind of content program. Instead, you have to think about it from your customer's point of view. So don't start with, I need a piece of content for. Start with, our customers need what? So what do your customers need? What will they value? That sounds like an obvious shift, but believe me, I talk to a lot of marketers worldwide, and invariably, that's the pressure that they have. Now it's like, we have a deadline next week, we have to send out an email on Tuesday. So what I'm suggesting is that you need to back up a little bit. You need to plan out your week. I mean, sorry, plan out your content strategy that doesn't start with Tuesday, starts with a customer. I'm a big fan of long form content in the right scenario. I think that in our always on video world, lots of great video, lots of great podcasts are being produced. That's amazing. Lots of great opportunity there, but there's also a lot of great content still with long form content, things that your audience can really sink their teeth into. I still think that there's a big opportunity there for marketers to create content that their audiences will value. Now I'm not saying the first touch point is the point where you want to hit your customer with something long form. Maybe that's not the right way to entice them, but I think especially further on down the It absolutely is. And even the notion of funnel actually is sort of archaic in a lot of ways. But even the notion of just the idea of really using long form content, I think there's great opportunities with long form content. So I would say that as a writer, but I don't think that it's either video or writing. I think actually the two of them together work really well. So that's the first thing I'd say. From a pure fun point of view, my favorite social platform is Instagram. I love Instagram. I just think it's a great platform because it's fun, it's short, it's quick. But it's also like, I don't know, I actually think about Instagram probably more than I think about say any other social platform on there. I mean, I'll dash off something on Facebook or on Twitter, but I never dash off anything on Instagram. I actually think about it. It's a much more considered decision for me what I post there. So I love Instagram. I think it's a great platform, both from a video as well as visual standpoint. But again, there's also an opportunity if you add some text in there that either makes a humorous comment or maybe describes what's going on a little bit more richly, more fully. It's also a great storytelling platform. So Instagram is probably one of my favorite. And my third, so long form content, Instagram, my third would be podcasts. I think podcasts as a storytelling medium is really interesting. I just finished S-Town. Have you listened to S-Town over here? Fantastic, fantastic podcast. Yeah, S-Town. It's produced by the same people who put out Serial, if you heard of Serial over here. So what I love about S-Town though from a content perspective, so I mean, it's fun to listen to. It's seven hours of content. It's an interesting story. But from what I like about it from a marketing point of view is that it's great narrative. It's great storytelling. Instead of thinking about podcasts as just like another audio, like sequential audio, instead what they did, the producers did, is that they recorded, I mean, it had to be hours and hours and hours of audio material. And then they shaped it into something that would resemble a narrative arc. They broke some rules with storytelling. I mean, it's just fantastic. So I think there's a lot of opportunity there to do some interesting things. There are some brands who I think are doing some interesting things with it. Let me think about this for a second. Slack, I talked about Slack at Epic Content Marketing last year. Slack has a really great podcast. Prudential has a great podcast that they just launched. So I think there's a lot of interesting things going on in the podcast world. I think we're going to see more and more and more of it. So I don't know how secret this is, but I think an untapped opportunity for a lot of companies with content marketing and something that I think about all the time is thinking about the video captions that you're using in your video content. So in a world where a lot of the content that we're producing, for Facebook, I mean, when people are viewing video content, for example, on Facebook, I read a stat recently that up to 85% of that is on silent mode. So that means that they're actually not just looking at your video, but they're also reading it. So think about the captions as an opportunity to tell a little bit of a richer story there. I've seen a couple of examples of that recently that have really impressed me. So rather than just sort of stating the obvious of what's going on on the screen, which you know because you're watching it, instead they've hired writers to describe what's going on the scene and tell a richer story. So that's another example, I think, of using writing and video together. It's not either or. It's both to make a stronger product.