But for today, I have a post that deals with a common misconception that some business owners have. Let me explain…
Many business owners ask these same questions:
Why do you need SEO?
Why do you need content marketing?
Why do you need a website?
And they never realize the answer is a very simple one that is foolish to overlook.
I’ll explain what I mean in just a minute. But first I want to share a story that I found in an old book from 1910 called The Science of Advertising by Edwin Balmer.
Why? Because it will make what I’m about to tell you make much more sense.
In the book, Balmer tells this story…
“In 1666, London was practically wiped out by fire. The printer of the London Gazette, with almost prophetic acumen, offered his columns for notices of new locations of shops
“But though practically every important shop in the city was moved, there was absolutely no response to this offer.
“The old locations had never been known through the newspapers, so why should anyone look there for the new (locations)?”
— The Science of Advertising, Edwin Balmer
Why do you need to be concerned about things like SEO, content marketing, and/or a website?
Because that is the way your business will be found today.
Many years ago, people might have found out about you through the phone book. Or maybe they discovered your business by walking by.
Well, those days are long gone.
This Is Why You Need SEO
The way they’re going to find your business today is by typing in the product or service you offer and the name of your city (or just the words “near me”) into Google.
If your business doesn’t show up, then it doesn’t exist in that person’s mind.
SEO (search engine optimization) helps you to optimize your website so it shows up when people type in what you offer.
This Why You Need Content Marketing
Another way they might find your business is if you create content that answers their questions, solves their problems, entertains, or even educates them.
Then when they go to Google and type in their questions, your business (if it’s optimized and has great content) will be discovered by them.
If it doesn’t appear, they’ll never know that your business is an option.
This is Why You Need a Website
The reason you need a website is because it increases the chance that your business will show up in Google when people go searching for what you offer.
The reason you need a website is because it is the place that can hold the content you create, which will help your business to be found.
Don’t Just Rely on Yelp
You might say, “I don’t need things. People already find our business online.”
If that’s true, then it’s probably because you or someone else made sure that your business is listed on Yelp.
That’s great. But that’s not enough.
You see, people that find you on Yelp still want to know more about you, your business, your products, or your services.
If you don’t focus on SEO, then you will always be 100% dependent on Yelp.
If you don’t create content, then you will lose a very valuable way that you could make your business stand out from your competition.
If you don’t have a website, then you will never be able to break free from reliance on Yelp. Plus, you’ll lose your ability to stand out in the marketplace.
The choice is yours. You can just keep things the way they’ve always been. That’s what business owners in London did 354 years ago.
Does that look like such a smart decision now?
P.S. If you’d like help in making sure that your business is found, so you don’t get left behind in the past, then contact me and we can discuss services that I offer that can help you. Click here to contact me now.
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“Backlinko is an online marketing blog that Dean launched in 2010. The site has grown rapidly over the past five years and currently receives nearly 100,000 visitors a month—a significant number for a blog in the insanely competitive SEO niche. “
— ERIC SIU, SingleGrain.com
(NOTE: Make sure to check out Eric’s article to learn 10 SEO lessons we can learn from Brian.)
I personally discovered Brian and Backlinko back in 2016 when I first learned about his ingenious content marketing/link building method that he calls “The Skyscraper Technique“.
It was during this interview that I heard Brian reveal the two ways he focuses on email:
1.He said that his main focus on his SEO site is his email list.
He does this because he knows he needs to warm up and nurture his subscribers before they’ll be willing to become clients for his high-end course (that is only offered 2 times a year).
2. One of the things he does whenever he doesn’t know what to do is focus on building his email list.
Not only that, he says that everyone should focus on building their email list.That again is really interesting considering he’s an SEO expert.
Why does Brian focus on email?
Because when Brian first began experimenting online, he began to follow an online guru who said that there were two questions that he always asked himself to see how his day went::
1. DID I BUILD MY EMAIL LIST? 2. DID I SERVE MY EMAIL LIST?
If this old online guru was able to say, “Yes,” to both of these questions, then he considered it a good day.
If he couldn’t, he made sure to correct that problem that very day or the next day at the latest.
Brian never forgot this lesson. That’s why, to this very day, SEO expert Brian Dean is always focusing on email.
Don’t get me wrong. Brian does use SEO in very powerful and creative ways. But he doesn’t rely only on SEO to grow his business.
Brian Is Not Alone with This Focus on Email
In case you think that Brian is crazy or an anomaly, he’s not.
All of the smartest digital marketers and content marketers know the importance of an email list.
“All these emails are from big social media platforms, so they can engage you with the content on their platform and get you to visit their app or website again.
“All social media platforms are building an email list because they are smart business owners. This helps their valuation when selling their business.
“While social media is a great way to reach your audience, it’s important to keep in perspective the timely nature of social media platforms.
“For business owners, email lists can yield dramatic rewards. According to the Direct Marketing Association, email marketing on average sees a 4300 percent return on investment (ROI) for businesses in the US. Can you say that about your social media marketing campaign?”
— Syed Balkhi, OptinMonster.com
You see? That’s why I say that all smart digital marketers and content marketers also know the importance of building an email list.
But here’s where things get really interesting.
Spoiler Alert: This Focus on Building an Email List is a Very Old Direct Marketing Practice
The importance of building an email list actually comes from an old school practice that came long before email was even invented.
The early direct marketers knew the same thing that Brian Dean knows.
One of the most powerful things about direct marketing is the ability to build and own your own list of prospects that you can market to.
That’s not all.
If you sit all of the top copywriters down in one room and ask them what the most important thing in direct response is, do you know what they’ll say?
They will tell you that the most important thing in direct response is the list.
(*If you pick the right list, your job will be much easier. If you don’t, you’ll see very little results, no matter how powerful your content or copy is.)
In direct mail, you either build the list or you can rent one. But when it comes to email, your main option is to build your list. (Renting email lists can get you in a lot of trouble.)
The importance of a list was important in the early days of direct response and it still remains important today for all content marketers and digital marketers.
I Don’t Know About You, But I Know What I’m Going to Do
Some of the greatest things that have ever been achieved throughout history were accomplished, not because of intelligence or power, but because of passion.
They were achieved by people who were so passionateabout what they were doing that they saw no other option but to accomplish their goal
What do you think made Thomas Edison try 9,000 times before he perfected the light bulb?
If he wasn’t passionate about it, he would’ve quit after the 10th or 20th try.
It takes passion to go past the 8,000th failed attempts and keep trying 1001 more times.
I came across a story that really reveals the power of passion…
A Boy Named Sparky
There was once a young boy who went by the nickname “Sparky.”
School was almost impossible for Sparky.
He failed every subject in the 8th grade.
He flunked physics, Latin, Algebra, and English when he was in high school.
He didn’t do any better in sports.
He finally managed to make the school golf team, but he lost the only important match of the year.
There was a consolation match and he lost that, too.
All through school, Sparky was socially awkward.
He wasn’t actually disliked by the other kids; just ignored.
He was surprised if any kid ever said “hi” to him outside of school.
In high school, Sparky never once asked a girl out. He was too afraid of being rejected.
Sparky was what other kids would call a loser.
Sparky, his classmates, and everyone else knew it, so he just accepted it.
But one thing was important to Sparky: drawing.
He was proud of his own artwork, even though no one else seemed to be.
In his senior year of high school, he submitted some cartoons to the editors of his yearbook. His drawings were turned down.
Even though this was a pretty painful rejection, Sparky knew he had found his passion.
After graduating from high school, he wrote a letter to Walt Disney Studios.
They told him to send some samples of his artwork and they gave him the subject matter for a cartoon he needed to submit.
Sparky drew the suggested cartoon. He spent a lot of time on it and on the other drawings.
One day the reply from the Disney Studios finally came.
He had been rejected again.
Sparky ended up writing his autobiography in his own cartoons.
His cartoons described his childhood self: a little-boy loser and chronic under-achiever.
He was the little cartoon boy whose kite would never fly, who never succeeded in kicking the football, and who became the most famous cartoon character of all… Charlie Brown!
Sparky, the boy who failed every subject in the eighth grade and whose work was rejected again and again, was Charles Schulz.
What gave him the courage to face all those rejections? Passion.
A passion for drawing.
You could also call it “enthusiasm” or “desire”.
Emerson said this…”Every great and commanding moment in the annals of the world is the triumph of some enthusiasm.”
W. Clement Stone, in his bookThe Success System That Never Fails, said that the first step to achieving success was to possess what he called “inspiration to action.”
That’s what I’m talking about when I’m talking about passion.
Why do I want you to see that passion is so important for you to have?
Because succeeding in any area takescourage, persistence, and determination.
If you have enough passion, it will give you the enthusiasm to do something!
Passion is what will get you to take action – even when you’re scared.
Passion is what will get you to keep trying when you fail.
Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936), the Nobel Prize-winning author of the classics Gunga Din and The Jungle Book, said it like this when he wrote…
“If you do not get what you want, it is a sure sign that you did not seriously want it.”
– Rudyard Kipling
What I want to remind you today is that one of the most important keys to succeeding in business or in life is passion.
Not because it’s a magic ingredient, but because it causes you to do all of the other things that lead to success.
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Are you creating amazing content, but you’re still having trouble getting any attention with it?
If you are, then keep reading.
Because I’m about to reveal a powerful way to not only make your content stand out, but also make it more valuable.
I’ll explain more of what I mean in just a minute, but first, you need to hear this story. (This story will tie into the lesson we can learn from “Hot Ones”.)
It might seem like a strange story to start with. The reality is that within this story is the solution to your problem…
Not Your Average Albertsons
There is an Albertsons near us that is not your average Albertsons.
It’s more like Albertsons on steroids. It’s the Disneyland of Albertsons.
This is what makes it so special:
They have wide aisles.
There is a bar within the store called Talon Tap and Spirits.
They have a full-Service Asian Bistro
There’s a fresh sushi station
They have a Starbucks
There’s an olive bar
And an oyster bar
There’s also a pizza area
And more
My mom was visiting from out of town and was amazed at the store, the variety of products that they had, and the way things were displayed.
I didn’t realize it yet but I was about to come across something that would remind me of a very important marketing lesson. A marketing lesson that I am going to share with you today.
You see, we went down a spice aisle and I came across a row of salts that caught my eye.
It was salt from a company I had never heard of before calledJacobsen Salt Co.
As you can see in the picture above, what made these salts stand out to me was the unique flavors:
Habenero Salt
Basil Salt
Black Pepper Salt
And Garlic Salt (Ok,this one isn’t that unique!)
It was at that moment that an important marketing — and content marketing — lesson came to my mind.
How You Make an Average, Common Product or Piece of Content Stand Out in a Crowded Market
I realized that the Jacobsen Salt Co. had applied an important marketing lesson that we all should learn from. Let me explain…
You see, they took an average, common product (salt) and they transformed it into something that’s above-average and unique.
How? By adding something new and different to it.
They added habanero, basil, etc. And by adding to it, it became above-average and unique.
You can do the same thing not only with any product or service, but you can also do that to any piece of content that you create.
Don’t believe me? Ok, I’ll prove it to you.
Hot Ones: How to Spice Up Your Typical Interview Show
A show that’s based on an interview format is nothing new. In fact, according to Wikipedia, there are 93 talk shows.
So, if you were to create a new talk show, you’d have a really hard time standing out and building an audience.
But what if you decided to use the lesson from Jacobsen Salt Co. and add something to your talk show?
That’s exactly what Christopher Schonberger did when he created the web series Hot Ones produced by First We Feast and Complex Media.
The basic premise of the show is to have host Sean Evans interview celebrities while they eat from a platter spicy chicken wings that increasingly gets hotter and hotter.
That simple and unique concept has enabled Chris and this show to stand out in a crowded market!
If you haven’t seen an episode, check out this one with Paul Rudd. (Warning: Sometimes the guests cuss in response to the hotter and hotter wings they eat.)
How a Marketing Guru Applies This Concept to Make His Content More Valuable
In case you don’t know who Dan Kennedy is, he’s the marketing guru who many of the top online marketers trace their success back to.
Well, many years ago Dan Kennedy came up with something that he calls “Magnetic Marketing”, and it’s still a powerful way to market any product or service.
Dan is a perfect example of adding something new/different to your marketing and/or product.
How? You see, he took his same basic product and applied it to dentists and chiropractors.
The same core product (i.e. content) was the same. But he created new and additional content that showed how to apply his concepts uniquely to dental practices and chiropractor practices.
The result? He was able to sell these courses at a higher price than just the generic product. Why? Because he added something new/different to his coursethat applied to a specific group of people.
That means that when you add to your content you not only make it stand out, but you also make it more valuable in the eyes of your ideal prospects.
How to Apply This to Your Content Marketing
Here are three questions you can ask that will help you to take what I’ve talked about today and easily apply it to the content you create:
Is there something new and different you can add to your content that will make it stand out? (Jacobsen Salt Co added unique flavors. Hot Ones added spicy wings.)
Is there a different target market that you can create content for which is less crowded than the current one that you’re in? (Dan did this by tweaking his course so that it would help dentists and chiropractors.)
Is there a different format that you can create your content in which will make it stand out? (Pat Flynn, from the Smart Passive Podcast, discovered that when he created content in the form of a podcast instead of just blog posts, that people began waiting in anticipation for it.)
How You Can Learn “Magnetic Marketing”
By the way, if you’ve never heard of “Magnetic Marketing”, you’re in luck. Dan finally came out with a book that teaches you everything you need to know about it.
Stay Tuned Tomorrow for a Unique Way I Will Present Content to You
I want to reveal one other way that you can create unique content that will stand out in the market.
I’m going to do that by presenting a unique way to take the content in this post and create another post that will be valuable to you in a completely different way.
In fact, it will help you improve your content creation skills.
Stay tuned and see what I mean.
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It’s been said that a 30-second commercial shown during the 2020 Super Bowl cost advertisers $5.6 million.
That’s a LOT of money! Normally, most of us rate the best Super Bowl commercials based solely on what commercials are the most entertaining.
What I Thought the Three Best 2020 Super Bowl Commercials Were (Based on EntertainmentValue)
Based on just being the most entertaining, I personally thought these were the best Super Bowl commercials this year…
Smaht Pahk | 2020 Hyundai Sonata | Hyundai
Cheetos® | Can’t Touch This | SUPER BOWL LIV OFFICIAL EXTENDED VIDEO
Jason Momoa Super Bowl Commercial 2020 | Rocket Mortgage
For us as individuals, entertainment is a fine criterion for a great Super Bowl commercial.
But if you’re a company spending $5.6 million dollars on a Super Bowl commercial, then the only criteria that really matters is whether the commercial helps you to sell more and/or gains more leads.
Look, if your business or company has a lot of money and the product or service you offer is:
A commodity
Inexpensive and therefore doesn’t require much risk to purchase it
Or is typically purchased not long after someone desires it (i.e. has a very short buying cycle)
… then you will probably see some results from strictly using brand advertising like Coca-Cola does.
Otherwise, the wisest, best kind of Super Bowl ad for you to use is:
The kind of ad that makes an offer
The kind that asks for a direct way for people to respond to it
Why are these the best and smartest type of Super Bowl ads for companies?
There are two reasons:
1. You can capture leads. 2. You can measure the effectiveness of your ads.
Without an offer or direct way for people to respond, there’s no real way to capture leads or know if your Super Bowl commercial is effective or not.
What I Thought the Best 2020 Super Bowl Commercials Were (Based on Potential for ROI)
With that in mind, here are what I think were the best (aka most effective) 2020 Super Bowl commercials (in no particular order).
1. Winona in Winona (Big Game 2020 Extended Commercial) | Squarespace
Why did I choose the Winonan/Squarespace commercial?
It had an indirect offer by adding a URL at the end.
And they used the curiosity factor as a way to encourage you to visit the URL.
2.QuickBooks Happy Business: Karate Kid Live Bookkeeping
Why did I choose the QuickBooks Live commercial?
This is one of the few videos that had a direct offer. The offer was “Get set up with a Live Bookkeeper.”
FULL DISCLOSURE: I work for Intuit but I would’ve chosen this ad even if I didn’t.
3.Loretta | Google Super Bowl Commercial 2020
Why did I choose the Google/Loretta commercial?
This ad made you want to use Google and in that sense had an indirect offer.
4. Best Thing Since Sliced Bread | Little Caesars Big Game Extended Cut
Why did I choose the Sliced Bread/Little Caesars commercial?
People love to eat during and after the Super Bowl and this commercial indirectly showed you a way to fulfill that desire, right away.
5.P&G Presents: When We Come Together, an Interactive Super Bowl Party, America’s Choice
Why did I choose P & G/We Come Together commercial?
I chose this because they included a URL at the end of the commercial and created a whole interactive website.This again was an indirect offer.
6. Facebook Groups: Ready to Rock? I Super Bowl 2020
Why did I choose the Facebook Groups/Ready to Rock commercial?
Because this commercial used social proof as an indirect incentive to get you to try Facebook Groups.
How Could Any of These Ads Be Made Better?
If I wanted to improve any of these commercials, I would test three things:
Adding more benefits that customers gain from the productor service
Give a more specific call to action
Adding a reason for people to respond now
Most Powerful and Effective Ad During the Whole 2020 Super Bowl?
But possibly the most effective 2020 Super Bowl ad wasn’t a commercial at all. It was seeing all of the people at the Super Bowl using Verizon’s 5G service.
I thought that was really powerful. And if 5G was really as amazing as it’s supposed to be, they probably also created a lot of word-of-mouth from anyone who used it at the game. Because they went home and told all their friends how cool it was.
What Do You Think?
Did I miss a commercial that you thought was effective (not just entertaining?
Do you agree with my criteria for what makes the best Super Bowl commercial based on ROI?
What was your favorite Super Bowl commercial just based on entertainment value?
Believe it or not, there are some powerful content marketing lessons that we can learn from Christmas songs.
In this video, you’ll not only discover important content marketing lessons you can learn from Christmas songs, but you’ll also learn valuable content creation lessons.
In this video, you’ll discover:
Two important content marketing lessons that we can learn from Christmas songs.
Two takeaways that you can apply to your own content marketing.
And three methods you can use to produce your content based on the way popular artists create and record Christmas songs
The Surprising Content Marketing Lessons You Can Learn from Christmas Song (VIDEO)
Does it sound to you like I say, “Christmas sogs” at the beginning of the video? It does to me! I’m not sure what happened, but let’s pretend it didn’t happen! 🙂
It is a book written by the late, great Yogi Berra (1925-2015), the fifteen-time Major League Baseball All-Star.
In that book, there’s a chapter titled, “You Can Observe a Lot by Watching.” In that chapter, Yogi Berra tells a story I want to share with you…
“When I was announced as the manager [of the New York Yankees] after the ’63 season, a reporter asked me what I had picked up from Casey Stengel and Ralph Houk, the two managers I’d mostly played for. I said, ‘You can observe a lot by watching.’
Yogi goes on to say, “I always observed a lot. Even Casey used to call me his assistant manager because I was always observing everything. He trusted me to go out and tell a pitcher what he might be doing wrong.
“As a catcher, you do a lot of watching. You’re the only player who faces his own teammates. You observe the mannerisms and tendencies of opposing hitters and the actions of your pitcher. Observing is learning. If you pay attention, you can learn a lot.”
You might not have realized it, but you just learned a very important lesson that all marketers must learn.
If You Pay Attention, You Can Learn a Lot
There is a lot of marketing going on around us all of the time. Some of it is effective marketing and some of it’s not. Some of it is good and some of it is bad.
But we can always learn something by observing the marketing that’s around us:. We either learn what to do or what NOT to do.
We all just experienced three days of sales: Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, and Cyber Monday.
Besides getting great deals, we should also make sure to learn (or be reminded of) some great marketing methods.
3Marketing Lessons You Can Learn From Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, and Cyber Monday
Today, I want to point out just three of the important marketing lessons that we can learn from these three big sales days.
1. The Power of a Great Offer
If you paid attention over the last few days, then one of the lessons you would discover is the power of a great offer.
All of these big sales days are all about making the best offer possible in order to entice the most customers.
Well, one of the key things an effective direct response ad must have is an offer.
Without an offer, it’s not direct response marketing.
What is an offer? Your offer is what exactly it is that you are offering to your prospects or customers. It’s not just price (see below). It’s any and all that someone is getting when they purchase from you.
If you want to create powerful marketing, then you and your prospects must be absolutely clear on what exactly it is that you’re offering.
And if you want your marketing to be really effective, then your offer can’t be average. You must create a powerful, attractive offer.
The criteria for a powerful, attractive offer: The advertising legend, Claude Hopkins, described how to know if your offer is powerful enough…
“Make your offer so great that only a lunatic would refuse to buy”
— Claude Hopkins
2. The Power of Discounts
Come on. Face it. We all love a good deal.
And if you paid attention over the last few days, then another one of the lessons you would discover is the power of offering a discount.
Discounts are effective because they allows the buyer to purchase something they want and end up keeping more of their hard-earned money in their pockets. And everyone wants to do that!
One of the underlying keys to succeeding on these sales days is to figure out how to give the best discount possible, while at the same time making enough profit.
I don’t have time to go into all the effective ways to offer a great discount, because there’s almost a science to it.
But let me give you three basic ways to offer a discount:
You can offer a straight discount on a product or service.
You can offer a discount for buying more than one of a product or service.
You can offer a discount in the form of a payment plan.
If you want to learn more, I’d encourage you to observe how the stores around you offer discounts and see what you can learn by observing.
3. The Power of Urgency
If you paid attention over the last few days, then there’s one last lesson I want to point out: the power of urgency.
Let’s face it. Getting any of us to take action is very difficult. Even when we know something is important or needed, we still tend to procrastinate and delay doing anything.
What’s the solution? You must limit what you offer to your prospects and customers. I know that sounds counter-intuitive, but it’s the only way to get people to take you up on your offers and discounts.
The two basic ways to use the power of urgency are:
You must limit the amount of items or services that you offer at a discount.
You must limit the time period that your offer or discount is available.
When we realize that only a certain amount of people are going to get a particular offer or discount, or when we realize that an offer is only available on a certain day and/or time, THEN we finally decide to stop procrastinating and take action.
That’s why all of these sales limit at least the time period (only on ___ day or days) and some also offer limits in the amount of items/services we can purchase on those days.
How to Apply These Lessons to Your Marketing
Let me be clear, I’m not saying that I like everything about Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, and Cyber Monday.
I don’t like the frenzy that Black Friday causes. I don”t like that people and/or businesses can become greedy on these days, etc.
But there are still marketing lessons that we can learn from these days that can be applied in ways that don’t go against our consciences or make us feel sleazy.
As 2019 comes to a close and as 2020 is almost upon us, I’d encourage you to think about ways that you can apply these lessons to your marketing.
What kind of powerful and attractive offers can you create?
What kind of discounts can you offer to people that help them and still help your business or company to make money?
What kind of limits can you add to these offers to nudge people to take action, so that you can help them and your business or company can also grow?
And most importantly, how can you creatively COMBINE these three powerful marketing methods?
I am sharing it here today because I thought you would enjoy the content marketing ideas that it reveals.
The Little-Known Origin of “Small Business Saturday”
Small Business Saturday is an American shopping holiday that’s held on the Saturday after Thanksgiving.
It hasn’t been around very long.
It was onlyfirst celebrated just five years ago on November 27, 2010.
It’s basically atake-off of the concepts of “Black Friday” (encouraging retail spending) and “Cyber Monday” (encouraging e-commerce).
Instead, Small Business Saturday encourages people to shop at their small, local, brick and mortar businesses.
So what does this have to do with the main secret of effective content marketing?
Simple.
It’s proof that focusing your content on helping others works.
Why do say that?
Because of how “Small Business Saturday” got started.
You see, its origins might surprise you.
Here are the origins of “Small Business Saturday” from Wikipedia:
“In 2010 the holiday was conceived and promoted by American Express via a nationwide radio and television advertising campaign. That year Amex bought advertising inventory on Facebook, which it in turn gave to its small merchant account holders, and also gave rebates to new customers to promote the event.”
Did you catch that?
“Small Business Saturday” was originally conceived and promoted by American Express!
They came up with the brilliant idea to help small business owners in this way and then got others to promote it!
The Result For Small Business Owners?
According to National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) and American Express 104 million shoppers “shopped small” last year.
Are their motives in doing this purely to help others?
I honestly don’t have any clue.
But even if they’re not purely to help others, their motives at least include others!
And the content they have created and that they’ve encouraged others to create (tweets, likes, articles, and posts like this one) have all had MUCH more influence and inertia than if they only created content about themselves.
Examples of Content Marketing Focused on Others from American Express
Check out all the types of content they’ve created for this on their site:
They provide an explanation of what “Small Business Saturday” is all about.
They have a section to help small business owners promote their business.
They have a section on how to rally support in your community.
They include a map with qualifying small businesses in your area.
They provide editable tweets, posts, and emails that can be used to spread the word.
They provide videos that explain what it is, give case studies, and more.
And mixed in with all of that content are offers from American Express.
The Content Marketing Lesson We Can Learn from American Express
I think the most valuable lesson that we can learn is that when we create content marketing focused on helping others, then it has a residual impact on us and our business.
(Most importantly, it makes you feel better!)
Who/what can you help with your content marketing?
Many people believe that marketing has changed a lot since the internet came along.
But that’s totally false.
Believe it or not, the marketing principles that today’s top companies use were being used back in the 1930s.
Don’t believe me? Then keep reading…
The Marketing Genius Behind the Success of “How to Win Friends and Influence People”
Victor O. Schwab is considered to be one of the top copywriters of all time. He was a marketing master.
Many people don’t know it, but he was the copywriter who helped Dale Carnegie’sHow to Win Friends and Influence People become a best-seller.
Schwab was also the man behind the ads for the famous body-builder Charles Atlas.
Not only that, but he was a copywriting pioneer. He would use coded coupon ads to test and track ads.
He would use the codes to track which ads the coupon came from, which headlines, appeal, etc. was used in that ad, etc.
Powerful Example of How Victor Schwab Tracked Ads
Besides the work I mentioned above, Victor Schwab was the man who managed the advertising account for Sherwin Cody’s famous ad, Do You Make These Mistakes in English?
Victor Schwab, the man behind this famous ad for Sherwin Cody’s course
In fact, Schwab considered this ad to be an example of the scientific approach to advertising.
Schwab wrote an article in the September 1939 issue of Printer’s Ink Monthly titled, “An Advertisement That is Never Changed,” which explained why he thought of this ad in this way.
In that article, he gave a ten-year comparison of the responses to two different headlines:
Do You Make These Mistakes in English?
How to Speak and Write Masterly English
And he revealed that the response rate was near three times better for the ad that asked readers about their mistakes.
Testing ads via split testing (like Schwab did) is something that all of the top companies and marketers still do today.
So you see? Marketing really hasn’t changed that much.
Marketing tools have changed but the fundamentals of marketing have remained the same and many of the techniques have stayed the same too.
If you’d like to know how you or your business can tap into the fundamentals of marketing and harness the power of techniques that have proven themselves for decades, then contact me.
The Story of the Unbelievable Treasure Unearthed in a Farmer’s Field
It was October 3, 2016, in Lincolnshire county in eastern England, when a man named Steve Ingram made a “monumental” discovery.
Hetook his metal detector out into one of the plowed fields of a farmer named Chris Sardeson and came across something that he and Chris never expected.
He uncovered 1,000 silver coins buried on the “front line” during the English Civil War.
(He later found fragments of the pot nearby, where the coins are believed to have originally been stored.)
When his discovery was made known, Adam Daubney, finds officer for the Portable Antiquities Scheme at Lincolnshire County Council, described it like this…
“This is a monumental find from the turbulent years of the English Civil War.
“The area between Grantham and Boston was a zone of intense conflict between the Parliamentarians and the Royalists in the early years of the war, so we can think of the Ewerby hoard as being from the ‘front-line.”
Then he went on to say…
“The hoard tells us about the uncertainty and fear that must have been felt at the time, but quite why it was buried – and by whom – is impossible to say. It might have been buried by someone who went off to fight and never returned.”
– Adam Dubaney Finds Officer for Portable Antiquities Scheme at Lincolnshire County Council
How Long Is It Going to Take for You or Your Business to Be Found?
Think about it for a second.
It took hundreds of years for those coins to be found because someone hid them in something that no one was looking for and hid them where no one was looking.
*You might not realize it, but this story reveals a very similar situation that many individuals and businesses are in.*
Unless you or your business are well-known, then people aren’t online searching for you.
(And even if you and your business are well-known, you shouldn’t only rely on waiting for them to search for you.)
What ARE they searching for? Information aka content.
That’s why content marketing is so important to any individual or company that wants to be found online.
Two Important Things That Happen When You Create Valuable Content
Because when you begin creating valuable content, two important things happen:
Suddenly you and/or your business becomes shareable.
In other words, by creating content you give people a reason to share you and your business with others.
This happens when people share your content on social media.
And it happens when they begin to link to your content from their own content on their own websites.
It helps you and your business to be discovered and known in your market.
Because you’ve created valuable content, you have in a sense “attached” yourself or your business to that content.
So when people begin sharing it and linking to it – and when your prospects search for and discover your content – you and your business are also found.
It’d be like taking those 1,000 coins and putting them somewhere that everyone is searching and within something that everyone is looking for.
By simply doing that, you would have exponentially increased the chance that they’d be found.
It’s the same with you and your business
That’s why if you want you or your business to be known or found in your market, then content marketing is one of the most effective ways to do that.
You see, the cool thing about content marketing is that it doesn’t feel like marketing, not to you or to your prospects.
That means there’s less resistance from you as you create it and less resistance from them as they consume it.
P.S. If thought this article was valuable, would you mind sharing it and/or linking to it?
P.P.S. If you want to learn some powerful ways you can create content to gain exposure for yourself or your business, then you can sign-up below to read three chapters from my book, 51 Content Marketing Hacks, right now…
I want to share it with you today because it contains an important lesson that we as marketers need to always remember.
The Fatal Mistake
There’s a fatal business mistake many people make. And marketers make a very similar mistake.
If you’re not careful, it can bring you many headaches and trials.
Listen closely to this powerful story that reveals this fatal mistake…
Thomas Edison’s First Patent
Thomas Edison invented a vote-recording machine for use in legislative chambers early in his career.
He was very proud of his invention.
It worked by moving a switch to the right or left, so an official could vote for or against a proposal and never have to leave his desk.
He felt that the machine would replace the monotonous repetition of marking ballots, counting them, etc.
He was excited with the prospect of how well this machine would do that he obtained a patent for it – his very first.
His Surprising Trip To Washington
With his patent, he headed for Washington.
He demonstrated his machine with excitement to the Chairman of Congressional Committees.
This man, while complimenting Edison on his ingenuity, immediately turned it down!
He told Edison, “Filibustering and delay in the tabulation of votes are often the only means we have for defeating bad or improper legislation.”
The young inventor was stunned.
He knew his invention was good and so did the chairman, but still, it wasn’t wanted.
His Promise
This moment taught Edison a lesson that would stay with him for the rest of his life. He expressed the lesson in this way…
“There and then I made a vow that I would never again invent anything which was not wanted.”
Many businesses struggle and many fail – many marketing campaigns fail – because they’ve never learned this lesson.
We must sell what our prospects and customers want, NOT want we think they need.
If you are struggling in your company or small business right now, maybe you ought to find out if this is your problem.
If you want to take your business or marketing to the next level, then this could be your key.
Talk to your customers.
Interview them.
Survey them.
Find out their real needs, real problems, real desires and then figure out a way to give it to them.
But there is something important to remember. Many times asking people what they want will reveal exactly what you need to offer them.
But sometimes you need to go deeper.
Why? You need to remember these facts:
Sometimes people don’t know exactly what they need or want.
Sometimes people don’t know exactly what their real problems are.
Sometimes people don’t know exactly what solution would help them or satisfy them.
When you listen to them you need to keep this in mind…
Take time to think about what they are really needing or wanting.
Take time to think about what their real root problems or desires are.
If you really ponder these things for a while, it can help you to think of creative products or services that they might have never have known they even wanted.
And the result? You’ll stand out from your competition. (Think Apple and the iPhone.)
Historical Footnote: After Edison made this vow to himself, his next invention did much better. It was an improved stock market ticker-tape machine (1869), which earned him an instant $40,000 [about $700,000 today].
What Do You Think?
Do you have any stories of this happening to you?
Have you had a product or service you thought people would want, but they didn’t?
Have you ever uncovered a new product or service from talking to your customers?
Share your answers in the comments.
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I love this quote from Jim Rohn because it applies to life as much as it does to marketing…
Copy & Paste Version
“Success is neither magical nor mysterious. Success is the natural consequence of consistently applying the basic fundamentals.”
Jim Rohn
What Are You Going to Do About This?
If your marketing results are stuck, or you are looking for breakthroughs, then I want to encourage you to go back to the fundamentals.
Begin to ask yourself this question…
Which of the marketing fundamentals have I forgotten or been overlooking?
I’m sure that if you really ask yourself this question, and really apply the answer you come up with, you will see new and better results with your marketing,
Each episode features the origin of commonly used phrases in our country. It’s a really interesting and fun way to learn where some of the words we use every day came from.
In one episode, the origin of the word “prospect” was discussed. It originally meant “future,” as in “how your future will be.”
During the gold rush days, the word came to mean that a particular piece of land had a future — it had potential.
As time went on, people who could potentially become customers became known as prospects, because they are a potential source of future income.
What all businesses need to understand is that if you don’t have new prospects, you don’t have a future.
Later in the chapter, I share the following story…
I once read something that I found very interesting: For every tree that loggers cut down these days, they plant four seedlings.
*Because of this practice, there are more trees now than there were in 1920.
If you think about it, this is a very smart practice. Because without new trees, loggers have no future.
How Success Causes Problems for Many Businesses
When many businesses start out they need clients, so they focus on doing everything they can to get prospects.
They do this regularly and religiously until customers actually start showing up.
But once they start showing up, something interesting happens: They stop focusing on getting prospects (or lessen that focus) and begin to concentrate on servicing the customers they’ve attracted.
Obviously, businesses need to focus on their clients, and no one would ever tell you that this isn’t a priority.
But what eventually happens if you forsake your prospecting efforts to focus exclusively on your current customers?
That’s right.
You’ll end up like loggers who don’t invest in seeding their future.
Dale Carnegie is not only the author of the famous book “How to Win Friends and Influence People,” but he’s been called by some “The Father of the Self Help Industry”.
This video is from A & E Biography and reveals how he went from being an out of work actor and unsuccessful car salesman into a best-selling author.
And how, by the age of 50 years old, became one of the most successful people in the U.S.
If you pay really close attention, and read between the lines, you’ll learn some powerful marketing lessons.
Plus, you will be inspired and learn some of his great philosophies.
But, in her words, she was “shipped off to study in other places”. Her studies involved a large variety of things such as cognitive science, communications, and ethnomethodology.
She eventually found herself living in the San Francisco Bay Area. And you’re not going to believe this, but after all of the education she received, she discovered that her real passion was food.
That’s why in 2005 she took an unbelievable risk. She quit her Silicon Valley job to pursue a career in food.
But what kind of career in food can someone who is not a skilled chef have? She decided to start a food blog she called chezpim.com, where she would write about her visits to some of the world’s best restaurants.
So she began creating content: writing, reporting, and taking photos about her love: food.
On her blog, she chronicled what she told FoodandWine.com was, “culinary adventures from street stalls around Southeast Asia to my longtime favorite Michelin three-star, L’Arpège in Paris.”
The Unbelievable Results of Content
In was through this blog that she became one of the early food bloggers to gain widespread praise for her blog. She ended up accumulating more than 142,000 regular readers who signed up for daily recipes, restaurant reviews and to hear her opinions on food.
Her recipes, writings, and photographs ended up appearing in the New York Times, Food & Wine Magazine, Bon Appétit magazine, and more.
One other surprising thing came from her blog: she met her longtime partner, David Kinch, who is the chef-owner of Manresa in Los Gatos. (It was through a comment on her blog that their relationship began.)
In the spring of 2014, Pim took a huge leap. She opened her own restaurant, Kin Khao in San Francisco, whose mission was in her words to “liberate” Thai cuisine from “the tyranny of peanut sauce.”
What was her inspiration?
She couldn’t find any good food like she ate in Bangkok.
That inspired her to begin learning the recipes for her favorite dishes by calling her relatives back home and on her annual trips back to Thailand.
And that leads to the most amazing part of this whole story…
The Michelin Rating
This year, Kin Khao received the highest praise: a 1-star Michelin rating. (1 star: Very good food). This is the rating from the MICHELIN Guide:
Don’t let its covert location fool you-Kin Khao is a flagrantly delicious and very distinctive dining room. The décor is unexceptional by no uncertain terms, but really nobody seems to care, as the cooking-punctuated by Californian elements and welcome seasonality-is the real deal. Northern Thai is what this kitchen is all about and pad Thai-loving palates should vacate these premises…pronto. Of course, the unique menu reads like a veritable thesis on Isaan food mingled with California love. Then there’s the easygoing and chill staff who never miss a beat-as they bestow tables with vibrant, product-driven plates. These have included crispy lima beans tossed in nam tok followed by crunchy albeit not as “hot” chicken wings massaged with tamarind and chili. Pork meatballs seasoned with garlic and lemongrass (laab tod) are enriched by a phenomenal chili (jaew) sauce; while a gorgeous platter of crunchy vegetables is accompanied by a jar of the incredible nam prik (potent with shrimp paste) layered with caramelized pork jowl, fried catfish, and a salted duck egg. Panang curry with tender-braised duck is a champ among palates less valiant. Closing arguments may reveal that this is a truly Thai kitchen turning out insanely memorable food. All objections overruled.
But you need to remember how this all began with content. It didn’t begin with cooking lessons. It began with her creating content based on what she loved.
There are many lessons we can learn from Pim, but here are four important content marketing lessons that I thought I’d point out:
Get started. Sitting around thinking about creating content doesn’t impact your life like action does.
Use a variety of content. She posted recipes, reviews, pictures, etc. Don’t get stuck one main form of content.
Interact with your fans. That’s how she met David! You never know what connections you can make when you interact with your audience on your blog, on social media, etc.
Use content to establish your authority in the market. She wrote articles for top magazines and eventually wrote her own book. These things elevated her in her niche and helped her blog to reach the #6 slot on a “50 0f the Best Blogs in the World” list.
Pim’s story is a powerful example of content marketing.
Next time you’re wondering, “Can this content marketing stuff really help?” Remember Pim’s story.
I love reading them because many times I will uncover a powerful truth, concept, or idea in them that I THOUGHT was a new or recent truth/concept/idea.
But discoveries like this always remind me that no matter how much things change, the fundamentals never do.
And when I discover that what I thought was a new or recent truth/concept/idea is actually a fundamental truth/concept/idea, then I am even more excited about it than ever.
Why?
Because not only are the fundamentals unchanging, they’re also much more powerful and important than trends, fads, and “fly by night” truths/concepts/ideas.
Anyway, I say all of that because you’ll never guess what I discovered in an old, obscure book from 1921.
What I Discovered in This Old, Forgotten Book Proves That Jim is Teaching Us the Unchanging, Powerful and Important Marketing Principles in “Copywriting Secrets.”
I had just finished reading Secret #3 “Without a Strong Why, People Don’t Buy” in Jim Edwards’ new book Copywriting Secrets.
A few days later, I was skimming through this old 98-year-old book and I couldn’t believe what I saw…
“That is to say, under one or another of the six arbitrary groupings will be found all of the related human instincts to which ordinary advertising is likely at any time to find it necessary to address itself. The list follows.
1. Desire for Gain
This includes the emotions of: Money-saving instinct Money-getting instinct Speculation in its various degrees Acquisitiveness Ambition (of a certain nature) Desire for knowledge (as an end in itself, or as a means) Self-interest
2. Caution
This includes the emotions of: Desire to provide for the future Desire to protect those dependent on one (whether family or employees) against poverty, disease, pain, or mental distress Desire for health Forethought or foresight Fear Self-interest
3. Utility
Which includes the instincts of: Constructiveness Convenience Necessity Desire for time-saving, labor-saving, and health promoting devices, and the enjoyment resulting from any of these
4. Self-Gratification
Which includes the instincts and emotions of: Self-indulgence Appetites and sense-pleasures Love of luxury or ease or comfort Vanity Pleasure Display Ornamentation Desire for personal adornment Striving to imitate others Sports and diversions Love of the arts Pride of possession
5. Competition
Which is inclusive of: Ambition (of a certain nature) Pride Emulation Coquetry Desire for skill in sports, trade, mechanics, etc. Desire for knowledge, progress, or improvement.
6. Moral and Esthetic Instincts
These are regarded as including: Love of beauty or convenience in the home. Desire for welfare and safety of others Hospitality and Sociability Cleanliness Religion
If you haven’t read Jim’s “10 Reasons Why People Buy” on page 16 yet, then this list won’t mean anything to you.
But if you have, you know why I was amazed to see a list like this in a book from the early 1900s.
Even though this list and Jim Edwards list isn’t exactly the same, the overall concept and many of the things on both lists are surprisingly similar.
When I saw this, I realized that Jim’s concept of universal reasons that people buy, which need to be appealed to, is one that I better not overlook or dismiss.
And I’d encourage you to pay close attention to them too. You might be wondering, “Well, could Jim have got inspiration from this old list?”
I seriously doubt it.
The reason I say that is because this isn’t a well-known, old school marketing book like Scientific Advertising.
It’s a random one that I hadn’t even heard of until I stumbled on to it one day.
The LONG Title of This Rare Book
This old book that contained this powerful and still relevant information is called…
BETTER ADVERTISING: A Practical Manual of the Principles of Advertising, Embracing Institutional and Direct Advertising, Reason Why and Human Interest Copy, Elements of the Advertisement, and the Make Up of Advertising Circulars and Folders
It was written by John M. Manly and John A Powell. Look in Chapter 3, called “Direct Advertising,” to find the section I quoted.
(If you’re a regular reader, you might recognize this title. I shared another excerpt from this book in a recent post. You can read it here: Marketing is Sales Talk Transformed into Words.)
The cool thing about this strangely titled book is that it contains a lot more information that is still relevant today.
Want to Learn More from Both of These Books?
If you would like to learn more from Jim Edwards’ new book, “Copywriting Secrets,” you can get a FREE copy (just pay for shipping) by clicking here.
If you would like to learn more from the old book, “Better Advertising,” then stick around.
I’ll be posting more information from the book in another article AND I will be uploading a copy of the book into our DRCM Member’s Resource Area.
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I want to share it with you today for two reasons:
The idea it’s based on is still needed today more than ever.
The idea is explored on a much deeper level in a new book that is coming out this week. (See below for more.)
First, let’s look at the idea and then I’ll tell you about the new book.
The Night a British Statesman and Financier Shocked His Dinner Guests
I once read a story about British statesman and financier Cecil Rhodes.
He is the one whose fortune was used to endow the world-famous Rhodes Scholarships.
People said that he was a real stickler for proper dress -–but not at the expense of someone else’s feelings.
A young man was invited to dine with Rhodes and he arrived late by train, so he had to go directly to Rhodes’s home in his travel-stained clothes.
Once he got there, he was appalled to find the other guests were already there and they were wearing their full evening dress.
After what seemed a long time, Rhodes finally appeared.
But what was shocking to this young man and to the other guests was that Rhodes was dressed in a shabby old blue suit.
Later on, the young man found out that Rhodes had been dressed in his formal evening clothes. But he had changed out of them and put on the old suit, when he heard of his young guest’s awkward dilemma.
How much influence and impact do you think that had on that young man?
I’d bet the young man never forgot what happened that night!
I bet he told everyone he knew about it. (In fact, I wonder if that’s how we know the story today.)
I bet he would do anything he could to help Rhodes from that day forward.
I bet he would take any advice Rhodes ever gave him and bend over backwards to return the favor!
The Secret to Impact and Influence?
*Do you want to know the “secret” to impact and influence? The real secret has nothing to do with how many followers you have.
The real secret to impact and influence is empathy!
It’s putting yourself in the other person’s shoes and letting them see you know what it’s like to be in their position.
It’s then interacting with them and treating them based on that understanding.
But it HAS to be real. It can’t be fake. If it is, you’ll lose any chance of impact and influence with that person and others.
When it’s real, you’ll have become a person of influence and impact, because you’ll be a person that people can genuinely trust.
Isn’t empathy the underlying principle of “The Golden Rule”?
Isn’t a lack of empathy one of the biggest reasons for strife and trouble between people?
We all want to have an impact and influence in this world.
The “secret” to actually experiencing this starts with thinking of others first and responding to them out of that understanding.
Mean People Suck: The Book
If this idea resonates with you, then you should consider getting your hands on a brand new book that is coming out on Friday. (You can pre-order it now.)
I received a preview copy of Mean People Suck and just finished it today.
Inside the book, Michael does a great job of showing you how the power of empathy can:
Help your company to be better
Help you to be a better boss or manager
Help you to create more powerful marketing
Help you to better serve and satisfy your customers
And more
And he does all of this by sharing his own personal story — and the stories of other people and companies – to reveal how empathy has been a key ingredient to true success for him and many others.
Who is Michael Brenner?
In case you’re one of the few people who don’t know who Michael is, here is some info to get you up to speed:
He’s been recognized as a Forbes top CMO influencer.
He’s been acknowledged as a top business keynote speaker by the Huffington Post.
He’s been designated a top motivational speaker by Entrepreneur Magazine.
He is CEO of Marketing Insider Group, where he has worked with more than 75 brands in building effective thought leadership, marketing, and employee activation programs.
If that wasn’t enough, he’s also the author of “The Content Formula” and “Digital Marketing Growth Hacks.”
The Biggest Reason to Get This Book
But the biggest reason to get his book is because Michael practices what he preaches.
Even though Michael and I have never met in person (yet), our interactions by email and phone have shown me that he is a person of empathy who really cares about other people.
If you believe the only way to become successful is by pushing others out of your way and by focusing only on yourself, your needs, and your career, then you will hate this book.
But if you want to achieve success by pulling other people up, helping other people succeed, and feeling good about what you do, then I can’t think of a better person for you to learn from.
Because this isthe good news Michael wants to reveal to you: it’s empathy, not apathy, that is the real key to success in business and in life.
I came across a great story about Cecil B. DeMille, one of the great movie makers of the early years in Hollywood.
And this story reveals a problem that all of us have.
It’s the problem we have with communicating with our prospects in a way that they actually “hear” us.
Listen to the story and then I’ll explain…
The Hard Lesson the Founding Father of Hollywood Had to Learn
Cecil B. DeMille
Cecil B. DeMille is acknowledged as a founding father of the Hollywood film industry, the most commercially successful producer-director in cinema history.
Between 1913 and 1956, he made 70 features, both silent and sound films.
Some of his blockbusters were:
The Ten Commandments
The King of Kings
The Greatest Show on Earth
And many, many others
Once DeMille was making one of his great epic movies.
He had six cameras at different spots who were ready to catch the overall action.
He had five other cameras set up to film plot developments involving the major characters.
To say this was a serious undertaking would be an understatement.
The large cast had been rehearsing their scene since 6 a.m.
They went through the scene four times and it was now late afternoon.
The sun was setting and there was just enough light to get the shot done.
That is when DeMille looked over the whole large set and saw that everything was perfect.
That’s when he gave the command, “Action!”
That simple, forceful command set off a chain of events:
100 extras charged up the hill.
Another hundred came storming down the same hill to do mock battle.
In another location, Roman centurions lashed and shouted at two hundred slaves who labored to move a huge stone monument toward its resting place.
Meanwhile, the main characters acted out, in close-up, their reactions to the battle on the hill.
The only thing that might have seemed wrong to you was that their words were drowned out by the noise around them.
But, that was ok. DeMille had planned for this.
The dialogue would be dubbed in later.
The whole scene took fifteen minutes to complete.
When it was finally over, DeMille yelled, “Cut!”
He then turned to his assistant and with a smile said, “That was great!”
The assistant yelled back, “It was, C.B.! It was fantastic! Everything went off perfectly!”
Enormously pleased, DeMille then turned to face the head of his camera crew.
He wanted to find out if all of the cameras had picked up what they had been assigned to film.
With anticipation, DeMille waved to the camera crew supervisor.
And from the top of the hill, the camera supervisor waved back.
He then raised his megaphone, and called out, “Ready when you are, C.B.!”
In the midst of all of that commotion, he and his crew had missed DeMille’s cue and missed the whole scene!
The 2 Requirements for Effective Communication
DeMille had to learn this hard lesson: just because you’re yelling out something to someone, it doesn’t mean you are actually communicating.
Communication only takes place when you have two things:
1. Someone speaking
2. Someone listening
Many businesses that are attempting to use content marketing don’t seem to have learned this lesson yet.
They still think that just because they’re shouting out their content at the top of their lungs that results should be happening.
They are tuning out all the screams from your competitors and they are scanning the “airwaves” for people who are providing the answers they want and need.
Those are the type of messages that they will hear above the roar of this loud world.
It starts with listening and then moves to speaking aka creating content. (Most content marketers skip the first part and move straight to the second step.)
Let’s be real.
To create content that no one ever “hears” (or wants to “hear”) is a waste of time.
It’s not something that I want to do and I don’t think you do either.
But to create content that comes through loud and clear – above the noise of life – that is the beginning of a very profitable endeavor.
I’d gladly spend my time doing this any and every day.
I’ll be honest with you, to create content that is “heard” by your prospects is not an easy task.
“Both of these now-defunct airlines were terribly mistaken.
“A Spanish speaker would think Braniff was asking its riders to ‘Fly Naked,’ and a Spanish translation of the Eastern slogan evoked a final destination in heaven, following death.
“A few classic marketing blunders: General Motors discovered too late that ‘Nova‘ literally means ‘Doesn’t go‘ in Spanish.
“Coors encouraged its English-speaking customers to ‘Turn It Loose,’ but the phrase in Spanish meant ‘Suffer from Diarrhea.'”
Today, we’re about to go back in time. 98 years to be exact.
What you’re about to read below is pulled from a book published in 1921 called (get ready for a crazy LONG title)…
BETTER ADVERTISING A Practical Manual of the Principles of Advertising, Embracing Institutional and Direct Advertising, Reason Why and Human Interest Copy, Elements of the Advertisement, and the Make Up of Advertising Circulars and Folders by John M. Manly and John A Powell.
That’s quite a title, huh? 🙂
The title might be more exhausting than it is breathtaking, but this book really does reveal one of the keys to creating better advertising (and marketing).
I want you to pay close attention to the powerful truth from Manly and Powell that I share below.
Because it will reveal to you one of the ways to make your marketing more effective.
Ready? Let’s open the book and take a peek…
“Advertising is ‘sales talk’ reduced to type.
“Scientific principles must underlie any kind of successful sales talk, but—and this is the important feature—the personality of the talker envelops the scientific features with his magnetism and personal qualities, his persuasiveness, his knowledge of his subject, his very manners, even.
“His talk is not cold and formal, but sincere and warm and winning—with the psychological ingredients so well mixed as to be invisible in the solution.
“Advertising copy, then, is not to be thought of as a mere formal announcement, not a mere listing of goods with prices attached, not even as a formal solicitation to buy, but as a talk from the prospective seller to the prospective customer.
“No matter how highly educated the seller may be, he does not talk to his customer in the formal language commonly called ‘rhetorical.’
“He brings into his conversation all the elements that will make it interesting. He avoids anything but ‘homely’ language, suited to the occasion. He talks, he does not ‘converse.’
“So should advertising be — it must have the same warm elements of a conversation that draws and interests by being human.
“An attractive analysis of the proposition itself, accompanied by a common-sense appeal which is based on a thorough knowledge of the motives and instincts that actuate the average purchaser—that is the secret of good advertising.”
BETTER ADVERTISING by John M. Manly and John A Powell
The Best Content Marketing and Direct Response Marketing
I really love that excerpt above.
In fact, I would encourage you to reread that excerpt above a couple of times.
Because as I think about it, the wisdom it contains is the secret behind all of the best content marketing and direct response marketing I’ve ever seen.
But the four things that stood out the most to me are these:
Write with personality
Write as a real person would speak, with real people in mind
Write in a way so that you draw people in
Write in a way that presents your ideas in an interesting way
Many rules/secrets that apply to direct response marketing also apply to content marketing.
In the short video below, you will understand exactly what I mean.
Why? Because as you will see in this video from Joe Polish’s Genius Network, legendary marketer, Joe Sugarman’s, copywriting tips apply to both content marketing and direct response marketing.
Learn to Write Copy That Sells with Joe Sugarman (VIDEO)
VIDEO DESCRIPTION: Joe Polish interviews the copywriting legend Joe Sugarman. Learn how his system can dramatically change your business.
This marketing quote from Seth Godin is great because it reveals the common mistake that many marketers make…
Copy and Paste Version
“Don’t find customers for your product. Find products for your customers.” – Seth Godin
What Are You Going to Do About This?
After thinking about the above quote for a while, really ask yourself these five questions:
– Who are the customers I am focusing on? – What do they need? – What do they want? – What solutions are they looking for? – How can I provide them with any (or all) of these things?
Content marketing is a powerful form of marketing that can really help you to sell more and gain more customers.
But if you think you can just post average content and see amazing ROI, then you’re fooling yourself.
Check out this infographic below from Domo to see why thinking this way today is so crazy.
Data Never Sleeps 6.0: How Much Data is Generated Every Minute?
In the early content marketing days, online content was a rare thing, but those days are long gone…
That’s what your content is competing against EVERY MINUTE of every day! Believe it or not, but content has now become a commodity.
That means that you can’t just post any-old, average content and expect to see results. It’s not going to happen!
But don’t get me wrong.
FACT:Unique Content Is Still In Demand
That DOESN’T mean that content marketing and content creation are a waste of time. Effective content marketing and skilled content creation is needed more than ever.
The good news is that even though content is now a commodity, unique content is in demand more than ever.
In fact, I’d say that if you’re going to create content, then…
It has to be original.
It has to stand out.
Otherwise it’s a waste of time. But, if our content is engaging and original, then…
You will stand out from the pack.
You will build a valuable audience made up of prospects and customers.
You’ll go from chasing prospects to attracting them to you, your business, or organization.
The key is going to be figuring out how to answer this question: “How do I create engaging and original content?”
If you stick around and keep checking back on this site, you will learn the answer to that question.
Take Any (or All) of TheseFour Next Steps
In the mean time, here are four things you can do:
This post originally appeared on my site RecessionSolution.com in a post called Jesse James: The Legend That Content Marketing Created on June 23, 2016.
I want to share it here because it reveals three powerful ways you can use content marketing to become an authority or star in your industry.
Jesse James: The Legend That Content Marketing Created
Well, the surprising example I am going to show you today is thanks to my wife.
You see, I came home the other night and when I sat down in the living room she said, “You’re going to want to watch this special series on AMC called ‘The American West.’ It told the story of Jesse James and I think there’s a content marketing example you might like.”
The next night I was up late and decided to watch the first two episodes that were on-demand to see what she was talking about.
First of all, the series is great! I learned all sorts of things I never knew about Jesse James:
I learned he was a former confederate soldier who might have had PTSD.
I learned that he robbed trains because they contained the wealth from the North.
He didn’t see himself as a bad guy. He saw himself as a hero for the South, stealing back some of what was taken from their families and their land.
It was some amazing stuff.
But then, during the second episode, there it was. My wife was right! Content marketing was involved in creating the legend of Jesse James!
Let me explain…
Not long after Jesse James and his brother committed their first major crime, Jesse got a message from Missouri newspaper editor John Newman Edwards who was a former adjutant to the famous Confederate General Joseph O. Shelby.
Editor John Newman Edwards
Edwards was a hardcore confederate who felt like Southerners had been robbed and made into outlaws.
Edwards was looking for a new way to push his Confederate agenda.
But when he heard about Jesse’s daring robbery, he believed Jesse James gave him a new opportunity to energize the “Southern spirit” of his readers.
He felt that the South needed someone to believe in. And he believed that Jesse James could be that person.
According to The American West, when Jesse James met with Edwards in Kansas City, Edwards toasted James for his work for the Confederacy. And he told Jesse, “You don’t have to be a common criminal. I can make you a hero!”
And that’s exactly what Edwards did.
Edwards went on to write dozens of articles in which he portrayed Jesse and his brother Frank as if they were some kind of modern-day Robin Hoods who stole from the rich so that they could give to the poor.
And it worked! Across the South, Jesse James went from being known as a criminal to being seen as a hero of the Confederacy.
Why do I say content marketing created the myth of Jesse James?
Because John Newman Edwards created content that sold Jesse James to his audience and, more importantly in Edward’s mind, sold the dream of the Confederacy that he wanted to keep alive in his reader’s minds.
As I sat and watched, The American West, I heard it explained powerfully like this…
“It’s impossible to talk about Jesse James without John Newman Edwards, who really just becomes Jesse James publicist, and is the one who manufactures the myth of ‘Jesse James the Rebel’ who is on this mission to stick to the establishment, justifying these criminal acts.” – Historian David Eisenbach
That’s when I knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that content marketing created the legend of Jesse James.
How come Jesse James is such a famous outlaw that we’ve all heard of? It’s because of John Newman Edwards and the content he created that made James a hero who was larger than life.
Now that you see the power of content marketing in Jesse James and John Newman Edwards lives, let me share with you what I believe is an important content marketing lesson we can learn from them.
An Important Content Marketing Lesson We Can Learn from the Legend of Jesse James
About seven months ago, I did a podcast interview with Ed Gandia in which I shared what we called Taking the First Steps to Becoming an Authority in Your Field.
Ed Gandia, host of “High Income Business Writing”
In that interview, I talked about the major error that most people make in their marketing and content marketing: They put all their focus on marketing WHAT they are selling.
Instead of focusing only on what you’re selling you need to start working on promoting the WHO of your business.
And when you focus your marketing and content marketing on your “who,” it changes everything!
Why is this so important? Because who you are influences your prospects and customers.
If you are perceived as an expert or an authority and if you have a certain level of status in your niche or subculture, then you will be more desired and you will be able to charge more.
That means the important content marketing lesson we can learn from the legend of Jesse James is this…
Never overlook the power of content marketing to position yourself powerfully in the minds of your audience.
So how do you use content marketing to position yourself in your industry or niche? I think there are some lessons we can learn from Jesse James and John Newman Edwards.
Keep reading and you’ll see what I mean…
3 Ways to Use Content Marketing to Become an Authority or “Star” in Your Industry
If you look again at the Jesse James story, you’ll see the importance of “Who,” but you’ll also discover a lesson on how content marketing can change our “Who” and position us as an authority in our market.
The lesson is this: Be seen on other people’s platforms.
When Edwards decided to feature Jesse James in the Kansas City Times it changed Jesse James’ life. Content Marketing can allow you to experience the same kind of life-changing experience.
Here are three ways you can use content marketing to be seen on other people’s platforms:
The more I began to read and research about it, the more I realized I had been accidentally using content marketing for years, even though I didn’t even know what it was.
With that post, I began writing for CMI two to three times a year. And in the process, I learned the importance of being seen on other people’s platforms.
By writing for others, it helped increase the exposure of my ideas to others and it changed “Who” I was in their eyes.
A while ago, people were saying we should stop doing guest posts because they thought Google would penalize that kind of content.
But the most important reason I didn’t stop is because I have never written guest posts for SEO reasons.
I have always written guest posts because of how they impact my “Who.” And I have gained clients, exposure, and even respect from any/all guest posting that I have done.
So I would encourage you to do the same and make sure that a certain amount of your time is focused on creating content for other people, so you can be seen on their platforms.
2. Keep an eye out for opportunities to be interviewed
The reason I take advantage of every opportunity to be interviewed on any podcasts (like Ed Gandia’s) is because it is another way for me and my content (via my words) to get exposure on someone else’s platform.
And when I am seen or heard on other people’s platforms, and positioned as an expert, it impacts and elevates my “Who” in my own arena and also in the arena that I am being interviewed in.
How do you get interviewed on other people’s platforms?
It all comes down to content marketing again.
You need to create powerful blog posts on your own site, write guest posts for other sites, and publish reports or ebooks.
If you do that, then you become someone worth interviewing!
And then one of three things will happen: People will approach you to interview you, people will recommend you to others to be interviewed, or you can approach people to see if they’d like to interview you.
(All of these methods have gotten me interviews.)
3. Get your content syndicated on other websites
This is an overlooked way for you to get exposure on someone else’s platform, but it’s a great one.
Instead of writing guest posts for other sites, see if there are any websites that will syndicate your content.
That means, that instead of writing guest posts for these sites, these sites have been given permission (by me) to republish any posts on my site that they like and want to share with their audiences.
This can especially be helpful if you don’t have time to write content for guest posts and it still allows you to be featured on other people’s platforms.
Are you wondering:
“Why would anyone want to let me guest post?”
“Why would anyone want to interview me?”
“Why would anyone want to syndicate my content?”
It’s simple.
Everyone needs content these days, so it’s really not as difficult as you think.
You just have to begin creating great content and then have the courage to approach other people who have platforms you want exposure on.
And when people begin to see you on other people’s platforms, that’s when the “magic” starts to happen.
You’ll begin to experience just a little bit of what Jesse James experienced when John Newman Edwards decided to feature him in the Kansas City Times and make him a star.
You might not become famous like Jesse James (and if you do, I hope it’s not for the same reasons), but it will begin to change how your market perceives you.
Your “Who” will begin changing. And when your “Who” changes, your results will change!
My Full Interview with Ed Gandia About “Taking the First Steps to Becoming an Authority in Your Field”
If you want more information about how you can implement these content marketing lessons borrowed from Jesse James and John Newman Edwards, then you can take a listen to my full interview with Ed below…
“Follow Me Home” is something that was started by Intuit’s founder, Scott Cook, in the early days of the company.
And it is, literally, what it sounds like.
Scott Cook would wait at the local Staples store until a customer would buy an Intuit product. Then he would ask the customer if he could follow the customer home to watch them use the product.
Over the years, Intuit has continued the tradition of “Follow Me Home.” Intuit now asks each of its employees to go on a “Follow Me Home” so the company can continue to know and understand our customers.
The group I was in visited a local small business owner who owns a coffee shop. (And who happens to be a good friend of mine!)
It was a great experience because it was a good reminder to me of who our company is trying to help.
It made me proud to be a part of a company that focuses on a simple, but powerful, practice.
And that leads me to my other takeaway from Content Marketing World.
My Other Takeaway from Content Marketing World
Content Marketing World 2019
One of the things I kept hearing over and over in different ways, and repeated in the different sessions that I went to, was something that “Follow Me Homes” are based on.
The thing I kept hearing repeated at Content Marketing World was the importance of knowing our prospects and customers.
You see, if we don’t know and understand who our customers and prospects really are, then our marketing will never have any impact.
Why? Because if you don’t know your prospects and customers, then how can you:
Know what they really need and want?
Know how to get their attention?
Know to influence them?
Know how to help them?
We can’t.
After my training last week and after going to Content Marketing World two weeks ago, it was an important reminder that the most powerful marketing and the most successful companies are successful for a reason.
They know their customers better than their competitors do. That’s where all effective marketing starts.
I’d encourage you to do the same.
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“Micro-influencers are social media users unlike typical celebrities, experts, or public figures. They’re individuals who work or specialize in a particular vertical and frequently share social media content about their interests. Unlike traditional ‘influencers,’ micro-influencers have a more modest number of followers — typically in the thousands or tens of thousands — but they boast hyper-engaged audiences.”
– Hubspot.com Definition of Micro-influencers
Now that you understand what micro-influencers are I want you to take a look this infographic about micro-influencers.
In it you will learn:
What micro-influencers are
6 benefits of working with micro-influencers
How to find micro-influencers
And tips on working with micro-influencers
The Ultimate Guide to Micro-Influencers (INFOGRAPHIC)
Check out this infographic from ShaneBarker.com and you’ll learn everything you need to know about working with micro-influencers.
If you really understand these things, you’ll be ahead of most businesses, companies, and business owners.
But if you just stop there, you’ll still be MISSING OUT on all the ways that content marketing and direct response marketing can take you and your business or company to the next level.
What Is Direct Response Content Marketing?
THE ORIGIN STORY: The idea of “direct response content marketing” came to me after teaching a marketing class for two years for UC Berkeley Extension in Belmont, CA.
In that class, I taught my students that direct response is the foundation of all effective digital marketing.
And I also taught them that content is key in building an audience that knows, likes, and trusts you.
That’s when something happened.
As I kept teaching my students these things, I kept thinking about these two ideas over again.
As I did, I continued to show them how direct response was really behind all effective digital marketing.
And as I continued to explain that content was needed throughout all of the nine steps to effective marketing, I suddenly realized something.
THE REALIZATION: I realized that these two types of marketing should not be practiced as separate disciplines in two separate camps but should instead be combined so that they can produce a greater synergy.
When I realized this, it suddenly hit me.
The greatest marketing that I’ve ever seen has been marketing that combined direct response with content marketing.
THE DISCOVERY: After thinking about it for a while, I came up with the term “direct response content marketing.”
But I want to be clear.
Direct response content marketing wasn’t necessarily an invention of mine. It was more like a discovery of mine.
AUTO-PILOT: In the book Thinking, Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman says this…
“At the age of four, a child effortlessly conforms to the rules of grammar as she speaks, although she has no idea that such rules exist.”
In the same way, the principles and rules of “direct response content marketing” have been put into use, unknowingly, by others for many years.
[*INTERESTING SIDE NOTE: When I’ve explained the concept of “direct response content marketing” to other content marketers and direct marketers, they instantly get it and recognize it.
In fact, when I shared it with one expert he said this, “I think the idea is a really great one and it is one I have been implementing with my own clients (although I wouldn’t say I put the two ideas together as well as you are articulating here!)”]
CODIFICATION: Even though I didn’t invent “direct response content marketing,” I have come along to identify it, systematize it, and to codify it.
And if you stick with me, I promise to do my best to show you the amazing, incomparable results that can happen when we harness the incredible power of content marketing and direct response marketing.
Are You In? Here Are Three Things You Should Do
If you can see the potential in direct response content marketing and you want to learn how to harness its power, or even be a part of fleshing out its identity in the marketing industry, then here are THREE THINGS you should do.
Join DirectResponseContentMarketing.com as a free member and you will get access to our Member’s Resource Area which will give you access to additional content and resources that I won’t share in the public areas of this website. Click here to join now!
Begin following me on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn or Twitter, so you will be one of first to access any/all of the concepts, strategies, and insights that I will reveal. (I haven’t created any separate accounts for this site.)
Share this article and/or any of our other articles. When you do that, you’ll be helping spread the word about this powerful paradigm shift and your friends, followers, and colleagues will be thankful to you for helping them be one of the first to know about this.
Why is content marketing so important? (Click here.)
Today, I want to talk to you about what direct response marketing is.
But in order to do that, I need to first talk to you about what direct marketing is.
What is Direct Marketing?
If you want to really understand what direct marketing is and why it is so important, you first have to understand two important things:
Masscommunication is communication reaching large numbers of people, usually over a long distance.
Mass marketing originated in the 1920s after the radio become popular. It was a means of businesses making a general, wide appeal to a large, diverse group of prospects. (This is what most advertising is focused on.)
How Is Direct Marketing Different from Advertising or Mass Marketing?
The difference with direct marketing is that you can communicate specific offers directly to a SPECIFIC group of people, INSTEAD OF general offers to the masses.
When direct marketing was created, it was designed to communicate through what was then the most personal channel known to exist: the U.S. Postal System.
(IMPORTANT: Stick with me. The reason I want you to understand this has nothing to do with you using mail to market.)
What Direct Marketing Enables You to Do
Direct marketing enables you to develop a more personal connection with potential customers.
And direct marketing enables you to geta direct, measurable response from these potential customers.
Do you see how different this compared to mass marketing? Do you see how direct marketing is so much more powerful?
Now that you understand these things, I can finally explain what direct response marketing is…
What is Direct Response Marketing?
When I am talking about direct response marketing, I am talking about the principles that direct marketing is based on and that direct marketing relies on.
That’s because direct response marketing can not only be used for marketing by mail, it can also be used to market through MANY other channels.
In fact, you might not realize this, but email marketing, content marketing, social media marketing, etc. are all built off of the fundamental concepts and principles of direct response marketing.
Stay tuned for more as we tie all of these things together!
Well, today I want to answer another question that many people are asking.
Why is Content Marketing Important?
Many people are wondering if or why they should even care about content marketing.
There’s one important reason why content marketing is important these days.
The reason content marketing is such an important form of marketing in this online-based world that we live inis because it’s what everyone is looking for online!
Content Is What Everyone is Searching For
What are we all searching for and consuming every day? Content! All different types of it!
Every single minute of every single day, people are searching for content in the form of:
Answers to their questions
To know their options
To know what to look for and what to be aware of when purchasing what you offer
To hear about other’s experience with your product or service
To know more about you and your business
One of the Main Way to Reach Your Prospects and Customers
And in their report, they showed that more and more advertising is being blocked or ignored.
That means that one of the main ways around this problem is to not just focus on creating ads to get your prospective patron’s attention. (Although that’s important!)
It means that if you want to get your prospect’s and customer’s attention — and gain their hearts, then you need to create content that they are looking for!
That’s why content marketing is so important, no matter what business you’re in!
Content marketing is talked about a lot these days. But there are many people who don’t know what content marketing is.
So today, I thought I would help to answer this important question for you.
Why? Because if you don’t really understand what something is then there’s no way you’ll ever be able to effectively use it.
What is “Content Marketing”?
In order to explain to you what content marketing is, let me share three definitions of content marketing that I share in my book 51 Content Marketing Hacks.
Why three different definitions? Because they will give you three different ways to think about content marketing, which will give you a more complete understanding of it.
1. Formal Definition – Content marketing is the marketing and business process for creating and distributing relevant and valuable content to attract, acquire, and engage a clearly defined and understood target audience – with the objective of driving profitable customer action.
Content Marketing Definition #2
Less Formal Definition – Content Marketing is owning, as opposed to renting media. It’s a marketing process to attract and retain customers by consistently creating and curating content in order to change or enhance a consumer behavior.
Content Marketing Definition #3
The third definition I share in my book is my own personal definition of content marketing…
My Personal Definition – Content marketing is the creation (or curation) of engaging content for the express purpose of gaining the attention and favor of a certain group, so that they will be persuaded to do business with an individual, business, or organization.
What’s Your Favorite Definition of Content Marketing?
I hope these are helpful to you.
If you have come across any other definition of content marketing that you really love or if you have your own definition that you’d like to share, then leave it in the comments!
I am sharing it with you today because the lessons in it are as important now as they ever were.
And I am also sharing it because I am going finally write the follow-up post that I promised. 🙂
Potatoes Used to Be Scandalous and Scary?
“Would you like fries with that?”
“I am a meat and potatoes type of guy!”
“Every single diet I ever fell off of was because of potatoes and gravy of some sort.” – Dolly Parton
It might be hard for you to believe, but these sayings about potatoes would have been scandalous and even frightening to the people of France back in 1785.
Yes, I did use the word “frightening” in regards to potatoes. No, I am not exaggerating.
Believe it or not, the potato was once not just an unpopular item but was thought by some people in France to have evil origins.
Now before you think, “Who cares!” and click away you need to realize something.
This story isn’t just about potatoes.
The story I am about to tell you could be one of the oldest examples of influencer marketing that you’ve ever heard of.
Not only that, it reveals an important lesson about the combined power of influencer marketing and content marketing.
Let me tell you the story and then I’ll show you what I mean.
The Amazing Story of How Influencer Marketing and Content Marketing Made the Potato Popular in France
It was the late 1700s in France, and after a series of harsh winters, the people of France were facing starvation.
At this point in time, the potato was seen in France as an unwanted and even evil vegetable:
Scientists said it caused leprosy.
The priests said it promoted lust.
The people thought it was cursed because it looked like a poisonous plant used by witches. And they thought that people who ate it could be controlled by them.
Besides all of these facts, the “gourmet people” of the day thought it was tasteless, indelicate, and gave people gas.
But there was a pharmacist named Antoine-Augustin Parmentier who had a whole different view of the potato.
Antoine-Augustin Parmentier
His different view came from his experience as a soldier in the French army. You see, during his time as a soldier, he ended up as a prisoner of war in Germany for several years.
And guess what they fed him in prison?
Yep, potatoes! It was his main source of food while in prison and it kept him and his fellow prisoners alive.
This caused him to realize that the potato could be helpful to his people because it was able to resist harsh weather conditions.
But he knew that the people of France would never eat potatoes if he couldn’t change their extremely negative opinion about them.
So he began a self-study of the chemical makeup of potatoes to try to prove that they weren’t the evil, poisonous vegetable that people thought they were.
And that is when a unique opportunity presented itself.
PHASE I: Enter the Contest
He would have the chance to use content to attempt to change people’s minds about the potato.
You see, a competition sponsored by the Academy of Besançon was being put on for people to write about, and identify, foods that could help fend off the mass hunger that had come after the famine of 1770.
Parmentier realized this was his chance to begin to change the attitudes of his people about the potato. I say “begin to change” because he knew that it would take more than just content alone to influence the people.
I’ll explain the rest of the ingenious plan he used to change their minds in just a minute. But first, let’s look at how he used content to begin the process of influencing them.
In the paper he submitted, Parmentier began by explaining that he was going to attempt to present the potato as a viable means to fight off famine.
He said that he would do that by “…showing them the potato, the subsistence of a great people, the food of the poor as well as of the rich.”
In his paper he went on to demonstrate:
That the potato, which he had analyzed carefully, was not poisonous but formed of a pure starch.
It could actually be made to taste really good, depending on how it was cooked and what other ingredients and spices were used.
It was easy to cultivate
And that it multiplied quickly and was easily grown even in poor soil conditions.
He submitted the paper and included his own personal story of his experience with potatoes in prison…
“Our soldiers ate a lot of potatoes in the last war; They have even made excesses of it, without having been inconvenienced; They were my only resource for more than a fortnight, and I was neither fatigued nor indisposed. “
And what was the result of all of his work and effort to write this paper?
The Academy of Besançondeclared him the winner – even despite the fact that the Parliament had put a ban on cultivating the potato back in 1748!
That’s how powerful his arguments in that paper were.
In fact, because of his paper, later in 1772, the members of the Faculty of Medicine of Paris published a paper stating that- without a doubt – potatoes were harmless, safe, and non-toxic.
So his paper obviously impressed the academics of his day, but did it work to influence the COMMON PEOPLE?
I am sorry to tell you this, but the answer is no.
But don’t misunderstand. It would be wrong for you to think that his paper was a complete failure in attempting to influence the people. Why?
Because it was that content, which opened the door for him to be able to implement the other phases of his plan.
And, as you’re about to see, his ultimate plan was an amazing and ingenious one, one that will teach you many lessons about how to amplify the impact of your own content.
I’ll tell you the rest of his incredible story and show you how you can implement these powerful lessons in a minute.
I need you to first understand what great content can and can’t accomplish
What Great Content Can (and Can’t) Accomplish
If we were to analyze Parmentier’s content we would see that he really did a great job of creating powerful content.
He told them that the potato was “the food of the poor as well as of the rich.” (Social Proof)
He told them that based on his studies of the makeup of the potato, he found that it actually wasn’t poisonous. (Biological/Scientific Proof)
He told them that it could actually be used to make tasty dishes.(Reframed Perceptions)
He told them that it was easy to grow potatoes. (Proof of Ease)
He even got his paper featured in a prominent scientific publication. (Power of Association)
If that all wasn’t enough, he shared about his own personal experience eating the potato. (Personal Testimony)
You might be wondering, “If Parmentier created such great content, then why didn’t his content have more of an effect on the common people?”
That’s because you have a misunderstanding of what great content alone can actually do.
Great content can accomplish many things. It can educate people. It can entertain people. It can inspire people. And it can even influence people to some extent.
But great content cannot, on its own, break deeply ingrained fears and beliefs. That’s what Parmentier was up against with the people of France’s beliefs about potatoes.
That’s why creating content was only PART of his plan – a very needed part of his plan.
You see, creating that content in that paper enabled him to take the next step. Because that content established his authority and expertise in the knowledge of potatoes.
It was his content that changed “who” he was in the eyes of the academic leaders and the rulers of France. It powerfully positioned him in their eyes. (SeeJesse James: The Legend That Content Marketing Createdfor more on using content to change your “who.”)
And that positioning enabled him to take the next step in his plan to change the minds of the people about potatoes.
PHASE II: Plant the Crop
King Louis XVI
Creating that paper allowed him access to King Louis XVI.
In 1785, Kind Louis XVI offered Parmentier two acres of land in the plain of the Sablons near Neuilly. The land the king gave him didn’t have the best soil, but that was exactly what Parmentier wanted, so he could prove how easy potatoes were to grow – even in horrible soil.
The following year, on these two acres, Parmentier planted potatoes. The next year, he brought a bouquet of potato flowers to the king.
King Louis XVI was so pleased with them that he slipped one in his buttonhole and put another one on the wig of Marie Antoinette.
But the common people were still wary of potatoes and they don’t want anything to do with them.
So Parmentier hatched an ingenious plan.
Watch what happens next…
Parmentier placed soldiers around the fields during the day but left no soldiers there to guard the field at night.
This made the nearby villagers very curious.
There were so curious that they couldn’t help themselves. So they decided to “help themselves” to his potatoes… and stole them!
They thought they had put one over on Parmentier, but the fact was that they had done exactly what he had HOPED they would do! (He also instructed the guards to accept all bribes from people who wanted some of the potatoes.)
Phase II of his plan was a success!
And if you like this part of his plan, wait until you see what he does in the next phase. It’s awesome.
But I don’t want you to miss these two important lessons that we can learn from what Parmentier did here in Phase II, so let me tell you them first.
Two Important Lessons from Phase II
1. If you want to increase the impact and influence of your marketing, then don’t forget the power of SHOWING, not just telling, your prospects what your product can do.
“Never forget the power of demonstration. Find ways you can create content that demonstrates your product or service in action.”
Parmentier told them that potatoes were easy to grow and could grow in poor soil, but by actually planting them in poor soil, he helped them see that this was true.
That was a subtle, but important and powerful lesson for those people to see.
Why do I say that?
Because it is said that some of those people who stole his potatoes went home and planted them in their own, nearby fields. (Fields that probably also had inferior soil.)
They saw that if he could grow them in that local soil, then they could too! That is the power of demonstration.
If you want to begin to counteract the ingrained fears and beliefs in your market, then you need to demonstrate the things that your content talks about.
2. The power of putting a “wall” or “guards” around the things you want to be seen as valuable.
The amazing thing about the internet is that it contains so much valuable, free, and easy-to-access content.
The negative thing about the internet is that it also contains so much HORRIBLE, free, easy-to-access content!
Because of this reality, we need to realize an important fact. Since so much content is free and right there at our finger tips, this begins to lessen the value of even the valuable content out there.
In other words, there’s so much great content out there, that is all free and easy to find, that it begins to make your content – no matter how great it is – seem like a commodity, instead of like something people should treasure.
What’s the solution? Do what Parmentier did.
Put guards or a wall around some of your content. That is a subtle way of increasing the value of the content in your prospect’s eyes.
Copyblogger.com did this with some of their content. They took some of the previously written content that they had (and also created some new content) and put it behind a free, membership “wall.”
By doing this, they automatically made the older content they placed behind this wall (that was previously “out in the open”) seem more valuable.
And it made all of the new content they created for that membership area (which would have previously just been posted on their blog) more valuable too.
Why is this important? Because when people value your content more, they will pay more attention to it.
And it’s only when people value and pay attention to your content that you will ever have a chance of even BEGINNING to influence and change your market’s deeply ingrained fears and beliefs.
(Hint, Hint. Wink, Wink: In case you haven’t noticed by now, Copyblogger.com isn’t the only one to have a “wall” around some of their content.
I’ve created a guide that will show you how to use a technique that Dickens used to create magnetic content that drew people in. It’s a technique that I use all the time. In fact, I am using it in this post.
Have you signed up for it yet? You can have access to it for free, but it’s in a downloadable area that you can only access with a password.
Sign-up by email and you’ll automatically be sent a link and password, so you can download it right now.)
PHASE II: Plan the Event
So far you’ve seen that Parmentier created powerful content that gave him authority and positioned him in the eyes of the academics and rulers in France.
He then demonstrated that his content was true by planting potatoes in poor soil.
And he made them seem more valuable to the local villagers by putting guards around them.
These first two phases of his plan began to get a small, local group of Parisians to begin planting and eating potatoes.
But Parmentier wasn’t satisfied with those results.
He wanted to change the minds of even more of his people because it was his only way to save them from future famines.
Luckily, he still had one more powerful trick up his sleeve.
He realized that if he was going to have a larger, widespread acceptance of the potato, then he was going to need to harness the influence of the people that the common people looked up to.
So it’s said that he convinced King Louis XVI that the best way to encourage people to begin planting and eating potatoes was to throw a huge banquet for the king and his friends in which all of the dishes were made from potatoes.
Fries And Ben Franklin
Legend has it that Parmentier threw a huge banquet for King Louis XVI,Marie Antoinette, and other important guests from around France and even from other countries. (Supposedly Ben Franklin was even there!)
At the banquet, they served potato soups, boiled potatoes, potato casseroles, and many other potato dishes.
But guess what the most popular dish that night was? Thinly sliced potatoes that were deep-fried and seasoned.
They later became known to the world as “French Fries.” The king and the guests LOVED the “French Fries.” But the truth is that they also really enjoyed all of the dishes.
When the word spread to the people of France that the king, queen, and all of these other distinguished guests not only ate potatoes but loved them, then it finally shattered the common people’s fears and false beliefs about potatoes.
That is how the common people of France began to gladly plant, eat, and even enjoy, potatoes. And what was the result?
Because of Parmentier’s unprecedented efforts to get the people of France to plant and eat potatoes, many were saved from some future famines.
Parmentier knew that the first two phases of his plan alone could not dislodge the ingrained fears and beliefs of the majority of people in France.
He knew that they were an important part of the puzzle, but he knew that the missing piece was to tap into the influencers of his day.
He knew that when THEY began to eat potatoes and rave about them, then:
That would make the truth he wrote in his paper even more powerful.
It would confirm his previous demonstrations.
It would prove the value of his “guarded” treasures.
Parmentier somehow realized deep down inside a truth that many content marketers today have forgotten…
Effective marketing is hardly ever built on a single event, channel, or tool. Effective marketing is a process that harnesses the power of multiple events, tools, and channels.
I say that because I want you to realize that even though “Influencer Marketing” seems all the rage right now, on its own, it is still not enough.
You can and should figure out ways to harness the power of “Influencer Marketing.” But don’t give up on content marketing (or other types of marketing) in the process.
They are all needed and must be used TOGETHER if you want to see the greatest influence and results come from your marketing efforts.
Whenever you doubt this fact and are ready to abandon content marketing for influencer marketing (or vice versa), then remember the humble potato and an amazing man named Antoine-Augustin Parmentier.
Part II of My “Influencer + Content Marketing” Series
In this post, I showed you how influencer marketing and content marketing (and a couple of other ingenious marketing techniques) were used separately, but in conjunction with each other, and that amplified the overall results.
But sometimes the two can be combined in a hybrid sort of way to produce the results you want to see.
In my next post, I am going to show you how Thomas Jefferson used influencer and content marketing in a combined way and changed the course of history for the United States.
Well today, I want to talk to you about my follow-up post and infographic that contained even more types of content we crave.
More Content We All Crave
Because of the popularity of my “21 Types of Content We Crave” post, ContentMarketingInstitute.com asked me if I wanted to do a follow-up post. I said, “Sure!”
From the very beginning, I’ve never claimed that my “21 Types of Content We Crave” are the only types of content we crave.
The twenty-one that I mentioned in my original list are just the main types that I came up with back in 2012, as I pondered the types of content that I had observed have a huge impact on people.
But as I was putting together my follow-up post for CMI, I thought a lot about other types of content we all crave.
I began to really think again about the types of content that I’ve seen have a huge impact people. And I began to think about the types of content I might have left out.
After much thought, I’ve come up with ten more, powerful types of content we all crave. So here’s my new list of 10 more types of content we all love to consume.
The Kind of Content We Must Create to Influence, Inspire, and Move People to Action
You need to understand this about my original 21 types of content and these additional 10 types:
This is the kind of content we never get tired of.
This is the kind of content we always have time for.
This is the kind of content we don’t forget.
And this is the kind of content we want to share with others.
This is the kind of content we must create if our goal is to influence, inspire, and move to action the unique group of people we have chosen to reach.
You don’t have to have each of these types in every piece of content you produce. Sometimes one type is enough. For longer forms of content, you might want to use multiple types of content and move from one to the other.
MY CHALLENGE TO YOU
Print out this list and put it somewhere you can see it regularly to help you develop irresistible content as part of your content strategy.
Regularly pick one or more items from this list and ask yourself one of these questions:
Does the content I am writing meet this criteria?
What can I do to make the content I’m creating fall under this category?
*Do you have any more types of content that you’d add to this list? Post them in the comments.
Share This Post and My Previous One with Others
Can you do me, yourself, and others a favor?
Please pass this post and my last one on to your friends, colleagues, and followers if you found it helpful.
**You are also welcome to post it on your blog or site. (A link back would be appreciated.)
What Another Person Said About the Training I Later Created
Like I said yesterday, I later created a paid webinar that revealed the little-known way that people could tap into the types of content we crave in order to create more engaging content.
I then talk that same information to a group of B2B content marketers.
The people who attended the webinar (and later my live teaching of it) really loved it.
Here’s what another person said after attending this same training:
“The title of Scott’s presentation, ‘21 Types of Content We Crave,’ was completely misleading, and that’s a good thing. For most audiences, the phrase ‘types of content’ denotes the different content assets: data sheets, white papers, infographics, news releases, etc. Currently, there are many content experts who talk about content strategy and content assets – talks that have become content cliché. Scott’s presentation, on the other hand, was about the different emotional triggersthat content should elicit and evoke – a truly brilliant and novel approach.”
– Alok Vasudeva, The Marketer’s Continuum
Watch the First 12 minutes of “31 Types of Content We Crave for FREE
Image of My Training Video (Not Clickable)
Want to Take a Peek at My Training Before You Pay?
I want to let you watch to the first 12 minutes of my 52:39-minute video training.
You can watch it for free. All you need to do is sign-up below.
That way you can see if you would like to purchase it or not.
I came up with the idea for the infographic below one day when I began thinking about the common themes of content that appeal to people across a wide range of audiences.
I had the infographic created and wrote it for ContentMarketingInstitute.com.
It originally appeared on their siteback on June 5, 2012.
Before their site redesign, the number of times it had been tweeted was over 800 times.
It has since been shared thousands of times by people from all walks of life.
21 Types of Content We Crave (INFOGRAPHIC)
What One Person Said About the Training I Later Created
Later, I created a paid webinar that revealed the little-known way that people could tap into the types of content we crave in order to create more engaging content.
I then talk that same information to a group of B2B content marketers.
The people who attended the webinar (and later my live teaching of it) really loved it.
This what one person who experienced the live training live said afterward:
“Scott is a fantastic speaker. His presentations grab your attention from the very start, then keep you on the edge of your seat for the entire duration. Scott had an audience of B2B content marketers hanging on his every word. Scott’s presentation sparked so many ideas that the subsequent Q&A with audience members ran long. Being a good sport, Scott stayed until every last question was answered.”
– Dennis Shiao Former Director of Content Marketing, DNN
If you would like to listen to a sneak peek of the webinar, then you can below…
Watch the First 12 minutes of “31 Types of Content We Crave for FREE
Image of My Training Video (Not Clickable)
Want to Take a Peek at My Training Before You Pay?
I want to let you watch to the first 12 minutes of my 52:39-minute video training.
You can watch it for free. All you need to do is sign-up below.
That way you can see if you would like to purchase it or not.
Sign-up Below to Watch the First 12 Minutes Now
See 10 More Types of Content We All Crave Tomorrow
Four years later, ContentMarketingInstitute.com asked me if I wanted to do a follow-up post, since the original post was so popular.
I said yes and decided to include ten more types of content we all crave.
I love this quote from Bill Bernbach because it counteracts the myth in the mind of the public (and in some ignorant marketers’ minds) that advertising is based on deception and manipulation.
Effective marketing is NOT based on lies and deceit. Listen to how Bill says it…
Who Was Bill Bernbach?
William “Bill” Bernbach was an American advertising creative director. He was one of the three founders in 1949 of the international advertising agency Doyle Dane Bernbach.
Copy and Paste Version of This Quote
If you’d like to copy and paste this quote, then here you go…
““The most powerful element in advertising is the truth.”
– Bill Bernbach
What Are You Going to Do About This?
After thinking about the above quote for a while, take a look at your content marketing or direct response marketing and then really ask yourself:
What is the most powerful truth I can reveal in the copy or content I am creating? How I can I show our prospects or customers why this truth is so important in their lives?
Video Description: David Ogilvy, in a 1981 film “The View From Touffou,” concisely shares some of his views on developing ideas that produce great advertising campaigns. The film, which was produced for internal use within his agency, provides some timeless suggestions for producing big ideas that drive brand success.
Even though I’ve been involved with writing on and off for Content Marketing Institute (CMI) since 2011, this was the first year I’ve made it to Content Marketing World (CMW).
The Two Most Important Things You Can Gain from Any Conference You Go To
After attending a few conferences over the years, I’ve realized that there are two important things you can gain from attending any conference:
The content you are exposed to
The connections you make
Content Marketing World is no exception. I feel like I gained both of these things from this year’s Content Marketing World.
Let me explain…
Moderating the Content Creation and Development Track at Content Marketing World
Besides getting the honor to emcee/moderate the Content Creation and Development track on Thursday, I had a great time just being there.
I really enjoyed getting to:
Finally meet some people I’ve interacted with online for years
Hang out, laugh, and get to know my co-workers better
Learn great tips, strategies, and ideas in the sessions I attended
My Biggest Takeaway from Content Marketing World 2019
There are many things I learned this year from Content Marketing World and I will share some of my other takeaways in upcoming posts.
But my main takeaway came from something that Joe Pulizzi, the founder of CMI and CMW, said.
The End of Social Media as We Know It?
One of Joe Pulizzi’s slides in his keynote speech for Content Marketing World 2019
In Joe’s keynote this year, one of the things that he talked about was the huge change in how content is published on social media.
He said that social media sites like Facebook and YouTube see the content we create on their platforms as their biggest liability.
Why? Because our content usually pulls people away from their platforms to our sites.
Because of this, Joe said that we’re just now just beginning to see what he calls “the end of social media as we know it.”
The Solution to the Loss of Social Engagement
What was the solution that Joe gave to the impending doom that he’s predicted?
He solution was a simple but powerful one. It was to focus on email and print subscribers. As Joe said, “It’s 1999 again.”
Why was this my biggest takeaway?
First of all, because it confirms the things that I’ve been noticing over the past few years.
In my marketing class that I taught for UC Berkeley Extension, I taught my students that most top copywriters agree that the three most important things in direct response are:
3. The Copy: These are the actual words you use. The words you use and how you use them are extremely important, but they’re not as important as two other things.
2. The Offer: Your offer is what exactly it is that you are offering to your patrons. When it comes to direct response marketing, what your offer is and how you frame it will make an even greater impact on your sales than just your copy alone.
But guess what the most important thing is?
1. The List: In the traditional sense, this is the mailing list that you send your sales letter to. In the digital world of today, this now also includes the email list that you send your sales letters and offers to.
The list is the most important thing because choosing the right list is what ultimately determines the success of your offer and your copy.
If you choose the wrong list, then a powerful offer, presented with engaging copy, will still fall flat.
But if you choose the right list, with a so-so offer, presented with average copy, it can still bring you decent results.
That’s how important the list is. (And that’s not just true for direct response marketers. It’s true for content marketers!)
But that’s not all…
When It Comes to Lists, You Have Two Options
Since the list is so important, having access to the right list will be a major determining factor in your and/or your company’s success.
And you have two options when it comes to mailing lists or email lists:
Rent one – Renting mailing lists is expensive. And renting email lists is ineffective and foolish.
Own one – Owning a good size mailing list or email list is one of the most powerful assets a business can have.
So, you can obviously see what your best choice is! 🙂
That leads us back to Joe’s statement that was my biggest takeaway…
The Money Is (and Will Always Be) In the List
The reason Joe’s statement resonated with me so much is because it was an important reminder that no matter how much technology changes, the fundamentals never change.
Even if Joe’s prediction doesn’t end up playing out exactly like he thinks it will, his advice will STILL BE the determining factor for you and/or your business’ success.
Because what was true in 1999 is still true in 2019 and will still be true in 2049…. “the money is (and will always be) in the list.”
(For those of you who don’t know, this is a statement which most of the early internet marketers continually emphasized back in the ’90’s. And do you know where they got the idea from? The early direct marketers!)
What I Am Going to Do (and What You Should Do Too)
There were many other awesome things I learned at Content Marketing World this year., but Joe’s statement inspired me to again focus the majority of my energy on:
Growing my email lists of prospects and customers
Consistently communicating with, caring for, and helping the prospects and customers on my lists
Continually coming up with more solutions and services to help my prospects and customers to become more and more successful
By doing these things, I’ll not only be insulating myself and my business from the possible social media apocalypse, but I’ll also be building a foundation that will give me, my prospects, and my customers stability no matter what happens.
RFM: A Way to Pick the Most Responsive Lists
In a video on our YouTube channel called, The Attention-Getting Secrets Marketers Can Learn from HGTV, I talk about something that direct response marketers call R.F..M.
Check out this video below to discover the way RFM can help you to pick the most responsive lists.
And if you use RFM creatively, you will figure out how to make your lists more responsive!
Check out the video now and please SUBSCRIBE to my channel now! (I’m practicing what I preach and focusing on subscribers!!)
Listen to Joe and Robert’s Podcast Episode and Learn More About Joe’s Prediction
If you want to learn more about Joe Pulizzi’s prediction about the end of social media, then check out this episode of the podcast This Old Marketing…
If you’re not a subscriber to Joe and Robert’s podcast, This Old Marketing, then you should subscribe now. You can go to iTunes, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
Before You Leave, Why Not Become a Free Member? When You Do, You’ll Get a List Building Cheat Sheet
Before you leave, can you do me and yourself a favor? Become a member of DirectResponseContentMarketing.com. (Click here to join.)
Why become a member?
When you become a member, you will have unlimited access to Member’s Resource Area which will contain special resources and rewards such as:
Special limited member discounts on designated products
Early access to certain products or services
Content upgrades
Checklists
Cheatsheets
Free reports
A special members-only newsletter called “Synergy”
Exclusive content
A private Facebook group (coming in May)
And other goodies
For Member’s Only: Cheat Sheet with 10 Ideas for Lead Magnets to Help You Grow Your List
When you join today, you’ll have access to a brand new resource that I just uploaded to the Member’s Resource Area.
It’s a cheat sheet that will give you 10 things that you can offer to people as an incentive to sign-up for your email list.
Become a member right now and you can get access to…
“10 Irresistible Lead Magnets to Help You to Grow Your List Today.”
WHY? Because whether you’re a content marketer or a direct response marketer, you need to understand why social media is failing so many of us these days — and what you can do about it.
This post reveals the connection between content marketing and Food Network…
Content Marketing’s Secret Role in the Creation of Food Network
You are about to hear a little-known story that reveals how content marketing was secretly involved in the creation of Food Network.
It’s a really intriguing story that involves a powerful Hollywood agent and one of the co-creators of cable TV’s 24-hour news industry.
It’s a story that will reveal to you how people in these top positions think about content and audiences, but it will also reveal something much more important than that.
If you’re a content marketer or company that is finding social media to be less and less effective, then pay very close attention.
Because I’m about to reveal to you a strategy to reach and expand your audience without relying solely on social media.
If you’re open to thinking about social media in a different way than the rest of the crowd, then keep reading.
You’re about to discover how to not be held captive by the social media treadmill but to instead break free from it and make it serve you.
Would you like to WATCH and LISTEN to the story I am about to tell instead of reading it?
If you’d rather read this post, then scroll down and you can continue reading it…
The Podcast Episode That Revealed a Big Secret
I was listening to one of my favorite podcasts, I Love Marketing, awhile back when I heard something I wasn’t expecting.
I heard a content marketing secret about the origins of Food Network. No, they didn’t call it a content marketing secret, but when I heard the story I instantly knew that’s what it was.
Let me explain…
The episode I was listening to that day was episode #301 and the guest that they had on was a guy named Shep Gordon.He’s an American talent manager, Hollywood film agent, and producer.
He began as an agent for Alice Cooper and went on to represent many different famous people. Here are just a some of the people he’s represented:
Luther Vandross, Ben Vereen, George Clinton, Groucho Marx, Kenny Loggins, Pink Floyd, Pointer Sisters, Raquel Welch, Rick James, and many others.
His personal story and his view of fame were really interesting.
But what caught my attention was the fact that he is the person who built what is now known as the “Celebrity Chef Genre”. What that means is that, except for a few people like Julia Child, celebrity chefs didn’t really exist.
That is until Food Network and Shep Gordon got together and changed all of that.
No Wealthy Chefs Before Food Network?
Now before you learn about how content marketing played an integral role in the creation of Food Network, you need to realize something important.
Before Food Network, there were no chefs making a $100,000 a year, not even the top chefs. And no chef had more than one restaurant.
There were top chefs. There were famous chefs. But none of them had what anyone would have considered a “celebrity” status or lifestyle.
Well, after seeing the discrepancy between his high profile clients and top chefs, Shep decided to change all of that.
And the strategy that he decided to use was an ingenious one. It’s one that he learned after observing and being a part of the making of so many top stars.
Pay close attention, because in just a little bit you’ll learn how this strategy could save you from being an on-call servant to social media.
Shep Gordon’s Strategy: Build “Delivery Systems” to Reach and Expand Your Audience
Shep Gordon
Shep realized that top artists like Michael Jackson had what Shep calls “delivery systems” which enabled them to become huge stars.
Shep said that without things such as radio, TV, and later MTV, Michael Jackson would have never become as big of a star as he did. Those delivery systems delivered him to larger and larger audiences, which made him the superstar he became.
But when Shep looked at the top chefs, he realized that the only delivery systems they had were their restaurants.
And those delivery systems were very limited. People were either in their restaurant or they weren’t. Shep described the problem like this, “With 80 seats, if that’s the only way you touch your audience, then you’re going nowhere.”
After thinking about this for a while, he approached many of the top chefs he knew and explained the problem to them.
But he not only explained the problem, he proposed a solution to them.
He said, “So let’s build some highways. Let’s get a TV network to broadcast you. Let’s get pots and pans in stores, books on the shelves, and videos that people can buy. Let’s give them a chance to like you.”
With that strategy in his mind, Shep decided to take action. And to do that, he decided to do what he always did: he tapped into his connections.
How Content Marketing Was Secretly Involved in the Creation of Food Network
And he heard that Reese had announced he was leaving CNN to start another network. He also heard that Reese wasn’t sure what kind of network it would be yet.
Shep realized this was his opportunity. He went to meet with Reese and he asked him if he had considered food as the theme of the channel.
Reese’s response wasn’t too hopeful. He said he didn’t really care for the food world. Not being a person to take “no” for an answer, Shep made Reese an “offer he couldn’t refuse.”
Shep said, “Well, if you do a food network, I can get you all of your talent for free. I’ve already talked to my guys and they’ve agreed to three years free if I can get someone to broadcast. So you’ll have no talent fees.”
Pretty amazing offer, huh?
I was impressed when I heard it. But it was what I heard next that opened my eyes to see Food Network’s content marketing secret…
After Shep told Reese about his chance to have free talent for three years, he then made his move to make sure that this “delivery system” would be a profitable one for his chefs.
He told Reese that in exchange for the free talent, all he wanted was just a spot in each show where the chefs could sell a product (ex. Emeril’s first product was spices).
Did you catch that?
Each Food Network chef, on each food network show, was given permission to not just create content for the network but to also use that content to sell something.
That means that each show wasn’t just content for the network, it was also content that sold a product of some kind!
When I heard this, it suddenly hit me. The foundation of the Food Network empire was built on (and because of) content marketing!
Who knew??
Content Marketers Are In a Very Similar Situation
I’ve thought a lot about this story since I first heard this episode.
And I’ve realized that there are some really critical lessons that companies who use content and content marketers who create content can learn from this story.
In fact, when you see the current state of content marketing and social media marketing you’ll understand the reason why these lessons are so important…
Here are three of the trends that apply especially to what I am talking about here: (NOTE: My comments are in the parenthesis.)
Based on a sample of 100 million posts published in 2017, social sharing of content has been cut in half since 2015. (There’s less sharing going on.)
The volume of content published continues to increase, and new topic areas get rapidly saturated with content.(There’s more content than ever.)
In this new world of content saturation and falling social shares, the big winners are sites that have built a strong reputation for original, authoritative content. (Without these things, you’re in trouble.)
That means that most companies using content and most content marketers are in a very similar situation as chefs were before Food Network and Shep got involved.
Why do I say that? Simple.
Social media’s diminishing power now provides most companies and content marketers with less of a delivery system than a restaurant that seats 80 people. (*Don’t believe me? Then read what I reveal in the next section and I guarantee you’ll change your mind.)
So what’s the solution?
Build “delivery systems” to reach and expand your audience!
The Strategy Every Company and Content Marketer Needs to Learn from Shep Gordon
I want to encourage you to download and read BuzzSumo’s and Steve Rayson’s full report (it’s free and no email is required).
But just from what I’ve revealed to you, you can see that the majority of content marketers and companies have the same problem that many chefs had before Food Network.
They have no effective delivery systems!
Social media, the delivery system that companies and content marketers could rely on in the early days of the content marketing revolution, has become more and more ineffective!
I’ve been involved in content marketing since the early days (2011) and I’ve had the opportunity to write for some top sites (examples are here and here). I remember when you could expect to reach a good size audience through social media.
But lately, I’ve noticed that social media isn’t working as well as it used to.
I’m not just talking about personal experience. I’ve been noticing that even the larger sites aren’t getting as much traction with social media as they used to.
Well, Steve Rayson confirmed my assumption in his report. He says that a number of major publishers have seen a fall in total shares. But this is the craziest thing that he shares…
You see? I wasn’t exaggerating when I said that most companies and content marketers have a smaller delivery system than a restaurant that seats 80 people!
With social media, the main delivery channel that most companies and content marketers rely on losing its effectiveness, most companies and content marketers really aren’t better off than chefs used to be before Food Network.
That’s why the same solution that Shep came up with for them is the same one that we must learn and implement: build “delivery systems” to reach and expand your audience.
“The average (mean) shares of Bitcoin articles in the last 12 months (6 Feb 17 to 6 feb 18) was 64. Average shares of articles about Bitcoin in the same period published by the New York Times was 2,300 and by Coindesk was 874. The median number of shares was just 4. Over half of the 40,000 articles a week being published on Bitcoin got less than 4 shares. Whilst it is tempting to jump on a trending topic, you need to have built some authority and reputation in the space. This emphasizes the importance of spotting new topics very early and building a reputation and authority.“
Isn’t that what Shep did for chefs and for Reese Schonfeld?
He realized that food-related content could be something that could become popular – before anyone else did.
Three Ways to Find or Build Delivery Systems to Reach and Expand Your Audience
Now, I know that finding or building new delivery systems isn’t a strategy that most companies or content marketers have ever considered (or ever even heard of).
But in this day and age, when social media is failing as a sufficient way to reach a larger audience, it’s a critical strategy to consider.
I also know that even if companies and content marketers want to implement this strategy, most don’t have a clue where or how to start.
Why? Because it’s not easy to discover opportunities where you can build new delivery systems before everyone does.
3 Ways to Build New Delivery Systems
Let me give you three things to be on the lookout for, which will help you to see the delivery system opportunities that are all around you, but which most people are blind to:
1. Look for a new channel
That’s what Shep did. He found a new channel for his chefs to be featured on. And in his case, it was a literal channel. But when I tell you to look for a new channel I am not talking about a TV channel (although that might work).
These days a “channel” simply means a way for you to access and communicate with an audience or a way for an audience to access your content.
So finding a new channel could mean:
Moving from blogging to podcasting
Moving from podcasting to Youtube
Moving from Youtube to Webinars
Moving from Youtube to TV
Moving from any other online channels to any offline channels
And the list goes on!
If you want to build a new delivery system, then instead of focusing all of your attention on one channel, like social media, consider getting your presence and content exposure on a new or different channel.
Here’s a story of someone who moved to a new channel and the incredible results that happened when he did…
Case Study: Russel Brunson – A New Channel
Russell Brunson
In 2013, online marketer, Russell Brunson, was fighting off bankruptcy.
He is a really smart marketer, but despite this fact, one of his companies had still failed. So what did he do? Something that no one would expect.
After years of his friend and podcasting expert, Paul Colligan, encouraging him to start podcasting, Russell decided to finally go for it.
Since Russell was busy, Paul suggested that Russell record the podcast while driving to work in his car. And that is how the “Marketing In Your Car” podcast was born (now known as “Marketing Secrets.“)
So there in the middle of one of his businesses imploding, Russell decided to use a new/different channel. He didn’t know if or how this channel was going to work. But he just went for it.
And so he started to therapeutically just tell his podcast audience of his loses and wins as he strove to rebuild his business and his life. The result? You won’t believe them, but here you go:
His podcast has become a top-ranking, popular podcast.
He built an “Inner Circle” group where 100 clients pay $25,000 a year to be a part of his private group. (And guess what? The majority of people who have become his best clients were first podcast listeners!)
He built a company called ClickFunnels, which has become the fastest growing non-venture capitalist backed SaaS company.
Does Russell use social media? Of course! But his success didn’t come from social media.
It came from finding and using a new/different channel and that enabled him to build a new delivery system.
So if you want to build a new delivery system, I’d encourage you to do the same thing. Find a new channel! Now, let’s look at the second way you can look for opportunities to build a delivery system.
2. Look for a new niche
If the audience you are currently trying to reach is in a crowded market, where it’s difficult to get attention or stand out, then try a different niche/market.
It doesn’t just give you the chance to access a new delivery channel. It also gives you the chance to create instant authority in that new arena.
Jay Abraham has significantly increased the bottom lines of over 10,000 clients in more than 400 industries, and over 7,200 sub-industries, worldwide.
Jay has dealt with virtually every type of business. He has studied, and solved, almost every type of business question, challenge, and opportunity.
Jay is paid a very significant amount by many top companies. And WHY is he paid so much? Because he comes up with ideas that are worth millions of dollars.
And what’s his “secret?” He borrows ideas from one industry (where it is common) and applies it in a new industry (where it is unknown). And the result? Insanely high levels of success for every company he works with!
If you want to build a new delivery system, then instead of focusing all of your attention on social media, consider taking your presence, content, and expertise out of your current niche and implementing it in a different niche.
Look for under-served markets/niches
Look for unused “market space”
Here’s a story of someone who moved from one niche/market to a new niche/market and the amazing things that happened when he did…
Case Study: Ryan Deiss – A New Niche
Ryan Deiss
Ryan Deiss entered into the digital marketing world way back in 1999, when he was a college freshman at University of Texas.
He ended up getting a job with an internet startup that quickly went out of business, but through that experience, he learned how to do basic web design.
So after that company went under, Ryan struck out on his own and began making websites for people and eventually for himself. Believe it or not, the first product he sold online was an ebook on how to make your own baby food.
It was from selling that product that Ryan learned how to drive traffic to a site and how to convert visitors into customers.
From those humble beginnings, Ryan eventually became a go-to expert in the area of traffic and conversion. In fact, he became such an in-demand expert that he put on a conference focused on that subject known as the Traffic & Conversion Summitwhich still exists today.
After having people ask him over and over if he had a book or a course, he realized there was a market that wanted to know what he knew.
He started out focusing on small business owners but didn’t get the traction he was hoping for. So what did he do? He moved out of that niche into a closely associated niche. He began focusing on the agencies that serve small business owners.
With this new niche in focus, DigitalMarketer.com began offering what that niche needed and wanted: digital marketing training and certifications. That change in niche completely changed the success of his company.
Using his niche focusing method, he founded NativeCommerce.com along with over 40 different businesses in various markets such as survival and preparedness, manufacturing, investing and finance, health and beauty, DIY crafts and home improvement, online skills training, and more.
“Everything that we’ve done has come out of recognizing that there’s a market and saying, ‘I think we can serve this market. Let’s do it.’” – Ryan Deiss in an interview on the Hack the Entrepreneur podcast
Now, let’s ask the same question I asked before: Does Ryan use social media? Again, of course, he does! But his success didn’t come from social media.
It came from finding and using a new/different niche and that enabled him to build a new delivery system into a new niche/market.
So if you want to come up with ideas on how to build a new delivery system, then don’t just look for new channels, look for new niches.
Now let’s look at the third way to look for opportunities to build a delivery system.
3. Look locally
Most companies and content marketers are focusing on reaching people who are far away. But you should also focus on those who are near: your local market.
There are local people, companies, and organizations who need and are hungry for the type of content you create.
And if you’re strategic about it, these local individuals and entities can become a new delivery system for you to reach and grow your audience. All you need to do is approach them.
Here’s the story of what happened when I made a move into my local area and the results I’ve already seen happen so far…
Case Study: Myself – Look Locally
A picture of me after teaching one of my classes at UC Berkeley Extension
I sort of “accidentally” got into marketing.
It all began when I was trying to figure out how to drive traffic to a website I had created in a small, music niche back in 1999.
So I began my own self-study of marketing and discovered that I not only found marketing interesting, it made sense to me, and I was good at it.
In 2002, when the recession hit, I put out an ebook called How Your Business Can Survive And Prosper In A Recession (that’s why my website has that URL). In it, I interviewed 20 top business, marketing, and sales experts who revealed their methods to help business owners survive and prosper in a recession.
That book led to some interviews with a couple radio stations and online interviews (before podcasting). In 2003, I was hired to help with the online and offline marketing for a non-profit on the East Coast.
In 2008, after returning to California, I put out a second volume of my ebook, when the most recent recession hit. And in it, I interviewed 18 more experts.
After receiving positive feedback from free business/marketing consulting that I had done, I moved into paid consulting.
In 2010, I noticed that content marketing was becoming popular and realized I had been unintentionally doing it from the very beginning of my marketing career. So I submitted a blog post to ContentMarketingInstitute.com (CMI) and began regularly writing regularly for CMI and other websites.
Now you need to realize something important. Up to this point, I had mainly worked with and helped companies and businesses that were in other states.
At the end of 2016, I saw that a friend was teaching a course for UC Berkeley Extension and I asked him how he got that opportunity. He explained the process and later introduced me to his contact there.
I submitted my name and some ideas and was asked to teach an “Intro to Marketing” course for them. I have since taught that course two times (fall 2017 and spring 2018) and I will be teaching it again this upcoming spring 2019.
But this is what I want you to see. After only teaching this class twice, I have already seen these results:
This course has given me the opportunity to teach people from key, local companies such as Oracle, PayPal, and NetGear.
I’ve received testimonials and endorsements from former students (people in important roles at key, local companies).
It has opened up new opportunities to work with local business owners.
Do I use social media? Just like the others, the answer is yes!But the momentum and new opportunities I’ve had in the last year or so didn’t come from social media.
They came from me looking locally and that enabled me to build a new delivery system to our local market.
So if you want to come up with ideas on how to build a new delivery system, keep looking for new channels, new niches, and keep looking locally.
Why Does Building a Delivery System Work Better Than Social Media? Simple. Supply and Demand!
If you’re in a market that’s crowded with content on your subject, then your content will automatically be seen as a commodity. It’s a simple case of supply and demand.
That makes it hard for you to differentiate your company or your content. And if your content and social media shares are seen as common, then they will never be seen as valuable.
That means that your content and social media shares will never be worthy of the attention of that market. All the content marketing and social media marketing in the world will never fix that problem.
But, if you move onto a different channel, or into a different niche, or move into your local area, then you tilt the law of “supply and demand” in your favor.
Because the content you’re offering in these three new areas, where your type of content is limited, makes you and your content stand out as unique.
And that automatically makes you and your content more valuable.
This is what I would Value-Positioned Content because you’ve positioned your content in a way that increases its value.
Sidebar: Value-Positioned Content or Value-Created Content
I don’t have time to talk about how providing your content to another market can have a ripple effect and make your content more valuable in your original market.
And I don’t have time to share with you other value-creating ideas here in this post.
The premise of my handbook is that in most arenas, content has become a commodity.
This handbook reveals a solution to this problem which involves tapping into the universal laws of what makes something valuable and using them to create or position your content. That way your content’s value is elevated out of the category of commodity and transformed it into a rarity.
Anyway, let’s get back to this post and finish it up with one last idea on how you can effectively build your content on these new delivery systems.
When You Find Your New Delivery System, Think Long-form and Long Haul
By just moving to a new delivery system in one of these three arenas, you’ll instantly sense more momentum than you would have if you just focused on social media.
But you will only see substantial and lasting results when you focus on two important things:
“Bottom line: We seek meaning and crave connection. That means marketing needs to slow down and think about substance and context. We also need to focus on the meaning baked into the experience we are giving our audiences.” – Ann Handley
That’s what the chefs on Food Network did. They weren’t just trying to create a quick piece of content like a short 5-minute recipe video you can find on Youtube. They produced content for 30-minute and 60-minute shows.
And they used that long format to tell stories: their own stories, stories about their food, stories about their guests, etc.
It was this long-form story format which gave their audience a chance to know, like, and trust them in the way that short-form, fact-based content never would have.
If you want your company or your content to really succeed in one of the three arenas I’ve suggested, then you must be wise enough to do the same thing.
“The biggest secret to becoming an influencer in any industry is to create content for years and years. Create content, and then multiply that by years. I’ve been creating content regularly for four years straight now. I’m talking publishing weekly or biweekly – usually multiple pieces of content. I’m emailing my list every single week. Because of that, things fall into my lap that I used to have to chase down. I get speaking gigs because of the content that I created years ago. It’s not the content I’ve created recently. It’s the track record I’ve built over years and years that’s getting me attention.” – Sujan Patel
That’s what the chefs on Food Network did. Shep’s plan wasn’t to just have his chefs do an appearance or two on Food Network.
The plan was to produce seasons of content for each chef.
And so they were in it for the long haul. They were building a content asset, a show that benefited their viewers, build a deep relationship with them, and one that would build fame and authority for whoever’s show it was.
If you want your company or your content to really succeed in one of the three arenas I’ve suggested, then you must do the same.
Before we end, I need to answer one question that’s probably on your mind…
Does That Mean You Should Abandon Social Media and Your Current Channels or Markets?
I am NOT telling you to stop using social media completely. Keep using it!
I am NOT telling you to abandon the current channels and markets that you’ve already invested time and money in.
I AM telling you that if you want to see new results, then doing more of the same thing isn’t the answer. If you want to see new results, then you need to begin to do some different things.
That’s why I AM suggesting that you begin to invest some of your time and money into building a new delivery channel.
And I hope if you’ve read this far, I’ve proven to you from the examples of Food Network and the three business examples, that it’s your only real hope to see the significant results you hope for.
But this is the thing that might surprise you.
When you build a new delivery system through a new channel, you can still reach the same market. You will just do it through a different means or media.
When you build a new delivery system through a new niche, you can still reach the same market. You just might end up doing it through a backdoor.
When you build a new delivery system through local arenas, you can still reach the same market. You just do it first on a more up-close basis.
The Unexpected, Social Media Side-Benefit of Building a New Delivery System
This is what you really need to understand.
The side-benefit of building a new delivery system is that you will begin to see more momentum on social media and within your own market! Why?
Remember what Steve Rayson said?
“In this new world of content saturation and falling social shares, the big winners are sites that have built a strong reputation for original, authoritative content.” – Steve Rayson
As you build original and authoritative content in new channels, new niches, and even locally, your authority in those arenas will grow.
And the people who discover you through these new delivery systems will begin to follow you on social media and see your social media shares not as a commodity, but as a source of quality information.
That will give you a new momentum in your social media marketing that will have a ripple effect back into your original market and niche.
The new prestige gained through these new delivery systems will give you a new unique status in your original market and to your original audience. That will make your company and your content stand out from your competitors.
And guess what happens then?
You will have positioned your content in a way that increases its value (there’s Value-Positioned Content again).
That’s why, while everyone else continues to blindly focus primarily on social media, I want to encourage you to put Shep Gordon’s strategy into action: begin building new delivery systems today!
Bonus Content
One of my and my family’s favorite parts of watching movies on Blu-ray or on Amazon Prime is the “Bonus Features.”
For that reason, I thought I would include below some additional “bonus content” that you might be interested in checking out now that this mammoth post is finished.
Listen to Paul Colligan interview Russell Brunson on The Podcast Report. Hear how Russell started his podcast and the ingenious ways he has leveraged it. Go here to listen now.
Listen to Ryan Deiss’ interview with Jonny Nastor on the Hack the EntrepreneurPodcast. Hear why Ryan says that you should aim to become a channel business. Go here to listen now.
Listen to Jay Abraham’s podcast called The Ultimate Entrepreneur Podcast.Hear Jay share some of his legendary wisdom in a way that only he can do. Go here to listen now.
Listen to Sujan Patel’s Growth Mapping Podcast. Hear his marketing and business growth ideas for 2018. Go here to listen now.
Listen to the latest episode of the I Love Marketing Podcast. Hear the amazing marketing insights that Joe Polish, Dean Jackson, and their guests share on this podcast. Go here to listen now.
Read Ann Handley’s book Everybody Writes: Your Go-To Guide to Creating Ridiculously Good Content. Discover why writing matters more—not less—if you want to attract and retain customers. Go here to grab a copy.
Read my free handbook on value-created content (VCC) and value-positioned content (VPC). Grab a free copy and learn how to tap into the universal laws of what makes something valuable and use them to create or position your content so it becomes more valuable to the market. Click here to grab a copy of The 19 Indisputable Laws For Creating Highly Valuable Content: How To Create, Elevate, Or Unintentionally Destroy The Perceived Value Of Your Content. (NOTE: In the handbook, you’ll also learn how to subscribe to my premium podcast on the same subject.)
Watch the video from Nola.com below and learn how Emeril became famous…
I love this quote from Peter Nivio Zarlenga because I think it’s a great reminder for marketers of all kinds about the most important question in marketing.
When we answer this question, our marketing is effective and impacts people. When we fail to answer this question, our marketing is ineffective and misses the mark.
Copy and Paste Version of This Quote
If you’d like to copy and paste this quote, then here you go…
“In our factory, we make lipstick. In our advertising, we sell hope.”
–Peter Nivio Zarlenga
What Are You Going to Do About This?
After thinking about the above quote for a while, take a look at your content marketing or direct response marketing and then really ask yourself:
Is our marketing focused more on what we make or what our market needs, desires, and craves?
Until that time, you can catch up on the first 12 videos that I have up there already. When you do, you’ll learn why I say, “Without attention, there is no marketing.”
After a move to a new state and a new job, I’m back!
I am about to share with you a marketing lesson that you will find really helpful. The most interesting thing about this lesson?
It was marketing that no one actually used on me. It just happened naturally. I’ll explain more in a minute. (*You’re about to learn how marketing taps into natural forces that influence us to make decisions.)
But first, let me explain why things went silent around here for so long…
A New State and a New Job
On July 14th, my family and I left the San Francisco Peninsula for a new adventure in a new land.
The name of the new land? Idaho. The destination? The Boise area.
But moving to a new state wasn’t the only big change. I also started a new job.
I said that because I realized that some marketing principles that are used frequently by marketers were at play here, but no one was using them on us. They were just happening naturally!
These are the four marketing principles I’m talking about:
Unique Selling Proposition: This term was created by television advertising pioneer Rosser Reeves. WHAT DOES IT MEAN? Wikipedia defines it like this… “A unique selling proposition (USP) refers to the unique benefit exhibited by a company, service, product or brand that enables it to stand out from competitors.”
Urgency: If we can delay a decision, we usually will. That’s why marketers try frequently try to use urgency to get prospects to make a decision now.
Takeaway Marketing: I first heard of this principle from Dan Kennedy. Copywriter, Roy Furr, describes this principle by explaining the way top sales professionals use this. He says, “…as the prospect is in through this front door and needing personal attention, the rock star salesperson switches from PULLING the prospect in (using automation) to PUSHING the prospect away.”
Alright, now that you have these principles in mind, let me show you how these marketing principles naturally took place in the situation with us buying our house.
Here’s how these four marketing principles naturally happened in the process of us buying our house:
Unique Selling Proposition: The house we wanted had a unique floor plan that was not like any of the other houses in the neighborhood we liked.
Scarcity: This house wasn’t available at this price anywhere else.
Urgency: We couldn’t delay and debate whether we wanted this house or not since someone had already made an offer on it. We had to decide right then and there.
Takeaway: This house was literally taken away from us by the other people putting an offer on it.
Do you see now why I said that there were natural marketing forces at play?
They think it’s manipulation. They think it’s unnatural. They think it’s all about making people do what they don’t want to do. That’s whey they think marketing is bad or evil.
But marketing is none of those things (when used properly, correctly, and honorably).
Marketing is really just tapping into the natural forces that already influence us all the time and using them to encourage people to purchase our products and services.
In fact, sometimes marketing happens on its own with no one pulling the strings. That’s what happened when we bought our house.
When this happened, I relearned the important lesson of the natural origin of marketing.
And I’ve been waiting all this time to get the chance to share this with you. I hope it has been helpful for you and I hope it helps you to market more effectively.
P.S. We really love our house and our neighborhood! You see? Marketing isn’t so evil or bad after all. 🙂
The Right and Wrong Time to Try to Capture Your Prospect’s Attention
Whether you realize it or not, there are good times and bad times to try to capture your prospect’s attention.
That means that if you try to spend all of your time trying to capture their attention when it’s the WRONG time, it will be a waste of your time and money.
But it also means that if you try to capture their attention when it’s the RIGHT time, then it will be much easier and you will see more ROI.
Watch my latest video to learn more about the good times and bad times to try to capture attention and what you can do about this….
When it comes to content marketing and attention-getting, Disney is at the “grand master” level.
If you understood only HALF of what they know about getting attention, then you would see a massive increase in your content marketing and your marketing in general.
Well, last weekend I went with my family to see the new “Aladdin” movie with Will Smith.
When it over, I was really happy.
Not only because I loved the new movie, but because I realized a connection between:
What they did with this new movie
What Backlinko’s, Brian Dean, revealed about how to increase traffic to your website
Watch the video below and you’ll learn Disney and Brian’s attention-getting secret…
“It was one of those moments that remains one of the greatest in Pawn Stars history because they were looking at a 1961 Gibson SG Les Paul Guitar that was played by the wife of the man who created it. It is like having Babe Ruth’s grandson bring in a signed rookie card of him. It does not get much better than that. After an expert confirmed the value of it to be close to $150,000, a deal was made for $90,000.”
It’s the story of Mary and her connection to Les Paul that made the guitar so valuable, not the guitar itself.
My Secret to Creating Valuable Content is Very Similar
The reason I couldn’t believe what I was hearing is because one of my secrets to creating valuable content is this…
“All of your content’s value comes from the story you wrap it in.”
– Scott Aughtmon, DirectResponseContentMarketing.com
How do I take a common idea or truth and make it feel new and valuable? I wrap it in a story.
Simply by using the right story, I can exponentially increase the value of the idea.
My Secret in Action: It’s Right Before Your Eyes
Want an example of how I use this content creation secret? OK, you just read one.
I wanted you to realize that it’s the story you use to create the context for your ideas that will determine whether your content seems valuable or not.
But instead of just telling you this idea, I told you the story of the secret that Rick Harrison revealed on the TV show Pawn Stars.
I used that story to give you a unique context for understanding my content creation secret.
And it’s that story that made my idea much more interesting and valuable than it would ever be without the story.
So, if you want to exponentially increase the value of your content, remember my and Rick’s secret: all the value comes from the story.
P.S. You can watch the episode that I was talking about right now on HistoryChannel.com. Click here.
(NOTE: You will have to enter your cable provider.)
Have you ever thought about the role that fear plays in keeping our prospects from buying?
Once you realize how often fear plays a part in stalling the sales process, you’ll begin to have a new understanding of why gaining and keeping your prospect’s attention is so important.
In my latest video, I share one of my favorite quotes about courage, a quote I once heard Dan Sullivan, from Strategic Coach, share on the 10X podcast.
I reveal what it is at the beginning of my video because until we realize our own problem with fear, we’ll never understand our prospect’s problem with fear.
To Gain and Keep Your Prospect’s Attention, Focus on Relieving Their Fear Instead of Manipulating It (VIDEO)
Most of us tend to focus on what we want to receive/get more than what we are giving. It’s human nature.
That’s why, when it comes to marketing, many companies and marketers focus mainly on what they can receive from a prospect or customer.
That’s what most people, companies, and marketers do. So, if you want you, your company, or your marketing to stand out, you ought to consider a different game plan.
Focus on what everyone else is ignoring: giving.
When you do, you, your marketing, or your company will stand out in the most amazing way. As the late, great Zig Ziglar once said…
“You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help other people get what they want.”
– Zig Ziglar
In my latest video, I will reveal how this all ties into keeping attention and how it can make your marketing more appealing and powerful…
The Companies and Marketers Who Give Shall Receive (VIDEO)
One of the purposes of this site is to promote, attract people to, and educate people in this new form of marketing that I am calling “direct response content marketing.”
In order to do that, I will be periodically sharing key principles of direct response content marketing (DRCM).
Here’s the post in this series of DRCM principles:
DRCM PRINCIPLE #2: Many More People Will Buy in the Next 3 – 12 Months Than Will Buy Today
Jim Obermayer is the principal in Sales Leakage Consulting, Inc. and he has come up with an interesting rule that reveals the basis behind my DRCM Principle #2.
Jim came up with a rule that he calls “The Rule of 45″, which says that 45% of all inquiries (not just qualified sales leads) will eventually buy from someone.
And get this…
This time-frame for this purchase is usually (but not always) within 12 months.
Did you catch that? 45% of the people who make inquiries to your business will purchase what you offer from someone within the next year!
But wait, there’s more…
The “Rule of 45” by the Numbers
Jim says that the percent that buy in three months is usually between 10%-15%, and the percent that buys in the next six months is 26%.
(The remaining 4%-9% will buy within the next 12 months.)
That means that somewhere 36%-41% of the people who contact you will buy WHAT YOU ARE SELLING within the next 3-6 months!
But don’t miss this important fact… They AREN’T ready to buy TODAY.
That means that there’s a fatal flaw that many marketers and companies are making.
The Fatal Flaw of Focusing Only on People
Who Want to Buy Today
The first DRCM principle states that onlyapproximately 3% of your market is ready to buy at any given time, the rest is not.
In other words, only three out
of every one hundred in your market is ready to buy right NOW,
today.
But what are most companies and marketers mainly focusing all of their marketing and effort on? They are focused only on those who are ready to buy TODAY.
That means that for every 100 prospects that come their way, these marketers and companies are missing out on 45 of the potential sales that they could be making!
Do you see why I say that focusing ONLY ON people who want to buy today is the fatal flaw that most businesses are making?
Two Things That Direct Response Content Marketers Focus On
This again points to the reason why direct response content marketers to focus on two things:
Building lists
Building an audience
We focus on building lists and on building an audience because both of these things are focused on the 40-odd people that most companies/marketers overlook and therefore miss.
The people who will eventually purchase what you’re offering from someone.
The other thing I want you to notice about the two above things is that they each come from the main focus on direct response marketing (lists) and content marketing (audience).
As direct response content marketers, we realize that BOTH of these things are important and we don’t sacrifice one in favor of the other.
Once you really understand this truth, you will realize that as content marketers or direct response marketers you must focus on people who aren’t ready to buy today but will buy “tomorrow.”
(I’ll go more in-depth on this in another post on this site later today when I share DRCM Principle #2.)
Once you realize this, you will realize how important it is to not just capture attention, but more importantly to keep it.
I explain more about this in my latest video below…
The Reason Why the MAJORITY of Your Sales Will Come from Your Ability to KEEP Attention (VIDEO)
I heard a story about a farmer who had some puppies he needed to sell.
He painted a sign that said “Puppies For Sale.”
He took the sign and nailed it to a post on the edge of his yard.
As he was pounding the last nail into the post, he felt a tug on his overalls.
He looked down and there was a little boy looking up at him from the other side of the fence.
The little boy said to the man, “Excuse me, mister. I want to buy a puppy.”
The farmer wiped his neck with his handkerchief and said to the boy, “Well, these puppies come from mighty fine parents and they aren’t cheap.”
The boy dropped his head for a moment.
Then he reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of change and showed it to the farmer.
“I got thirty-nine cents. Is that enough to take a look?”
“Well, alright. Sure, boy” said the farmer.
The farmer then whistled and yelled the dog’s name.
Suddenly, the mother dog came running out from the doghouse followed by four little puppies.
The little boy pressed his face against the fence and he smiled at the sight of those puppies.
And then, out of the corner of his eye, the boy noticed a movement coming from the doghouse. Slowly another little puppy appeared, but this one was much smaller than the others.
It sort of slid down the ramp and then hobbled awkwardly toward the other puppies.
The little boy pointed to the runt as it joined the others and said, “I want that one!”
The farmer couldn’t believe it.
He said, “Now, son, you don’t want that puppy. He’s never gonna be able to run and play with ya like these other ones here.”
When the boy heard that, he stepped back and rolled up one of his pant legs to reveal a steel brace running down both sides of his leg. It was attached to a specially made shoe.
Looking back up at the farmer the little boy said, “You see sir, I don’t run so well myself. That little puppy needs someone who understands him and I do.”
—————————- Isn’t that what we’re all looking for? Someone who understands?
An author named Jess Lair had a great definition of empathy. He said, “Empathy: Your pain in my heart.”
And do you know what? There is power in empathy.
One type of content that you MUST create as a content marketer is content that describes your prospects’ or customers’ problems, dreams, etc.
Why? It shows your prospects and customers that you can relate to them.
When someone knows you understand them, then you have their attention like no one else.
And you won’t just have their attention. You’ll have their alliance.
But your empathy must be real. If it’s not it will backfire.
So stop trying to “sell” with your content marketing and start trying to empathize.
Watch what happens.
P.S. In the past, I’ve been asked to share examples of how to use my “21 Types Of Content We Crave.” (Click title to see the infographic.)
Well, this post uses content types #4, #7, #19, and #21. If you have examples of the 21 types, then tweet them using the #contentwecrave hashtag.
Without knowing you personally there are not a lot of things that I can predict will grab your attention every time except for one thing: the thing you crave.
Because I know that if it’s something you crave, then you’re going to have your reticular activating system on “high alert” and on the lookout for that thing.
That means that if you want your marketing to capture your prospect’s attention, then all you have to do is figure out what they crave.
Now I CAN’T tell you what your prospect specifically craves, but I CAN tell you what they crave a universal level.
And it has everything to do with what I call “content we crave.”
Watch my latest video to learn about the “31 Types of Content We Crave” and how you can use them in your marketing to grab attention…
How Marketers Can Capture Attention Using My 31 Types of Content We Crave (VIDEO)
After you watch my video, you can download or print out my two “content we crave” infographics so you can use them as your cheat sheet whenever you want to create copy or content that has a higher chance of capturing your prospect’s attention.
Even though I really thought I had come up with an important concept, the response to that post still surprised me.
It was shared something over 800 times. (I stopped counting!)
It ended up with a 101 comments before CMI turned off the comments.
It has since been shared thousands of times.
You can see the infographic below…
21 Types of Content We Crave (INFOGRAPHIC)
“Scott has consistently been one of our top authors at the content marketing institute. His posts are timely, fact-driven and almost always drive a high-level of discussion. His ’21 types of content we crave’ infographic post on CMI was one of our most popular posts of the year!”
– Joe Pulizzi The founder of ContentMarketingInstitute.com One of the leading thought leaders behind the content marketing and social media movement
That original post was so popular that they asked to repost it again as a “Back by Popular Demand” post.
And when they did, they asked me if I had any new thoughts to add. So I had another infograph created with 10 additional types of content that we crave.
Below is that infographic with more of the types of content that we crave…
10 More Types of Content We Crave (INFOGRAPHIC)
The Webinar I Put on to Show People How to Use “Content We Crave” to Create Engaging Content
I went on to put on a webinar based on how to use the the types of “content we crave” to create engaging content.
Here is what two of the original attendees said about what I shared…
“If you are involved in content creation in any way, 21 Types of Content We Crave is for you. It not only shows you what works, but why. In just a short time this webinar will help anyone learn to break through all the other noise and “content clutter” out there by creating powerful stories that people remember and want to share.”
– Joe Basques, Quality Analyst – Allergan
“Scott’s concepts in 21 Types of Content We Crave are absolutely brilliant! He simply breaks down an actionable approach that any content marketer can and should start using immediately. I highly recommend Scott Aughtmon as a valuable resource for both entrepreneurs and marketing professionals.”
– Bryan Kelly
I later taught the same, basic information at a Meetup for B2B content marketers. This is what some of the people who were there had to say.
“Scott is a fantastic speaker. His presentations grab your attention from the very start, then keep you on the edge of your seat for the entire duration. Scott had an audience of B2B content marketers hanging on his every word. Scott’s presentation sparked so many ideas that the subsequent Q&A with audience members ran long. Being a good sport, Scott stayed until every last question was answered.”
– Dennis Shiao Former Director of Content Marketing, DNN
“The title of Scott’s presentation, ‘21 Types of Content We Crave,’ was completely misleading, and that’s a good thing. For most audiences, the phrase ‘types of content’ denotes the different content assets: data sheets, white papers, infographics, news releases, etc. Currently, there are many content experts who talk about content strategy and content assets – talks that have become content cliché. Scott’s presentation, on the other hand, was about the different emotional triggers that content should elicit and evoke – a truly brilliant and novel approach.”
– Alok Vasudeva, The Marketer’s Continuum
Want to Take a Peek at My Training?
You can watch the first 12 minutes of my 52:39-minute video training, if you’d like to understand more about “content we crave” and why we need to learn to use it.
You can watch it for free. All you need to do is sign-up below.
Watch First 12 Mins. of “31 Types of Content We Crave” for FREE
That way you can see if you would like to purchase it or not.
The Attention-Getting Secret That Made a Shopkeeper the First Millionaire of the Gold Rush
I was watching one of my favorite TV shows recently and I was reminded about a story I had forgotten about from the days of the California Gold Rush.
And because of my current focus on the need for marketers to capture attention (See: Without Attention, There Is No Marketing), all I could notice was the amazing attention-getting secret that one wise shopkeeper understood which made him very wealthy.
If you’d like to discover what that secret is so you can use it in your own marketing, then watch my latest video below…
The Attention Getting Lesson Marketers Can Learn from the 1st Millionaire of Gold Rush (VIDEO)
John Lee Dumas (aka JLD) is an American podcaster. He’s the founder and host of Entrepreneurs on Fire, a business podcast where he interviews successful entrepreneurs.
How popular is it his podcast? As of 2018, his podcasts have received 70 million downloadswith 1 million monthly listens.
John obviously understands what it takes to capture attention.
In my latest video, I reveal one of the attention-getting strategies he decided to use early on which is one of the secrets of his success.
But in order to really understand how important and powerful his strategy for getting attention is, I have to tell you the craziest story.
It all happened when I was 10-years-old and fishing with my dad…
Have you ever stopped to think about what gets you to stop scrolling and pay attention?
I was thinking about this as I was scrolling LinkedIn today. And as I thought about this I came up with what I believe are the three primary ways to get attention.
I believe that they will work whether you’re trying to get attention with email marketing, social media marketing, or whatever!
Check out my video below to learn what these three primary ways to get attention are…
The Voice Producers Know How to Capture and Keep People’s Attention
The Voice is a singing competition television series broadcast on NBC. It premiered during the spring television cycle on April 26, 2011.
Besides understanding the music industry and how to find the next top artists, the producers of The Voicehave perfected the art of capturing and keeping an audience’s attention.
Want to proof of how good they are at attention-getting? You do? Here you go… 🙂
“NBC’s The Voice “Top 24” episode (1.2 rating in the adults 18-49 demographic, 7.20 million viewers) topped Monday among the Big 4 broadcasters in both metrics. “
“Even after all these years, ‘American Idol’ is still TV’s most-watched reality show. Per TV By The Numbers, ABC’s ‘Idol’ topped all others for the final week of April with 2.0 million viewers in the all-important 18-49 demographic. In fact, it was the #2 program of the week in that age group behind only ‘The Big Bang Theory’ with 2.3 million. As for its closest reality TV competition in the demo, ‘Survivor’ came in with 1.9 million while “The Voice” (Monday) scored 1.5 million and ‘The Voice’ (Tuesday) earned 1.2 million.”
Do you see now why I say they’re so good at capturing and keeping attention? Wouldn’t it be cool to learn some lessons on how to capture and keep your prospect’s attention?
Well, in my video today I want to reveal a technique that the producers use that enables them to capture and keep our attention.
And the cool thing about this technique is that it’s something that you can use in your content and copy.
Watch the short video below to learn the technique that The Voice producers use so that you can begin using it today…
Attention-Getting Lessons from ‘The Voice’ TV Show (VIDEO)
IMPORTANT: There are none (zero, nada, zilch) spoilers of any kind in this post or in the video below. So if you haven’t seen Avengers: Endgame yet, you have nothing to worry about.
Previous Videos in This Series on Attention
If you haven’t seen my other two videos in this series, then you can check them out here:
The Avengers: Endgame is the end of a wave of attention that started with the first Iron man movie.
Now, with those things out of the way, let’s get to today’s post…
Have You Been Paying Attention to the Attention-Getting Lessons We Can Learn from Marvel?
As I talked about in my first video, the first lesson we must learn and the first thing we must do as direct response marketers or content marketers is to learn to how to gain people’s attention.
And whether you realize it or not, there are some lessons that we can learn from this final movie in this epic drama.
Powerful lessons that can help you to become much better at gaining people’s attention.
In this lesson, you will learn how Marvel has rewarded its audience with “Return on Attention,” which has resulted in their audience rewarded Marvel with greater and greater attention.
Learn these lessons in my latest video below…
The Spoiler-Free, Attention-Getting Lessons We Can Learn from Avengers: Endgame (VIDEO)
In my last video, I told you that we need to make sure that anyone who pays attention to our marketing (i.e. pays us with their attention) is rewarded with “Return On Attention” (ROA).
If you really want to know the secret to getting your prospect’s attention, it starts with paying attention to certain things about them.
You must pay attention so you can uncover the things that will grab their attention.
If you start by paying attention to the right things, then you will have a much easier time getting your prospect’s attention.
Watch my video below to discover what things you be paying attention to…
What We Must Pay Attention to in Order Get a Prospect’s Attention (VIDEO)
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Are You Making It Worth It For People to Pay Attention?
I was on a trip out of town yesterday and I wanted to share with you some quick thoughts about getting prospect’s to pay attention.
So I recorded a short video for you while I was stuck in traffic.
In order for any of our marketing efforts to work, we must first get people to pay attention.
It’s one of the most basic things that direct response marketers or content marketers need to do.
But I don’t think that most of us really think about what we’re asking people to do when we ask them to “pay attention.”
Because if we did, I think we’d realize the secret to not only getting them to pay attention once but also to pay attention to us AGAIN in the future.
In my video below, I reveal a way to think about getting people to pay attention that will help you to devise strategies that will make people want to keep paying attention to you/your marketing in the future.
And the when you figure out how to do this, you will move people from being just a prospect to becoming something much more valuable (to them and you.)
Watch my short video below and you’ll discover what I mean…
Make Sure Your Prospect Receives “Return on Attention” If You Want Them to KEEP Paying Attention (VIDEO)
Your LAST DAY to Get a Free Copy of My Book!
For a limited time, those who join in the month of April will get a FREE COPY of my book 51 Content Marketing Hacks.
(It’s a book FILLED with stories. You will not only discovered powerful examples of content marketing from throughout history, you’ll also see how I use stories to draw people in.)
If you haven’t seen it yet, then make sure to check it out after you read this one.
The following post is from my website RecessionSolution.com. It originally appeared on October 25, 2016, but I feel it’s important to share it again here on my new site.
WHY? Because whether you’re a content marketer or a direct response marketer, you need to understand the power of stories to amplify any/all of our marketing efforts.
This post reveals the behind-the-scenes, neurological secret that reveals just why stories are so powerful.
This Is Your Brain on Stories
“The brain is a wonderful organ. It starts working the moment you get up in the morning, and does not stop until you get into the office.”
I found out that Jack Gallant is a professor at UC Berkeley who does research focused on Cognitive Neuroscience and Behavioral and Systems Neuroscience.
And it was during one of his research projects that he discovered what stories actually cause to happen within our brains.
The Study They Didn’t Have to Pay People to Be a Part Of
Gallantand his team decided to test people while they listened to The Moth Radio Hour. They chose this because normally laying in an MRI scanner is very boring because they just flash words at the person inside the machine.
This is not the way to get brain activity going! 🙂
But the stories they share on The Moth are much different than flashcards. The stories are very engaging and compelling. In other words, people can’t NOT pay attention to these stories!
In fact, people loved the stories so much that Gallant said that they didn’t even have to pay the test subjects like they usually do. It was the perfect way to test how the brain responds to stories.
The people in the MRI scanners listened to a couple hours of stories. As they did, Gallant and his team measured their brain activity by measuring the changes in blood flow and blood oxygen in different locations across the brain.
As they measured these things, Gallant and his team tried to figure out what information in the stories was creating the activity at the different locations in the brain.
And that’s when Gallant and his team found something they weren’t expecting.
Stories Light Up the Brain
Gallant said that stories didn’t really activate the normal auditory part of the cortex like they expected them to. Instead, stories activated a larger constellation of areas in the brain – areas that represent different aspects of meaning.
Listen to what Gallant says about it in his own words…
“…the one very surprising thing from this study is that semantic information, the meaning of the stories, is represented broadly across much of the brain. All of those various areas of the brain represent different aspects of semantic information, in these really complicated maps that are very, very rich but fairly consistent across different individuals.”
Your brain can ignore dry facts. It passively takes in data and stats. But when you tell a story (if you tell it well), then the brain wakes up and plays along!
This is why stories are so powerful. This is why you MUST use them in your content marketing.
How to Tell More Engaging Stories
If you want to learn more about how to tell stories that light up the mind, then check out my previous posts below:
For a limited time, those who join in the month of April will get a FREE COPY of my book 51 Content Marketing Hacks.
(It’s a book FILLED with stories. You will not only discovered powerful examples of content marketing from throughout history, you’ll also see how I use stories to draw people in.)
Have You Read “The Direct Response Content Marketing Manifesto” Yet?
If you would like to know more about this site and the new form of marketing that I’ve come up with, then check out my “Direct Response Content Marketing Manifesto.”
Click the image below to read it now. (If it resonates with you, then become a free member today.)
In the video below, you’ll get to listen in to an interview that I did with David Garfinkel, the man who some call “The World’s Greatest Copywriting Coach.”
In this video you’ll discover:
What David means when he says, “Direct marketers go where branders fear to tread.”
Two important examples of this idea
(One example of is of an extremely successful company that became successful because it went where branders fear to tread.)
The key question direct marketers ask that branders tend to avoid
Watch the video now….
Direct Marketers Go Where Branders Fear To Tread (VIDEO)
CLARIFICATION: Brand marketers, please don’t misunderstand this video.
It isn’t meant to be an attack on brand marketers. And it’s not saying that you don’t need to have a name or brand that stands out in the marketplace.
Having a known brand in the marketplace is important. (When I say “brand,” I’m not talking about a logo. I am talking about a distinct identity/persona.)
Brand marketing can be useful if you’re selling consumable or commodity items that people already plan to buy. Then brand marketing can help your product to stand out from the crowd.
The reason that David and other direct marketers don’t favor brand marketing as the main marketing strategy is:
It is too expensive for most businesses and companies, if you want to really stand out in the marketplace or in people’s minds. (Most companies don’t have as much money as Coca-Cola.)
If you’re selling something that people don’t already plan to buy, then you will need to start with some type of education-based marketing instead of focusing on branding.
It isn’t sustainable for most businesses and companies as a primary marketing strategy. (Most companies need to make a sale now, before their brand becomes known.)
*As David shared in the video, direct marketers tend to focus on getting the sale (and especially the second, third, fourth, etc. sale).
They do that by marketing directly to a focused target group in a measurable way.
And they do it in a way in which branding becomes a by-product of what happens as they are gaining customers.
They don’t use branding as a way to get customers.
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NOTE: This video is part of our a brand new channel, so subscribe and stay tuned for more interviews, ideas, lessons, and strategies that can help you to be an effective “direct response content marketer:”
Gene is one of the legends who all direct marketers look up to, so any information related to him is information you should listen to!
Plus, you should listen to it because David reveals the problem with just writing copy “right off the top of your head.”
David also reveals a different method that will help you produce the best copywriting you’re able to. Click the link/title above and listen to it now! (Then don’t forget to subscribe so you can hear all of the future episodes that come out.)
Finally, if you don’t just want to learn from David, but you also want to be mentored by him or see if he can work for your company, then go to GarfinkelCoaching.com.
4 Days Left to Get a Free Copy of My Book
For a limited time, those who join in the month of April will get a FREE COPY of my book 51 Content Marketing Hacks.
Have You Read “The Direct Response Content Marketing Manifesto” Yet?
If you would like to know more about this site and the new form of marketing that I’ve come up with, then check out my “Direct Response Content Marketing Manifesto.”
Click the image below to read it now. (If it resonates with you, then become a free member today.)
P.S. I’ll have other interviews with David, and other articles from other direct response and content marketing experts, in the future on this site. So stay tuned. P.P.S If you’d like to write a guest post, then contact me and let’s talk!
I don’t know if you’ve ever seen any of the videos from the “Try Guys,” who were formerly a part of Buzzfeed, but I find the ones where they try food at all different price levels very interesting.
Why? Because, even though the Try Guys didn’t intend this, it reveals that the same product can be priced at extremely different prices.
What’s the difference? It all has to do with:
The context in which you offer the product
The way you prepare the product
The ingredients or elements you use
How you present the product
Watch the video through the pricing lens and see what lessons you can learn about pricing from it…
$3 Sushi Vs. $250 Sushi
Some Additional Thoughts on Pricing
The point of showing this video isn’t to suggest that you should only or always price your products or services at the highest level you can.
The point is to remind you of some important things about price that you might not realize or have forgotten:
The price you have chosen for your product or service is much more elastic than you’ve assumed. That means your prices aren’t out of your control.
The price you have chosen for your product or service is impacting the kinds of customers that you are attracting. That means that your pricing is a part of your marketing!
If you’re marketing campaign isn’t making enough money to be profitable, you can probably raise your prices slightly without any negative consequences. In fact, you might be surprised and see positive results!
What Lessons Did You Learn About Pricing?
What prices did you learn about pricing from this video? I’d love to hear them. Comment below or contact me and let me know!
5 Days Left to Get a Free Copy of My Book
For a limited time, those who join in the month of April will get a FREE COPY of my book 51 Content Marketing Hacks.
I don’t know if you’ve realized this or not, but if you want your company, product, or service to be remembered, it all starts with attention.
You will need more than attention to continue to be remembered for an extended period of time. But you will never be remembered if people don’t pay attention to you or your marketing in the first place.
I will be talking more about the importance of attention, memory, etc. in future posts.
But for today, I want you to really think about this famous quote from Samuel Johnson about the true art of memory…
Copy and Paste Version of This Quote
If you’d like to copy and paste this quote, then here you go…
“The true art of memory is the art of attention.”
Samuel Johnson
What Are You Going to Do About This?
I’ve been thinking more and more about the fact: being successful today is all about being paid attention to and being memorable.
With that in mind, I want you to ask yourself these questions:
How can our marketing, company, product, or service become more attention-worthy?
I think this shows the extreme of what I talked about in that article. This is an example of false hope or misplaced hope.)
A Different Type of Content Marketing Article
You can guarantee that 98.% of the time if you read about content marketing on this site, it will usually be an article showing the positives of content marketing.
In other words, I’ll normally show you the power of content marketing to promote great products or services.
Well, today is going to be different, very different.
I am going to show you that the power of content marketing is so effective that it can successfully promote horrible, even deadly, products.
Let me explain.
I really like watching a show called Monumental Mysteries that’s on the Travel Channel.
(There’s another variation of that show that also stars Don Wildman. It’s also called Mysteries at the Museum.)
Well, I was watching episode 18 of the second season on demand and I came across a shocking, true-life story that I realized revealed the power of content marketing.
The Dr. Who Harnessed the Power of Content Marketing
In 1908, a woman set up a medical practice in Olalla, Washington, which is just across Puget Sound from Seattle.
The woman’s name was Dr. Linda Hazzard. (As your about to see, she had a very fitting name.)
A woman opening up a medical practice in the early 1900s isn’t something that’s worth mentioning on its own.
But it was the type of practice she opened that makes it worth mentioning.
You see, Dr. Hazzard didn’t rely on the regular procedures and medicine to help her patients.
She believed that fasting could help any/all of their medical problems. She thought it could cure anything from colds to cancer.
The problem was that she was new to the area and she needed to attract patients.
Instead of advertising her practice, she decided to try something that was bolder. She wrote a book. (This is content marketing!)
Her book was called Fasting for the Cure of Disease.
She then took to the streets and began telling people the ideas found in her book. (This is also a form of content marketing.)
And her methods worked!
In fact, they worked so well that she began attracting many patients, people who believed her unique message and wanted her help.
This was great news for her practice, but bad news for her patients.
You see, her usual practice of having her patients ingest nothing but vegetable broth and a tomato juice for up to two months was having a deadly effect.
Three years after opening her practice, over 20 of her patients had died.
And this was especially shocking because most of those people who came for treatment only had minor illnesses when they came to Dr. Hazzard.
When family members of these victims went to the police, the police said there was nothing they could do, since people had voluntarily chosen (and paid!) for Dr. Hazzard’s help.
For this reason, no one could get the authorities to stop Dr. Hazzard.
That is until the day in 1911 when two wealthy sisters went to Dr. Hazzard for help.
The Only Way She Was Finally Stopped
Their names were Dora and Claire Williamson and they were wealthy British heiresses.
The women had stumbled upon Dr. Hazzard’s book and, because they were interested in alternative forms of medicine, decided to go visit her and receive treatment.
What seemed like a good idea turned into a nightmare.
The two sisters became so malnourished under Dr. Hazzard’s care that Claire ended up dying.
If Dora hadn’t been rescued from Dr. Hazzard’s sanitarium by family members, then she would’ve died also.
This is how she looked when she was rescued…
When her family found out that before Claire died she had signed over a portion of her inheritance to Dr. Hazzard’s practice, they contacted authorities and finally were able to get Dr. Hazzard investigated.
It was eventually discovered that Dr. Hazzard had had several wealthy patients die under her care.
And many of those individuals had signed over large portions of their estates just like Claire had done.
They finally had enough evidence to prosecute her.
On August 15, 1911, the authorities arrested Dr. Hazzard on charges of first-degree murder for starving Claire Williamson to death.
She was convicted and ended up spending 2 years in prison for the crime. (Doesn’t seem fair, does it?)
She (Tragically) Practiced What She Preached
Some might call Dr. Linda Hazzard a quack and evil and I’d have to agree. But she believed in the virtues of fasting to her dying day.
In fact, she followed her own advice and experienced the same tragic results.
In 1938, at the age of 71, and in an attempt to cure an illness she had, Dr. Hazzard began a fast.
It was just a very short time later that she died of starvation.
The Moral of the Story
Content marketing is powerful, whether used for good or evil.
It’s so powerful that the one idea of creating content in the form of a book and/or through speeches has worked for many people throughout history and still works to this day.
It’s a time-tested method for spreading your ideas and establishing your credibility.
And, sadly, it worked for Dr. Linda Hazzard too.
It enabled her to ruin the lives of over twenty families, including Claire’s family.
But if content marketing can work powerfully for bad products, think of how powerfully it could work for great products.
The challenge for all of us is to harness this power and use it for great products and services and worthy endeavors.
New Study Highlights How Much People Dislike Digital Ads (Adweek)
(NOTE: If you click on any of the above headlines, it will open a new window.)
It sounds pretty hopeless for marketers and advertisers, huh? But what if there was a way to create marketing that people don’t hate? What if there’s a way to create marketing makes people hopeful?
I think there is a way. And I will reveal it to you after I tell you this story that is an analogy for how to think of your marketing…
11,000 to 12,000 WWII Prisoners Escaped Thanks to Monopoly
You might not know this, but during WWII prisoners of war who were held by the Germans were allowed to actually receive care packages delivered by the Red Cross.
These packages were always carefully inspected by the Germans to make sure that the prisoners WEREN’T sent things that could help them escape.
But the British were STILL able to sneak silk maps, tiny compasses and metal files to their soldiers.
HOW were they able to pull this off?
The British hid the maps and compasses inside copies of the game MONOPOLY that they shipped to British prisoners.
And, because they had these maps and compasses, it’s estimated that somewhere between 11,000 and 12,000 troops were able to escape captivity!
This reveals an important truth…
Important Truth: We’re All Lost Without a Map
Without a map or compass, it is very hard to know the right way to go. It’s easy to get lost or remain a prisoner.
This was true in the case of these prisoners, but it’s even more true for us in life in general.
If we want to have any hope of safely navigating through life and getting out of whatever trouble, problem, or pain we have, then we need a map and one that we know how to accurately read.
If we don’t have a map, then we needsomeone who can lead us in the right direction themselves.
Never forget that this is true of your prospects and customers. They’re all looking for a map or a guide!
If they see your marketing as a map to freedom from their problem, instead of an annoyance, then they will respond hopefully to it and not with hate.
Your Marketing Message Should Be a Map or Guide to Your Prospects and Customers
This leads to six important ways that you as a direct response marketer or content marketer can create marketing that brings hope:
BEFORE YOU CREATE YOUR MARKETING:
1. Before you create any marketing or take any of the other steps below, your desire must be to really help your prospects and customers. You must want to really help them get unstuck and out of whatever mess they’re in.
2. Next, you must believe that the solution you’re offering through your marketing is the best (or one of the best) solutions or ways out.
AS YOU CREATE YOUR MARKETING, REMEMBER THESE THINGS:
3. Your marketing should speak to your prospects and customers with the understanding of where they’re currently at and in whatever way they’re stuck or trapped.
4. Your marketing must reach, or get to, your prospects and customers wherever they’re at. (In other words, they’re job is not to look for or find your marketing. It must find and reach them.)
5. The purpose of your marketing is to immediately communicate to your prospects and customers that you, your company, or your product or service, can show them the way out of the mess they’re in. (When they see your marketing, it should fill them with hope.)
6. The purpose of your marketing is to then communicate to your prospects and customers the steps they should take so that you, your company, or your product or service, can help them get out of the mess they’re in. (They should understand how you can help them and what to do to receive the help.)
Marketing That Brings Hope
If you remember this as you are creating your copy or content, then your prospects and customerswill feel hope when they see your marketing.
And that hope will lead them to take the steps to possess whatever you’re offering, which will lead to their “freedom” through whatever solution you’re marketing.
That’s much different than annoying people with another cold call, cold email, Linked pitch, or Facebook ad.
That’s how you create marketing that brings hope instead of hate.
Want Examples of How to Make of How to Create Marketing That Brings Hope?
As I was finishing this article and looking for some links to add to my opening section of examples of people hating ads, I came across an article that gives some great examples on how to create marketing that brings hope.
One of the purposes of this site is to promote, attract people to, and educate people in this new form of marketing that I am calling “direct response content marketing.”
In order to do that, I will be periodically sharing key principles of direct response content marketing (DRCM).
Today, I’ll be sharing the first principle that is important to understand.
DRCM Principle #1: Only a Small Amount of People Are Ready to Buy Today
As Chet Holmes, the late corporate trainer, strategic mastermind, business growth expert, and lecturer revealed in his book, “The Ultimate Sales Machine,” only approximately 3% of your market is ready to buy right now. The rest of your market is not.
In other words, only three out
of every one hundred in your market is ready to buy right NOW,
today.
The Mistake of Only Focusing on People Who Want to Buy Today
But what are most businesses and marketers mainly focusing all of their marketing and effort on? They are focused only on those who are ready to buy TODAY.
Think about that for a second. When you do, you’ll realize that that’s the reason why the response rates are so low!
“The average rate of return on direct mail campaigns is generally 1/2 to 2 percent, according to JWM Business Services; in a campaign involving 100 pieces of mail, two to four people can be expected to respond and half that number to make a purchase. “
When we’re focused only on those who are ready to buy, we’re not reaching the majority of potential customers. We’re only reaching a tiny piece of the market.
That’s why direct response content marketers know that besides focusing on getting people to buy today, we must also focus today on the people who will buy in the future.
Two Things That Direct Response Content Marketers Focus On
This understanding is the reason why direct response content marketers to focus on two things:
Building lists
Building an audience
I will elaborate on these two important things in a future post when I explain DRCM principle #2.
But for today, I will leave you with this thought.
It is the unique, coordinated focus on both of these things that enables direct response content marketing to produce greater results for businesses both today and tomorrow.
Stay tuned to future posts where I will share other principles.
In the meantime, if you’d like to know more about direct response content marketing, then I’d suggest you take two steps:
It’s a fable that reminds us of the fact that it’s HOW you communicate your ideas in your content marketing or copy that will make all the difference in the effectiveness of your marketing.
Here’s the fable…
The Fable of the Old Blind Man & The Young Ad Writer
Once an old blind man was sitting at a busy street corner in the middle of rush-hour and begging for money. He had a cardboard sign and an empty tin cup.
On the sign, he’d written: “Blind – Please help.” But no one was giving him any money.
That is until someone special came by.
You see, a young ad writer walked past the blind man and saw him with his sign and empty cup. He also saw all the people passing by without giving any money.
And that gave the young man an idea.
The ad writer took a thick marker from his pocket. He turned the cardboard sheet over and re-wrote the sign. He put it back next to the tin cup and then he was gone.
Immediately, things changed. People began putting money into the tin cup.
After a while, when the cup was overflowing, the blind man couldn’t understand what had happened. He finally asked a stranger to tell him what the sign now said.
The stranger told him, “Your sign says, ‘It’s a beautiful day. You can see it. I cannot.’”
The Moral of the Story: Words Matter
The moral of the story is that words matter.
It’s not just WHAT you say that influences how people respond to whatever you’re offering. It also has to do with HOW you say it.
This is true for content marketers and direct response marketers. The content you create and the copy you write will succeed or fail based on HOW you present or say the information.
Check out these two quotes from advertising legends and you’ll see that what I am saying is not just my opinion…
“What really decides consumers to buy or not to buy is the content of your advertising, not its form.”
– David Ogilvy
“I have learned that any fool can write a bad ad, but that it takes a real genius to keep his hands off a good one.”
– Leo Burnett
Whenever I am creating content or any other persuasive words, I always spend the majority of my time trying to figure out HOW I am going to express my ideas in the most intriguing and interesting way.
Today, I want to challenge you with this.
As you are working on your content or copy, remember this fable and let it inspire you to really take time to think about HOW you’re going to express your ideas.
And if you have been having a problem getting customers, clients, or patients, then take a look at your content and/or copy and see if you can improve how you’re expressing your ideas. Then see if that brings you better results!
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This video below is from A & E Biography and reveals how he went from being an out of work actor and unsuccessful car salesman into a best-selling author and by, the age of 50 years old, one of the most successful people in the U.S.
Watching it will inspire you and teach you some of his great philosophies.
In fact, I believe there are AT LEAST five lessons that marketers can learn from Dale Carnegie.
(*I’ve included these lessons below the video.)
Dale Carnegie A Man of Influence An A&E Biography (VIDEO)
5 Lessons That Marketers Can Learn from Dale Carnegie
Here are just five of the lessons that marketers of all types can learn from Dale Carnegie and immediately begin applying to their marketing:
Become genuinely interested in other people – Dale said, “You can win more friends in two months by becoming genuinely interested in people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you.” LESSON FOR MARKETERS: You should become genuinelyinterested in your prospects. If you do this, and apply it to your content or copy, then you will win more customers in two months than you can in two years by trying to get people interested in your product, service, or company. Doing this will become your secret weapon for creating more powerful marketing than your competitors.
Become passionate about the thing you’re selling – In 1912, Dale discovered his passion: teaching a YMCA night school course on public speaking. It was that passion, which led him to become the successful person that he’d become. LESSON FOR MARKETERS: Becoming passionate about the product or service that you are selling, or the product or service the company you’re creating marketing for is selling, will be the second secret weapon to creating powerful marketing.
Create content for others – As Dale became famous, he began writing articles for others. This helped him name and fame to spread. LESSON FOR MARKETERS: Never forget that publishers need content. When you offer to write for them, you’re not asking them to do you a favor. You’re doing them a favor. So one part of your marketing plan should be to write articles for others, whether that’s articles in magazine or guest posts on websites.
Learn from your customers – As Dale taught more and more people how to speak effectively, he realized that most of them weren’t learning how to speak in order to give regular speeches. They were coming to him so that they could increase their self-confidence. That insight caused him to change his classes to focus on what he called “human relations.” LESSON FOR MARKETERS: Always watch, listen to, and observe not only how customers are purchasing from you, but also how they’re using your products or services. This can give you amazing breakthroughs.
The importance of choosing the right audience to offer your product or service to – When Simon and Schuster published Dales book, How to Win Friends and Influence People, they realized the best people to market the book to were the people who took Dale’s courses. It was a way for them to take Dale’s lessons with them and share these lessons with their friends. That decision made the book land on the best sellers list… for 10 years!! LESSON FOR MARKETERS: Take time to think about who the best people are to begin marketing your product or service to. It could be a make it or break it decision.
These are just a few of the lessons that you can learn from watching this video.
I’d encourage you to watch the video for yourself. Because his story is very inspiring and the lessons will impact you more when you hear them as a part of his story.
Do You Want to Discover More Lessons in His Book “The Art of Public Speaking”?
There are more marketing lessons that you can learn from his book, The Art of Public Speaking. If you comment or contact me and let me know if you’d be interested in reading it, then I will include it in our free Member’s Resource Area.
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This post originally appeared on my website RecessionSolution.com on May 2, 2017.
I am reposting it here today because it contains a story that reveals an important lesson about the type of people we should target with our marketing if we want to see the maximum results.
Here is the post…
The Surprising Thing an 8-Year-Old Boy Did When He Really Wanted a Cheeseburger
It was 8 pm April 9, 2017, and a young boy in East Palestine, Ohio was really craving a cheeseburger from McDonald’s, so he decided to do something about it.
Instead of waking his sleeping parents and begging them to take him (who were asleep after a long day of playing with the kids outside), he decided to take matters into his own hands in the most unbelievable way.
He went online and looked up videos on YouTube on how to drive.
After he felt like he knew enough from watching the videos, he took action:
He stood on his tippy-toes and grabbed the van keys down from where they were hanging.
Then he got into the family van, with his 4-year-old sister in the passenger seat, and drove to McDonald’s!
And this is the amazing part of the story.
According to witnesses who saw the young boy driving, he must have been a fast learner!
The witnesses said that the boy followed all the rules of the road, stopped at all stoplights, and even kept within the speed limits – all within the mile and a half that he drove.
When the boy pulled up to the drive-through window with his piggy bank, the McDonald’s workers thought it was a prank. They thought that his parents were hiding in the back.
It wasn’t long until the police finally arrived at the McDonald’s, because they had received multiple calls from the people who saw the young boy driving.
The boy burst into tears when he found out that he had done something wrong and told the police officer that he just really wanted a cheeseburger! 🙂
A family friend who was eating at McDonald’s recognized the kids and called their grandparents.
The GOOD NEWS is this…
1. No charges were filed.
2. They got to eat a cheeseburger while waiting for their grandparents to pick them up! 🙂
THE Factor That Either Frustrates or Liberates Content Marketers and Direct Marketers
So what does this have to do with the factor that either frustrates or liberates content marketers and direct marketers?
Well, when I read this story, I realized that it reveals an important factor that effective content marketers and marketers understand that ineffective content marketers and marketers are unaware of.
Let me explain.
Who Would You Rather Market To?
Who do you think would be harder to market a McDonald’s cheeseburger to?
1. People who are like the 8-year-old boy in the story above and who would do anything to get a McDonald’s cheeseburger
2. People who don’t like McDonald’s cheeseburgers, but prefer In-N-Out cheeseburgers
3. People who are like my niece, who hates cheeseburgers of all kinds, because she hates the texture of ground beef
If you were on McDonald’s marketing team and you wanted to pick a group of people to market to, so that you could have the most success, then which one would you choose?
That’s a pretty easy choice, isn’t it? It’s group #1.
Why is it such an easy choice? Because you know that that group of people loves McDonald’s cheeseburgers. And the other groups? Well, not so much!
Well, THAT’S the factor that effective content marketers and content marketers take into account and that’s why they experience better results than ineffective content marketers and marketers.
They understand that one of the most important factors in effective marketing of any kind is doing everything you can to target the people who are most likely customers.
When you do that, then everything else becomes easier. (I didn’t say “easy,” just easier!)
When you do that, your results are much better. (I didn’t say that the results would be amazing, but they will be better.)
Effective content marketers and direct marketers know the importance of this factor to effective marketing.
They know how important it is because they understand… what marketing really is (and what it’s not) and what it can really do (and not do).
So before you work on your next content marketing or marketing piece, remember the little 8-year-old boy and remember to focus everything you do on getting your marketing message to the people in your market who are like him, when it comes to what you’re offering.
After writing about a similar idea in the above-mentioned post, writing that article in “Synergy,” and thinking about this quote, I’ve come to believe this more than ever before…
The marketers and companies who know and understand their customers the best will be able to create to most powerful and effective marketing and have the greatest success in their markets.
Copy and Paste Version of This Quote
If you’d like to copy and paste this quote, then here you go…
“The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself.”
– Peter Drucker
What Are You Going to Do About This?
After thinking about the above quote for a while, take a look at your content marketing or direct response marketing and then really ask yourself:
How well do I know and understand our customers?
What are some ways that I can begin to know and understand them even more?
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(DISCLAIMER: I just wrote this post quickly and wanted to post it quickly before I announced this site to the public. Please excuse any typos or errors! I will fix them later.)
I want to start by telling you a story about Austrian-born violinist Fritz Kreisler (1875–1962).
I want to tell it to you because it’s a story that reveals two important things that I want you to understand:
The importance of proof in all marketing
My plan for this website
Fritz Kreisler: One of the Most Famous Classical Musicians in the World
According to Encyclopedia.com, he was one of the most famous classical musicians in the world during the first decade of the twentieth century.
Why was he so famous? Well, besides the fact that he had amazing skill at playing the violin, Encyclodpedia.com reveals this interesting reason…
“Kreisler led a long and colorful life, the substance of which he embellished still further through a consistent habit of exaggeration and storytelling.”
– Encyclopedia.com
I don’t know if this story that I came across below is one of those stories or not, but I think you will like it anyway…
One day violist Fritz Kreisler, just an hour before getting ready to set sail to give a concert in London, decided to wander into a music shop.
He didn’t realize it at the time, but he would soon regret that decision. Why?
Because the proprietor of the shop stopped him and asked if he could look at the violin Kreisler was carrying.
After Fritz let him, he quickly vanished and returned with two policemen.
Immediately, one of the policemen told Fritz, “You are under arrest.” Fritz responded, “What for?” The officer said, “Because you have Fritz Kreisler’s violin.” Totally caught off guard, Fritz said, “I am Fritz Kreisler.”
But the policeman didn’t believe him, so he said, “You can’t pull that on us. Come along to the station.”
Fritz didn’t have time for this. His boat was sailing soon! There wasn’t time for drawn-out explanations.
So Fritz quickly came up with a solution.
He asked the officer if he could have his violin for a second and then quickly began playing a piece he was well known for.
He stopped and the looked at the police officers and the shop owner and asked them, “Are you satisfied now?”
They were! The quickly apologized and let him go!
The Reason Our Marketing Is Failing?
You might not realize it, but many of us who are involved in marketing in any way have the same problem that Fritz Kreisler faced that day. People don’t believe us!
“Only a third of Americans now trust their government ‘to do what is right’—a decline of 14 percentage points from last year, according to a new report by the communications marketing firm Edelman. Forty-two percent trust the media, relative to 47 percent a year ago. Trust in business and non-governmental organizations, while somewhat higher than trust in government and the media, decreased by 10 and nine percentage points, respectively. Edelman, which for 18 years has been asking people around the world about their level of trust in various institutions, has never before recorded such steep drops in trust in the United States.”
– Uri Friedman, TheAtlantic.com
Whether we’re creating content marketing or direct marketing, we always have to remember that people don’t trust us – or anyone.
What can we do about this? We have to “overwhelm them.
The Importance of Proof in All Marketing
In all of the marketing we do, we must remember that all of our strategies, ideas, or techniques will fall flat, if we don’t make sure to provide proof.
How much proof? Marketing guru, Dan Kennedy, says this
“The battle for trust in decidedly un-trusting times, to be secured from anxious, skeptical, suspicious, worried and mistrustful prospects, is best waged with overwhelming proof.” – Dan Kennedy in No B.S. Trust-Based Marketing
So before you release your next piece of content or copy, you need to ask yourself, “Have I provided an overwhelming amount of proof?”
How do we provide proof? Let me answer that by showing you what I am going to do on this site…
My Plan for This Website
Because I understand this problem with trust and the need for proof, I know that in order to prove to you that “direct response content marketing” can be a game changer for you or your business, then I am going to need to prove it.
Don’t worry. I plan to do just that.
In order to do that, I am going to use four elements of proof.
Evidence and Examples– As I did with my “21 Type of Content We Crave” and my book 51 Content Marketing Hacks, I will show you evidence of the existence of direct response content marketing and the use of it throughout history.
Testimonies – I will quote and interview people who can tell you the powerful results that they experienced when they combined the incredible powers of direct response marketing and content marketing together.
Demonstration – I will demonstrate direct response content marketing through the things I do on this site itself and through other channels.
Results – I will present to you results that prove that direct response content marketing works. I will do that through the results I produce for myself and others. (*If you would like for me to use you and/or your company as a future case study, by producing results for you – risk free – then let me know.)
Your Invitation: Prove It Yourself
But I don’t want to attempt to prove all of this alone. I want to invite you to join me in this journey.
P.S. The first 100 people who become members get a free, PDF copy of my book 51 Content Marketing Hacks. (It doesn’t cost you anything to become a member.)
I am not here to debunk those stats. I believe them and I am personally using images in my content more than ever.
But what I want to do today is show you the importance of using images for a completely different reason than engagement.
Today I want to show the importance of using images for an important, but often overlooked reason: for proof.
I’ll explain more in just a minute.
But first, let me tell you the story of the person who some believe was the real first person to fly.
And if you pay close attention to this person’s story, you’ll see why using images in your content is so critical.
The Real First Person to Fly?
Gustave Whitehead
The Wright brothers first recorded flight was in 1903.
But the reason we know that they actually flew isn’t just because they said they did and had witnesses to confirm the story.
We know that they actually flew because a photographer was there and took a picture of the event. (That’s the image at the beginning of this post.)
What you might not know is that a man named Gustave Whitehead claimed that he successfully flew his own powered machine that he named “Number 21” in 1901 – two years before the Wright brothers.
In fact, Whitehead claimed to not have just flown his machine once, but several times in 1901 and 1902.
You might be thinking: Why should we believe him? What other proof is there for his claims?
Well, here are two good reasons we should believe him:
A newspaper reporter witnessed the event and wrote about it The event reportedly took place in Fairfield, Connecticut on August 14, 1901. It was described later in an article that appeared in the Bridgeport Herald newspaper on August 18, 1901. The reporter said that he saw Whitehead fly his aircraft and said that Whitehead flew for about half a mile, reached a height of 50 feet, and then landed safely.
There were three other witnesses The Bridgeport Herald reporter said that Whitehead and another man drove to the testing area in the machine. (Number 21 supposedly could be driven like a car when the wings were folded along its sides.) The reporter also said that he and two other people followed them on bicycles to the place in Fairfield.
So you’re probably wondering…
“Wait a minute. If there was all of this proof, then why have I never read about this in the history books? Why was I told that the Wright brothers were the first to fly?”
Well, that’s where our lesson about the importance of using images for visual proof comes in.
Keep reading and you’ll see what I mean…
The Proof is in the Photo
Some say the reason that you never heard of Whitehead and the reason that you were told that the Wright brothers were the first to fly is because they had better proof.
What do I mean?
You see, on that day in August 1901, when Whitehead flew “Number 21” fifty feet high for half a mile, the only proof that the Bridgeport Herald gave was this illustration…
This illustration was supposedly based off of a photo, but the photo went missing and couldn’t be used to prove the flight.
So there wasn’t some conspiracy to keep you from knowing about Whitehead.
The photo of the Wright brothers’ first flight was all the proof that people needed to believe that they really did it, so they were declared the first to fly.
(Many people today still debate whether it was the Wright brothers or Whitehead who were the first to fly.)
Gustave Whitehead’s Hard-Earned Lesson on the Importance of Visual Proof
Can you imagine how bad Whitehead must have felt to be the first to fly, but not have any proof besides his words (and the words of a few others)?
That would be beyond frustrating!
You don’t want to experience the same frustration when you are creating content with the purpose of proving something.
The Main Lesson: Images Reinforce Facts
What is the main lesson we can learn from Whitehead? It’s this…
If you are creating content that is intended to prove something to a prospect, then never rely solely on your words or even the testimony of others.
Whenever possible, use images to reinforce your words. Powerful words, stories, and social proof are important, but images help “seal the deal”.
Images plant your words firmly in the concrete world of reality.
They help convince (and silence) the doubters who rebelliously declare, “I’ll believe it when I see it!”
Proof That Images Really Are Influential
If you think this is just a nice idea that I came up with, then you’ll want to keep reading. I have some powerful proof for you.
“…photographic images traditionally have been taken as proof that the scenes contained within them really did occur as shown. In much the same way that a fingerprint or footprint testifies to the existence of the person who left it, a photograph can be seen as testifying to the reality of the situation it records.”
Basecamp began to test using large photos of their customers on their landing pages. And do you see the results? Jamie Dihiansan explained their tests in this way…
“The Person Page was far shorter. There was less information about Highrise. However, it had a 47% percent increase in paid signups than the Long Form design.”
Jamie Dihiansan, Basecamp
After their tests, they came to this conclusion: Big photos of smiling customers work.
Did you see? It was the photo/image that made the content more convincing and persuasive.
Advice From a Legend in Advertising
Does this mean that you should always assume that adding an image as proof will be the end-all, be-all solution for improving the impact of your proof-based content marketing?
In many cases, adding an image will be your best bet for improving the strength of any content marketing used to establish proof. The evidence I gave you above should make that clear.
But you should always test your results.
What advertising legend David Ogilvy said about advertising is true about content marketing….
David Ogilvy
“Never stop testing, and your advertising will never stop improving.”
– David Ogilvy
Whitehead’s Redemption
In the mid-1980’s a guy named Andy Kosch formed the group “Hangar 21” with the purpose of proving that Whitehead’s “Number 21” really did fly.
He led a team in the construction of a reproduction of the craft. To create the plans, original Whitehead photos were found and studied.
Replica of Gustave Whitehead’s plane
On December 29, 1986, Kosch and his team brought their replica, dubbed “21B”, to an airstrip to see if it would fly.
And what was the result? To their joy and amazement, they made 20 flights and reached a maximum distance of 330 ft.
Gustave Whitehead would’ve been so proud!
Did you notice how the above picture gave the words of this final story more validity and impact?
Well, as you and your team work to create visual content marketing and use more images within your overall content, never forget that it’s not just a way to increase your engagement
If you use the right visuals in your content, then it will also increase its influence.
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Marketers in general, whether content marketers or direct marketers, sometimes believe a commonly accepted lie about what their marketing can accomplish.
They mistakenly believe that if they get their marketing just right, then people will be helpless to resist their incredible offers.
Yeah, that’s never gonna happen. (And that’s a good thing! We shouldn’t want our marketing to hypnotize people and “force” them to buy!)
And that’ not just my opinion.
A little-known advertising legend named Theodore F. MacManus (1872–1940) said the same thing.
(Who is he? He was a copywriter who revolutionized advertising with his work on advertisements for luxury cars by General Motors which included Cadillacs.)
Listen to what MacManus said in his book from 1927…
“The Sword-Arm of Business” by Theodore F. MacManus
The False Assumption About Marketing
Here’s what he said about this commonly believed lie…
“This sounds as though the buyer were a helpless factor in the situation—that he must respond when subjected to certain influences in certain volume with a certain degree of skill and persistency. The word “must” does not apply. The buyer is always a free agent. He can refuse. “
-“The Sword-Arm of Business” by Theodore F. MacManus
How DO You Create Marketing That Influences People?
So, how can content marketers and direct marketers create marketing that influences (or at least encourages) people to buy?
The Real Secret
MacManus goes on to reveal the secret in that same book. He says…
“He buys because he wants to buy, and he wants to buy because his ‘want’ has been catered to in such volume and in such force that he has no disposition to refuse.”
– “The Sword-Arm of Business” by Theodore F. MacManus
The Place Where Powerful Content Marketing and Direct Marketing STARTS
That means that if we want to create marketing that gets people to buy, then the place we need to start is with our prospects wants, not with our wants or the wants of the company we’re creating our marketing for.
Once we start at that place, we need to create content marketing or direct marketing that speaks and “caters” to their wants “in such volume” and in “such force” that they will fully understand how the thing we’re offering gives them what they want.
That’s when they will, in MacManus’ words, “have no disposition to refuse.” It WON’T be because they’re helpless. I won’t be because they can’t resist.
The will respond simply because they want to… because you showed them that what you were offering them actually satisfied their wants/desires.
That’s the secret of getting people to buy. It worked 92 years ago and it still works today!
And when I thought about these things, I couldn’t help but think about an error that some are making.
And if I am honest, I make this error sometimes too.
As I thought about this error, I remembered a fable that I once heard that I think will help us to see the error of our ways and how to fix it.
An error limiting our marketing and the results that we see from it.
(*And if you don’t consider yourself a marketer, but you are trying to figure out how to get more customers, clients, patients, etc. from your marketing efforts, then keep reading. Because what you’re about to read will help you fix this problem.)
The Sharpshooter and the Royal Duke
Once a duke was hunting in the forest with his advisers, men-at-arms, and servants.
Suddenly he came across a tree that caught his attention. Why? It was because he noticed targets painted on it. But that wasn’t the shocking part.
What caused him to stop was the fact that right in the middle of each target was an arrow. When he saw this, he spontaneously yelled out, “Who is this incredibly fine archer? I have to find him!”
Not seeing anyone around, they continued through the forest for a few miles.
Until something stopped him again. This time he came upon a small boy carrying a bow and arrow. They began to question the boy to see if he was the amazing sharpshooter.
At first, the boy pretended to not know what they were talking about. But eventually, the boy admitted that he was the person who shot the arrows in the center of all of the targets.
But the duke wasn’t sure if he could believe the boy or not.
“Are you sure you didn’t just walk up to the targets and hammer the arrows into the middle?” asked the duke suspiciously.
But the boy said, “No, my lord. I shot them from a hundred paces. I swear it by all that I hold holy!”
When the duke heard this, he was amazed and said, “That is truly astonishing!” And then he said something unbelievable to the little boy…
“I hereby admit you into my service!” The boy didn’t know what to do except to thank him over and over again.
But then the duke asked the boy if he could do him a favor. He said to the boy, “You must tell me how you come to be such an outstanding shot.”
And that’s when the boy revealed his secret…
“Well“, said the boy, “first I fire the arrow at the tree, and then I paint the target around it.”
Source: This story is a well-known fable, but this version of the story comes from the book “The Collapse of Chaos” by Jack Cohen and Ian Stewart
What We Have in Common with That Boy
The error that some of us make, some of the time, is very similar to this boy. We fire our marketing out there, and then after it hits, we try to draw a target around it.
Sometimes we get lucky and this method works.
But many times, the results of our marketing fall short of what we hoped for, dreamed of, and thought they would be. And if you think about it, how could they not?
We’re just firing our marketing out there and we’re having to settle for whatever target we hit and whatever results we get.
If you’re happy with the current target market you’re reaching and/or satisfied with the results you’re getting, then stick to your current strategy.
But if the people that you’re reaching aren’t the best for you, your company, or the company you’re creating marketing for, then you need to decide on your target first.
And then you need to create all of your content and your marketing with that target in mind.
When you do that, and continue to test, tweak, and improve your aim, then you will get closer and closer to reaching/impacting that ideal target market and the results you will get will become more and more to your liking.
The First Step to All Effective Marketing
What I’ve been talking about here really goes along with something I teach my UC Berkeley Extension marketing students that I call “the first step to all effective marketing.”
I call it that because it’s the first place you need to start with any type of marketing that you use. If you don’t, then the results will always be less than you hope for and less than they could be.
If you’d like to learn more about how you can listen in to some of the lessons that I teach my students, then check out the links below.
Some Helpful Links for You
Here is a list of links that I mentioned in this post and also a link to an additional resource:
NOTE: This site uses affiliate links to Amazon. If you click on a link and are taken to their website, we might make a small commission. But we only link to or recommend products or services that we like and think are actually good and helpful! The commission is not worth it to recommend books or products we don’t believe in.
Leo Burnett’s Quote on the Greatest Dangers of Advertising
He said something really interesting about what he considered the danger of advertising that I wanted you to see… (The danger is probably not what you think it is.)
Copy and Paste Version of This Quote
If you’d like to copy and paste this quote, then here you go…
“The greatest thing to be achieved in advertising, in my opinion, is believability, and nothing is more believable than the product itself.”
– Leo Burnett
Side Thought: Marketing Déjà vu
This quote reminds me of something that marketing guru, Dan Kennedy, says… “The greatest marketing sin is being boring.”
What Are You Going to Do About This?
After thinking about the above quote for a while, take a look at your content marketing or direct response marketing and then really ask yourself:
Am I (or Are we) neglecting this danger and committing this marketing sin?
Affiliate Link Disclaimer
NOTE: This site uses affiliate links to Amazon. If you click on a link and are taken to their website, we might make a small commission. But we only link to or recommend products or services that we like and think are actually good and helpful! The commission is not worth it to recommend books or products we don’t believe in.
I didn’t get into marketing the typical way that many marketers have. I didn’t walk through the front door. Instead, I sort of slipped in through a side door.
What do I mean? What I mean is this…
I didn’t originally plan (or even want) to be a marketer.
I didn’t even really know (or care about) what marketing was.
Instead, I stumbled into marketing accidentally.
You see, I was trying to figure out a solution to getting traffic to a website that I had started in the late ’90s and I realized that in order to get more traffic, I needed to understand marketing.
So I began looking into what marketing was and how to do it effectively.
And that initial pursuit to understand marketing and figure out how to do it has led me on a journey I never planned or expected to take.
My Unexpected and Unbelievable Journey in the Marketing Arena
In spite of that fact that I stumbled into marketing, when I discovered what marketing really was and how it could help me personally to reach my goals, I decided to dive in head first.
And when I did that, my unexpected and unbelievable journey began.
Here are some of the things that I have happened to me along the way:
I ended up being interviewed as a recession solution expert on a couple radio stations.
I became known in the content marketing arena.(I unintentionally used content marketing back in my earliest days of marketing, even before it had a name.)
I am the person who discovered the oldest known examples of content marketing that are known to exist.
In 2017, I became a marketing professor for UC Berkeley Extension in Belmont and began teaching what I’ve learned about marketing over the last 20 years to the young marketing professionals who have taken my class.
And most recently, I came up with a new form of marketing that I call “direct response content marketing.”
Don’t get me wrong. I didn’t jump from one success to another.
Not at all. Instead, I learned certain concepts, tried them, and then learned from the results.
Some of my efforts lead to great results. Some of my efforts were faulty and led to failures.
But it didn’t matter, because whether the results were exciting or embarrassing, I took whatever happened and learned from it.
What I am trying to say is that my path hasn’t been a straight line. It was more like a zig-zagging path.
The 4 Marketing Lessons I’ve Learned That Can You to Better Market Yourself or Your Business
In my class room at the UC Berkeley Extension building in Belmont, CA
But the benefit of this path was that I’ve learned a lot of lessons along the way. (You tend to learn more from failures and mistakes and I’ve had enough failures and made enough mistakes to learn many lessons.)
I’d like to let you listen in to my story as I told it to my UC Berkeley Extension marketing class recently (the audio is only 32:53 minutes).
And as you hear my story, I will reveal four marketing lessons that can help you to better market yourself in the marketplace and/or how to more effectively market your business.
I’ll show you:
Why being positioned well in the market is even more important than your marketing (and one way to do this)
How to increase the exposure of yourself, your ideas, your products, or your business to a larger audience than you reach now
How to present your ideas to the marketplace in a way that really resonates with people
Why changing the form or format of how you present yourself/ideas will change people’s response to you and your ideas
Testimonial from One of My Past Students
“I have never been involved in marketing before, but I took an ‘Intro to Marketing’ class with Scott Aughtmon at UC Berkeley Extension in Belmont and I really enjoyed it. I not only enjoyed Scott’s speaking style, materials, and quizzes, but it was really helpful for me to put together the required marketing plan for the class. It really helped me to be able to consolidate what I learned in the class. And the suggestions and feedback that Scott gave me while I was putting together my plan was like magic and worked great for me!”
– Ken Imai, Sr. Marketing Manager at Renesas Electronics America Inc.
Ken Imai – Sr. Marketing Manager at Renesas Electronics America Inc.
Listen to My Story and Learn My Hard-Earned Marketing Lessons for FREE
I’d like to let you listen to my story and learn the lessons that I’ve learned from my successes and failures for free.
All you have to do is fill in your name and email address below and then hit “submit.”
Once you do, you’ll be able automatically sent a confirmation email. Click that link and you’ll be sent an email with the URL and password where you can listen to my story and learn my lessons.
One of my goals with this site, besides defining and systematizing what direct response content marketing is and how to harness its power, is to give you examples of how content marketing and direct response marketing have been used in subtle and creative ways in the past.
My purpose for this is to show content marketers how much they need direct response principles, methods, and techniques and also to show direct response marketers how much they need content marketing principles, methods, and techniques.
This post I have for you today has the purpose to do just that…
What is an Infographic?
Midori Nediger, over at Venngage, defines an infographic like this…
“An infographic is a collection of imagery, charts, and minimal text that gives an easy-to-understand overview of a topic.”
– Midori Nediger, information Designer at Venngage
What is the Purpose (or Benefit) of Infographics?
In my experience, creating an infographic can have a powerful impact on you and your business. How? Let me give you three reasons:
It allows you to present information in a way that it can be quickly consumed by busy people. (Even though I personally think it’s crazy, most people don’t/won’t read these days!)
It allows you to present information in a memorable, attractive, and visual way. (People remember things they can see and picture in their minds.)
Infographics are very shareable and can spread your ideas and get you exposure you would never get without them. (Everyone is looking for helpful information to share on their websites and with their social media followers. Infographics give information that can easily and quickly be shared by anyone!)
My Own Shocking Experience with Infographics
In 2012, I was thinking about how all the content that people love seems to have common themes, regardless of whether it is on TV, in movies, in books, or is even in a blog post.
After thinking about all these content themes, I decided to try to come up with a list of all of the types of content that people crave.
I looked at my final list and thought it was a really interesting list.
I believed it could really be helpful to people, so I decided to get an infographic of the list made. I contacted ContentMarketingInstitute.com (CMI), to see if they would be interested in using it as a guest blog post. They said they would.
I really thought that what I had come up with was an important list, but I still wasn’t sure how the CMI audience would respond.
The infographic, and the short blog post that I wrote to go with it, originally appeared on CMI back on June 5, 2012. It was called “21 Types of Content We All Crave.” Here is my infographic…
Note: In 2016, CMI asked me to do a follow-up post. In that post, I provided 10 other types of content we crave.
The Response
As soon as it appeared, people began commenting and sharing the post. And they KEPT commenting and sharing it and commenting and sharing it.
It ended up being tweeted well over 800 times and it received 102 comments before the comments were finally closed.
Not only that, but the founder of CMI, Joe Pulizzi, later gave me a testimonial that said that my post was one CMI’s most popular posts of the year. I couldn’t believe the response!
Quick Tangent: Here’s How to Hear More of My Crazy Story and Discover the Lessons You Can Learn From It
You can listen to more of my story and learn how I stumbled into marketing 20 years ago, by listening to an audio recording from the marketing class I teach for UC Berkeley Extension.
In that story, I reveal the crazy zig-zaggy path I took on my marketing journey.
You’ll discover:
How I ended up putting together a book with interviews with 38 top business, sales, and marketing experts
How I ended up being interviewed on the radio for the “resolution solution” knowledge that I had gained
How I unintentionally began using content marketing (before the term existed)
How I ended up doing marketing consulting and helping small business owners, business founders, and others
How I began speaking in front of authors, small business people, and B2B content marketers
And… how I ended up writing for top marketing websites, wrote a book that was nominated for an award, have been interviewed on podcasts for my content marketing knowledge and ideas, and how I became a marketing professor for UC Berkeley Extension
**Do you want to know the craziest part of my story? I have done all of this without a degree in marketing. (I am 100% self-taught.)
And in this audio, I reveal four, hard-earned marketing lessons that you can apply to your own career and/or to your business.
Click here to sign-up and listen to it for free, right now.
Ok, Now Back to Our “Regularly Scheduled Post”… 🙂
So, you can see why I believe in the importance of and the power of infographics.
But there was one completely incorrect thing that I believed about infographics (and I didn’t even realize my mistake).
I thought infographics were a new, modern idea. (I started noticing them around 2011.)
Turns out that I was wrong. But at least I was only 61 years off! Haha!
Did Advertising Legend David Ogilvy Create the First Infographic in 1950?
In the video, Ogilvy told stories about his early years.
In one story, he said that when his agency was starting out, he was the research director and had never really done any creative work when it came to advertising.
It was during this time that his agency received a job where they had to an ad for Guinness (beer) and oysters.
He kept trying to think of what kind of ad they could possibly do and that’s when it suddenly came to him.
On the train ride home from work he was struck with inspiration. He decided that his ad would be a guide to oysters.
He was so excited about the idea that when he got off the train, he immediately called the office right away and told them his idea.
When I saw the image of the ad appear on the screen during this interview, I was caught off guard.
I had to stop the video and “google” the ad to see it up-close for myself. And when I did, I realized how wrong I had been about infographics being a modern idea.
Take a look at this ad and see for yourself if it doesn’t have a really familiar look and format to it…
Isn’t it crazy how it looks exactly like an infographic!?! That’s because it is one. It’s an infographic in print.
I haven’t researched to see if there are any older examples, but this appears to be the first infographic (or at least one of the first).
The Most Surprising Part of the Story
The most surprising part of the story was what David Ogilvy said as he finished off this part of his story.
He said that this was his first advertisement.
If I understood him correctly, that means that David Ogilvy’s first ad was a print-based infographic. (And he said it appeared only in The New Yorker!)
He used content marketing (in the form of an infographic) as a way to provide helpful information for beer drinkers and build an affinity between beer drinkers and Guinness Beer.
That means that David Ogilvy, a man who strongly believed in direct response marketing, saw the importance of, and the benefit of, content marketing.
A Freak Accident or an Effective Strategy?
In case you’re thinking, “Yeah, so what? So he used what we would now call an “infographic”… once! That doesn’t mean he found value in infographics or content marketing!”
Oh really?
Ogilvy told the interviewer that after they did that first guide they went on to do a SERIES OF ADS of different Guinness Guides!
If the first guide didn’t produce results, then there’s no way that David Ogilvy would have produced other guides.
That means his use of infographics and content wasn’t just an accident. It was a strategy that he used repeatedly.
To Readers Who Are Direct Response Marketers or a Part of Companies Who Mainly Use Direct Response…
So, to my readers who are direct response marketers or to companies who mainly use direct response, I hope this helps you to realize that content marketing is something that can add to the marketing and advertising that you do.
I hope you stick around, come back for more insights that can enhance your marketing, and even consider becoming a free member.
To Readers Who Are Content Marketers or a Part of Companies Who Mainly Use Content Marketing…
And to my readers who are content marketers or to companies who mainly use content marketing, I hope that you see that the content marketing principles, methods, and techniques that we use today have deeper roots that go much farther backthan we’ve probably ever realized.
I hope you stick around, come back for more of these “forgotten insights” that can enhance your marketing, and open yourself up to the idea of learning how to add direct response to make your content marketing even more powerful. And I hope you also consider becoming a free member.
Some Helpful Links for You
Here is a list of links to many of the things that I mentioned in this post and also to some links to additional resources:
You can listen to my personal, crazy story of how I got into marketing and discover some important lessons that can help you to market yourself or your company, then you can sign-up to listen to it here.
You’re about to see not only a great example of old school content marketing, filled with lessons you can use today, but you’re also about to see the perfect example of what I call “direct response content marketing.”
Keep reading and you’ll see what I mean…
A Direct Mail Legend That Content Marketers Should Know About
Direct mail legend Maxwell Sackheim
Maxwell Sackheim is a direct mail legend. If you have never heard of him, here is why he is so respected:
He wrote one of the most famous ad headlines in the history of advertising (“Do You Make These Mistakes in English?“), which ran profitably for 40 years.
Well, if that wasn’t impressive enough, you need to add one more thing to that list of his achievements: content marketer.
Here’s why…
How Maxwell Sackheim Used Content Marketing to Get New Clients
Maxwell Sackheim’s ad “Seven Deadly Advertising Mistakes”
I came across an ad that Sackheim wrote for his agency called “Seven Deadly Advertising Mistakes” and I quickly realized, it isn’t just an ad. It’s a brilliant example of content marketing!
Here’s the definition of content market that I give in my book 51 Content Marketing Hacks so you can see why I call this ad content marketing… (NOTE: You can grab a free copy of my book in our free Member’s Resource Area.)
“Content marketing is the creation (or curation) of engaging content for the express purpose of gaining the attention and favor of a certain group, so that they will be persuaded to do business with an individual, business, or organization.”
– My personal definition of content marketing in my book 51 Content Marketing Hacks.
Maxwell Sackheim didn’t just create an ad to promote his agency. No, instead he created a full-page article that gave his readers powerful information on how to create an ad.
It was content to get their attention and gain their favor, so they would consider hiring him and his agency.
Let me break the ad down for you and show you some of the powerful things that he did in the ad…
12 Content Marketing Lessons from Maxwell Sackheim’s Ad
This ad isn’t just a great example for direct response marketers, it’s also a great example of how to create awesome content that your prospects will consume.
Let me show you six of the ingenious things he did in this ad and show you the eleven content marketing lessons you can learn from him:
He makes the ad irresistible with an intriguing headline and byline: “Seven Deadly Advertising Mistakes: Conclusions Based Upon 45 Years of Experience with Keyed Advertising.”
Lessons #1: If you don’t capture your reader’s attention at the beginning, then they will never read your content.
Lesson #2: Your headline and byline is the most important part of your content. Don’t just use any old headline and/or byline.
He begins the ad with a powerful intro… “We do not presume to know all there is to know about advertising – But we have been planning, preparing, and placing keyed advertising for 45 years, and from the traceable results from ads that failed, and ads that succeeded, we have learned many of the things that influence people, and many that do not.” | “We believe that the motives which induce people to respond to a keyed advertisement will move them to go to drug stores, grocery stores, and other stores for the goods advertised. By avoiding these Seven Deadly Advertising Mistakes, the sales of your product, or whatever it is, and however it is distributed, will increase.”
Lesson #3: The way you begin your content is the next important thing after your headline.
Lesson #4: You should introduce your content in a way that does one of the following things: proves your expertise, explains why the content is important to the reader, and/or promises them some desired or needed information.
He then offers a way for people who don’t have time to read his whole ad to get a copy of it in the form of a “lead magnet.” He tells the people that if they don’t have the desire or time to read it right then, then they can mail the coupon at the end of the ad to get a free copy of it in the form of a pocket-size booklet.
Lesson #5: Make sure to provide ways for people to consume your content later. This is not only helpful for your reader but also gives you leads that you can follow up on.
He then gives them the powerful information he promised them in the form of seven advertising mistakes: 1) GIVE THE READER A REASON FOR NOT READING 2) USE HEADLINES THAT WHISPER SWEET NOTHINGS 3) USE PICTURES THAT DO NOT TALK 4) THE CURSE OF CLEVERNESS 5) GO AROUND ROBIN HOOD’S BARN 6) LEAVE’EM DANGLING 7) USE “YACKETY-YAK COPY”
Lesson #6: Make sure that the content you provide your reader is worth their time and effort.
Lesson #7: Don’t just give them generic information. Always present valuable information in an entertaining and intriguing way.
He then finishes his ad with information to help his readers apply what they’ve learned from the information he’s given them. He does this in the form of seven questions the readers can ask about their advertising: 1) DOES IT GIVE THE READER A REASON FOR NOT READING? 2) ARE WE USING HEADLINES THAT WHISPER SWEET NOTHINGS? 3) ARE WE USING PICTURES THAT DO NOT TALK? 4) IS OUR ADVERTISING CURSED WITH CLEVERNESS? 5) DOES OUR APPROACH GO AROUND ROBIN HOOD’S BARN? 6) DO OUR ADVERTISEMENTS LEAVE THEM DANGLING? 7) DO OUR ADVERTISEMENTS CONTAIN “YACKETY-YAK” COPY?
Lesson #8: Make sure that the content that you create is practical in some way or another. This type of content is much more valuable than just informational content.
Lesson #9: Whenever possible, make sure to include ways that will help your reader apply what you’ve taught them.
Lesson #10: When your reader sees results that you or your company helped them get through your content, guess who they will want to purchase from or work with?
Finally, like all direct response marketers, Sackeheim made sure to leave his readers with a “call to action.” He ended this ad by saying, “We believe our approach to attracting, interesting, convincing, and selling the public is sound whatever you sell, however you distribute it.” | “We are willing to prove this to any advertiser, on one product, in one market. The ‘gamble’ is so small and the stakes are so high that you have little to lose and much to gain by making the test.” | “We shall be pleased to confer with you at your convenience. Write us now! And here is your coupon!…”
Lesson #11: Make sure that in most cases and situations you always have some sort of “call to action” in the content that you create. (This is something that many content marketers leave out regularly.)
Lesson #12: If you really want your reader to take action, then make sure that you make an irresistible and risk-free offer. That’s what Sackheim did here. He offered them the chance to see results on one product in one market for free. How can you create an equally powerful offer?
Want to See the Full Ad?
The complete ad is not only a great example of content marketing, but it also contains some really great information about how to create interesting, engaging, and powerful content.
I know that the image I used above is blurry. Sorry about that! But the ad was way too big to include in this post!
If you would like to see the full ad, you can download a readable, PDF version of the ad in our free Member’s Resource Area.
Are you interested in finding out more about what direct response content marketing is all about?
Click the image below to learn how it can help you to be a better marketer and/or your company’s marketing to see more results.
Get a Free Copy of My Book
For a limited time, those who join in the month of April will get a FREE COPY of my book 51 Content Marketing Hacks.
P.S. A Page Out of Sackheim’s Book – If you would like me to show you how direct response content marketing can improve your results, then contact me.
I will prove that it can help you by applying it to one of your products or services in one market– for FREE.
Affiliate Link Disclaimer
NOTE: This site uses affiliate links to Amazon. If you click on a link and are taken to their website, we might make a small commission. But we only link to or recommend products or services that we like and think are actually good and helpful! The commission is not worth it to recommend books or products we don’t believe in.
My Discovery That Collected “Digital Dust” in My Inbox for Almost 4 Years
It happened on October 6, 2015, and I don’t even remember how I came across it.
I was probably searching and bouncing around the internet looking up some marketing related information.
And that’s when I made this surprising discovery. (Even though, at that time, I’d have to admit that I didn’t realize how important my discovery was.)
What was it? It was a digital copy of an old book about advertising from 1912.
I skimmed it and thought it looked interesting, but I didn’t have time to really read it right then.
So what did I do? I Gmailed it to myself so I could look at it later and figure out what I wanted to do with it.
I think over these years I might have glanced at it once or twice really quickly but, again, didn’t get to really consume it and figure out what to do with it.
That is until Friday, February 1st of this year.
117-Year-Old Secrets About What Makes People Buy (That Still Apply Today)
That’s the day that I remembered again that old book that I had emailed myself.
For some reason I can’t really explain, this time I decided to finally take the time to sit down and really read the book.
And when I did, I began to smile with excitement.
Why? Because I suddenly realized just what an amazing find I had been sitting on for almost four years!
The more I read, the more excited I got. I quickly began to realize that this book was unique. Why?
It a world where the same ideas are repackaged and regurgitated over and over, this book contained some rare ideas, concepts, methods, and tools on how to discover the real reason people buy.
Not only that, but it contained a unique tool (in the form of a chart) to help you uncover the thing that’s really keeping someone from buying from you (It’s a different tool than ones I’ve come across before.)
This might sound strange, but some of the ideas and methods that it contains have been forgotten for so long they are new again!
And finally, when I looked at the publisher and realized the origin/source of the ideas — and when I realized that the methods had been thoroughly tested and produced proven results back then — that’s when I understood why these truths have stood the test of time.
This all led me to realize that the high quality and quantity of information gathered and presented in this book was something I needed to share with others.
It was too valuable to keep to myself or let remain forgotten.
Because in this day and age, just as it was 117 years ago, knowing how to create content or copy that makes people buy is a key skill that is crucial and is always in demand.
(*CLARIFICATION: Please don’t misunderstand me. When I say “make people buy,” I do NOT mean that in a manipulative or sleazy way. I mean causing people to want to buy in a completely honest, upfront, powerful, and persuasive way. A way that helps the seller present their valuable solutions and helps the buyer solve their pressing problems.)
And because I knew that I was about to reveal DirectResponseContentMarketing.com to the world, I realized that this book would be the perfect fit and this site would be the perfect platform to reveal the powerful lessons this book contains.
So today, I am going to begin peeling back the layers and reveal some of the valuable and profitable ideas that this book contains.
(IMPORTANT: This book is 117 years old. I am not claiming that all of the things in it are amazing or still applicable. They’re not! But when you see the quality and quantity of ideas, concepts, methods, and tools that it does contain —which are amazing and still applicable today, I think you’ll agree that I am not exaggerating.)
Why You’re Going to Have to Wait to Find Out the Name of This Book.
But before I share the first lessons from this book, I want to be really clear about what I am going to do for you and what I am not going to do.
What I Am Going to Do
What I am going to do in this series that I am beginning today is repackage and share the information that this book contains.
I am going to pull out lessons from this information and show you how it applies to the content and the copy that you create today.
What I Am Not Going to Do (and Why)
But, what I am NOT going to do is reveal the name of the book…. at least not just yet. And when I do reveal it, I am not going to reveal it all of you.
Why? I want to wait to reveal the name of the book at the end of this series for several important reasons that benefit not only me but also you:
I want to be able to share my exclusive insights from the book with you here,before the information can be diluted and commoditized.
This rewards me for finding the book and for taking the time to read it, condense its wisdom, and present it to you in an easy to consume, understandable, and applicable format.
It also rewards you for finding this website, spending time reading what I have written, and gives you a head start in applying this information before it becomes common knowledge and loses its effectiveness.
Plus, mysteries are fun. They’re attractive. They create suspense. I want to leave the source of this information a mystery in order tomake it more enjoyable for you as you discover the powerful lessons along the way. And I am doing this so that the anticipation will make the “final reveal” more exciting for us both.
*When I reveal the title of the book at the end of this series, I will only be revealing it to members of DirectResponseContentMarketing.com.
Why? There are many important reasons but here are a few of them:
It will give you an incentive to sign-up to become a member of DirectResponseContentMarketing.com. (This book will only be one of the treasures that you will eventually have access to in our Member’s Resource Area.)
It will reward people who sign-up as free members of this community so they get “first dibs” at it and can go read the book for themselves.
It will hopefully delay the dissemination of this valuable information to slow the pace of it being diluted and cheapened.
Plus, I am doing this in order to apply my “6th Indisputable Law for Creating Highly Valuable Content,” which states: “Things that are popular and hard to get our hands on are seen as more valuable.” (In other words, I am applying this law because I don’t want to fail you by cheapening the information you’re about to discover. If you think it’s easily accessible then you might make the same mistake I did and wait four years to consume and apply this important information.)
Now that we’ve gotten that all out of the way, it’s time to pull this book from my digital shelf, open the cover, and thumb through its pages to unveil its first insights and lessons…
How to Create Content and Copy That Sells – Pt. 1 (Wisdom from Inside the Book)
Content and Copy That Motivates People to Buy Requires More Than These Things
Contrary to popular opinion, marketing that makes people want to buy is more than:
The appearance of the content and copy
The words you choose to use
The layout of the copy
The choice of the medium
Don’t get me wrong. All of these things matter! But you can do all of these things perfectly and still not produce something that makes people want to buy.
Why? Because even if your marketing had all of the above things going for it, it could still be missing the secret ingredient that influences people to buy.
The thread that must weave its way through your whole marketing campaign must be grounded in a strong appeal.
And not just a strong appeal, but an appeal that makes people want to buy.
If you don’t find the right way to appeal that will make your chosen prospect want to buy, then everything else will fall flat.
But, if your content or copy is grounded in a strong appeal that makes people want to buy, then the appearance, words, layout, and medium you choose will amplify it.
An Example We Can All Relate to From Childhood
Let me give you an example of the importance of choosing the right appeal in order to get someone to take up your offer.
Think of any type of food you used to hate as a child but you now love as an adult.
I used to hate curry when I was a kid. Back then, my step-dad was a cook in the hospital cafe and he made some curry there that people loved.
My mom would bring some home and try to get me to eat it by saying things like “it’s really good” (appeal to quality) or “everyone loves it” (social proof).
But those appeals had no effect on me, so I didn’t take the offer. WHY? Because I didn’t like curry, her appeals were pointless!
But now, as an adult, I LOVE curry. If my Mom made those same appeals now, I would instantly respond and take her up on her offer!
Appeal: the power of arousing a sympathetic response: ATTRACTION
Do you understand? When I was younger, all of my Mom’s efforts were useless, because her appeal wasn’t attractive to me since I didn’t like curry at the time.
But now, since my tastes have changed, she could convince me to eat curry with hardly any effort – using the same appeal – because that appeal is attractive to me now.
That means that BEFORE you put any effort into your content or copy, you must make sure that the underlying appeal that you have chosen will make your prospect want to buy.
The skillful content marketer or copywriter must make sure that the message that runs through their content marketing or copywriting is filled with buying reasons and buying attractions that are appealing to their target prospect.
The skillful content marketer or copywriter must focus on the product’s essence in a way that’s appealing to his target prospect and in a way that appeals to the prospect’s desires.
Otherwise, the marketing will have no pull, no attraction. And with no pull, all the effort, strategies, and methods in the world can’t help you!
Without the Right Appeal, You Can’t Create Effective Content or Copy
In the book, it says that if you want your content or copy to get people to buy, it must:
Grip your prospects
Reveal the innermost benefits that your product or service offers
Focus on their wants not just your needs
Foresee every hesitation the prospect might have and counteract these with logical reasons to buy
But how can you possibly do any of these things, if you don’t know the right appeal that will make your prospect want to buy?
When your content or copy is based on a weak appeal, or the wrong appeal, then your prospect will quickly begin to put up one of four roadblocks that will keep you from getting them to move forward.
These roadblocks come in the form of four choices that the book describes a prospect making if your appeal isn’t correct or strong enough:
1. Without the right appeal, the prospect (B2C) or company (B2B) you’re trying to target might decide to save their moneyfor now. They might decide to not spend it all, spend it on something else, or save it for a larger purchase.
(*How much “money off” do you think you can offer them as an incentive to buy if they’ve already decided to save themselves 100% by not buying and just saving their money?)
2. Without the right appeal, the prospect (B2C) or company (B2B) you’re trying to target mightjust decide to delay the decision. Maybe he/she is too busy today. Maybe they have more pressing concerns right now.
(That means that instead of just needing to convince them that your product/service is good and can help them, you’re going to need to convince them that they’re not too busy and that your offer is more important than their other concerns.)
3. Without the right appeal, the prospect (B2C) or company (B2B) you’re trying to target might want to take some time to reexamine or reappraise their situation. This might come from self-doubt about the uncertainty of the exact problem that needs to be solved.
(*How easy do you think it’s going to be to convince them that your product/service will solve their problem if they aren’t sure that that’s their exact problem?)
4. Without the right appeal, the prospect (B2C) or company (B2B) you’re trying to target might simply procrastinate and put off the decision (like we all like to do).
(*Think about how good you are at procrastinating and then think about what you’re up against in trying to get your prospect not to do it.)
So you see, by not using the right appeal it’s going to make things very difficult.
But if you figure out the right appeal, then some of your prospects will proceed forward before even stopping to consider putting out these roadblocks.
Without the right appeal, you’re just wasting your time trying to convince your prospect that your product or service is great and can help them, when that’s not the reason they aren’t buying. (Remember my mom and the curry story?)
If you’re going to have any hope of discovering the right appeal, then you must start by clearly understanding the answers to four questions from the book:
What does the prospect want?
How does your product fit that desire?
What overall tone should permeate your content marketing and/or copy?
And what should be your primary appeal that will get your prospect to see that buying now is their best (if not only) option?
Just knowing your product or service isn’t enough. You must know your product or service in relation to your prospect.
It’s the only way to begin to figure out what is keeping a prospect from buying from you right now.
In just a second, I will show you give you a preview of what’s coming next.
But I want to offer something to those of you who want to begin applying what you’ve already read…
Want a Checklist to Help You Begin to Analyze, Evaluate, and Apply What You’ve Learned Here?
If you’d like a checklist based off of the concepts, ideas, and questions that I’ve presented here, then sign-up to become a free member of DirectResponseContentMarketing.com.
I have put together a 5-page checklist that will help to do two things:
Analyze and important a current piece of content or copy
Create a new piece of content or copy
Become a free member right now and you can download this and other resources in our Member’s Resource Area.
Sneak Peek: A Tool to Help You Analyze Your Marketing Problems, So You Can Uncover the Right Appeal
As we continue delving deeper into this book, I am going to begin revealing the questions from a unique chart that this book provides.
It’sa chart that is meant to be a tool to help you analyze your marketing problems and uncover the correct appeal you must use to get your customers to buy.
This chart will help you figure out things like:
The key factors in determining the most effective sales appeal for you to use
The buying motives that you should make sure that your copy or content appeals to.
And more
I think you’re going to have plenty of “aha! moments” and experience some breakthroughs, so make sure you to come back for Part 2. (And there are many more parts to come!)
We’re Just Getting Started
Most of you who have read this far are excited to read this information and thinking of friends, followers, and colleagues you can share it with.
But I know there is a small group of you who, even though you thought the information was good, you aren’t convinced that it is that unique, rare, or different.
My only response to you is, “We’re just getting started!” Come back next week for part two and see the next batch of powerful ideas, concepts, methods I am going to reveal next.
Do You Have a Guess?
You’re always more than welcome to take a guess at what you think the title of the book is at any point throughout this series.
If you have a guess, please email me and let me know what you think it is. (I just won’t confirm or deny it.)
*Just please don’t ruin the surprise for everyone else by posting your guess in the comment section.
NOTE: This post originally appeared on my site RecessionSolution.com here.
I am reposting it here because I want to show content marketers and copywriters to see they might have more in common they realize.
Content marketing is very popular nowadays and it should be.
I believe it’s one of the most powerful ways to market in our current climate.
But the more I’ve thought about it, the more I’ve realized there is an overlooked similarity between content marketing a successful sales letters of the past.
You might be wondering, “What could possibly be similar about these two things that seem to be polar opposites?
Let me give you an example and see if you can see the similarity I’m thinking of.
The Wall Street Letter That Ran for 28 Years
The Wall Street Journal Letter below is one of the world’s most famous copywriting pieces around.
It ran non-stop for 28 years without them being able to find another letter that was more successful.
One of the most famous and successful sales letters of all time
The Overlooked Similarities Between Them
Notice something? It starts with story. What do content marketing and successful sales letters have in common?
Here it is: classic, successful sales letters use stories and content to lead to a sale.
People don’t usually think of them this way, but successful, classic sales letters always use a LOT of content.
They are never just about pitching whatever product or service they’re selling. Oh course not! The legendary copywriters were too smart for that!
When they wrote those classic sales letters they made to do many things BEFORE asking for the sale:
They engage the reader.
They address the problem and the pain the reader is dealing with.
They educate the reader about their problem and the solution the product or service offers.
And only when they are done doing all of those things, do they ask for the sale.
That’s why classic sales letters were so many pages long. All of that takes a lot of content and information!
Sound familiar?
Effective content marketing does the same thing nowadays. It just does it over time, over a series of published chunks of content (blog posts, videos, audio, whatever), instead of trying to accomplish it in one letter.
Content marketing is like a sales letter that’s been dismantled and delivered overtime.
You might not realize it but Ben Franklin once gave some really important advice and inspiration for all content marketers and direct response marketers who are trying to make an impact in their industry.
And his advice is all about content creation and acting boldly.
If You Need to Copy & Paste the Quote, You Can Below
“If you would not be forgotten, as soon as you are dead and rotten, either write things worth reading, or do things worth writing.” – Benjamin Franflin
What Are You Going to Do About This?
After thinking about the above quote for a while, let it inspire to create amazing written content and to attempt things that might be worth writing about!
P.S. Hopefully direct response content marketing will accomplish both of these things!
Elmer Wheeler (1904-1968) was one of the pioneers of persuasion, best known for his advice “Don’t sell the steak, sell the sizzle.”
It was 7 words are what make Elmer Wheeler very famous.
What did he mean by this saying? By saying this, Elmer Wheeler was expressing the importance of focusing on the emotional benefits of what you’re offering someone over the logical benefits.
I discovered a rare movie from 1952 in which Elmer shares some of his most powerful ideas.
P.S. Make sure to check out the rest of this post below the embedded video. If you do, you’ll discover his “5 Wheelerpoints” and you’ll learn how you can get a free copy of his book.
Elmer Wheeler Movie: “Selling the Sizzle” (VIDEO)
Screenshot from Movie Embedded Below
In this rare, powerful video from Periscope Film, Elmer Wheeler answers a question that he asks at the beginning of the movie, “What makes people buy?” (03:20)
Then he goes on to show you how to “sell the sizzle” to get yourself that job, that sale, etc.
WARNING: The movie definitely has some cheesy, NOT POLITICALLY CORRECT, 1950’s scenes, sound effects, and humor, but don’t let that keep you from watching it.
The powerful things that Elmer Wheeler shares in this video aren’t just important for salespeople. It will also be a huge help to both content marketers and direct response marketers.
(He also shows you how to use his principles in your own life.)
One thing you’ll appreciate in this move is that Elmer actually gives you examples of some successful (and unsuccessful) “signatures sizzles.”
He also takes the last part of the film (in an after scene part of the movie) and shows how to apply what he teaches in a real-world situation.
You can watch the video below…
The Five Wheelerpoints from the Book Sizzlemanship: New Tested Selling Sentences
In the movie above, Elmer shares his five “Wheelerpoints” that he was famous for.
And to make sure that you don’t miss them, I decided to share them with you below in the way that he presents them in his book Sizzlemanship: New Tested Selling Sentences.
(*You can download a FREE copy of this book in our Member’s Resource Area.)
1. DON’T SELL THE STEAK SELL THE SIZZLE!
“Its the sizzle that sells the steak and not the cow.
“Steers can’t take orders for their shank bones, but, when the waiter carries a sizzling steak across the restaurant, you hear, see, and smell that sizzle and buy!
“Find the sizzle in what you sell and you find success.”
2. “DON’T WRITE TELEGRAPH.”
“Learn how to speak telegraphically how to boil your words down.
“The more you concentrate sunbeams the deeper they burn. The finest steak in the world loses its sizzle if the waiter takes too long in delivering it.
“So learn the new art of verbal shorthand.”
3. “SAY IT WITH FLOWERS.”
“‘Happy returns of the day’ means much more when you say it with flowers.
“It’s as much what you do as what you say. So? fortify your words with gestures. Back up your sizzles with action. Synchronize them with showmanship.
“Say and do all in one motion.”
4. DON’T ASK IF ASK WHICH!
“Always give the other person a choice between something and something never between something and nothing.
“Be a good lawyer and ask leading questions. Ask ‘Why?’ or ‘Where?’ or ‘When?’ or ‘How?’ or ‘What?’ Not ‘if’ but ‘which!’
“Give others a choice between two things you want. You can’t lose on this principle.”
5. WATCH YOUR BARK!
“The little dog has only one word, and only one tail to wag; but the way he barks and the way he wags his tail convey his meaning.
“So watch your bark. The best sizzle in the world flops with a thud if your voice is flat.
“Your voice, remember, is the carrier of your message. How you say it is as important as what you say.”
Download Our Member’s Resource Area: Sizzlemanship: New Tested Selling Sentences
You can grab your copy for free in our Member’s Resource Arena.
P.S. Make sure to check out my infographic “7 Ways to Create Boring Content” before you leave. It will give you ways to guarantee that your content will be boring!
P.P.S. Make sure you check out the steps at the end of this post to learn how to create interesting content.
In a Reader’s Digest issue from April 1981, a man named Louis De V. Day, Jr., told an interesting story in an article called Pennomena.
The story was about the surprising and funny solution that a group of college students came up with in order to help them get through a boring professor’s lectures.
And I believe that this story presents an important reminder for all us content marketers.
Here’s the story in Day’s own words…
The Funny Way a Group of College Students Handled a Boring Professor
“Several years ago a professor at the University of Pennsylvania was know for giving boring, cliché-ridden lectures.
“At the beginning of one semester, an innovative class breathed new life into his course by assigning baseball plays to each hackneyed phrase.
“For example, ‘on the other hand’ was a base hit;‘by the same token’ was a strikeout; ‘and so on’ was a stolen base.
“Divided into two teams by the center aisle of the lecture hall, the students throughout the term played inning after inning of silent but vigorous baseball.
“On the last day of class, the impossible happened — the score was tied, the bases were loaded and the batter hit a home run!
“The winning team stood and cheered wildly.
“Though deeply appreciative, the professor was quoted later as having wondered why only one-half of the students had been enthusiastic about his lectures.”
The One Lesson a Boring Professor Can Teach You
It’s hard to learn from a boring professor, but there’s an important lesson they can teach us. And that lesson is this…
The power of your words is not just in WHAT you say, but it’s also in HOW you say them.
They’re the equivalent of a boring college professor who can’t get through to their students. That’s never going to work!
Your prospects and customers won’t make an effort to make your boring content exciting, like those students did. Instead they’ll just tune you out completely. Or unsubscribe!
So that leads us to these questions:
What can you do about this?
How can you make sure that you’re content is not boring?
In order to help you with this, I thought it’d be fun thing to tell you what NOT to do.
So below I am presenting to you what I am calling “Seven Ways to Create Boring Content.”
You’ll find it below in two helpful formats for you: 1) An infographic and 2) A text version of the list
7 Ways to Create Boring Content (Infographic)
7 Ways to Create Boring Content (Text Version)
If you follow these tips, you’re guaranteed to bore people every time!
1. Create content that has no personality
2. Create content that is exactly the same as any or all other content I can find on the subject
3. Don’t use any stories
4. Don’t give any examples
5. Don’t surprise me in any way with your content
6. Don’t take an interesting perspective on a subject
7. Don’t share a bold opinion
Time Drags When You’re Boring
I heard that the famous film director Billy Wilder, who was known for classic movies such as “Some Like It Hot,” was once asked how he liked a new film.
His answer was both funny and enlightening.
He said, “To give you an idea, the film started at eight o’clock. I looked at my watch at midnight –and it was only 8:15.”
Isn’t that true? When you’re bored, time drags… on… f-o-r-e-v-e-r!
When you follow my tips above, you’re sure to slow down time for people in the same way.
So how do you create exciting and engaging content?
How to Create Interesting Content
If you want to know how to create interesting and engaging content, it all comes to doing the opposite of everything in my list above.
That means you need to create content that:
Has personality
Is different than other content that can be found on the same subject
Tells stories
Gives powerful examples of what you’re talking about
Surprises people in some way
Gives an interesting perspective
And finally shares a bold point of view
This is the kind of content that will never bore people.
If you’d like more examples of how to create exciting and engaging content, then make sure to check out my “21 Types of Content People Crave”.
I am about to show you some content marketing stats that reveal some really important things you need to consider if you’re going to use content marketing in 2019.
But first, there’s an 8-sentence story you need to hear…
STORY: The Sculptor’s Plans vs. the Writer’s Plans
You’re about to read a story that reveals why content marketing produces results for some companies and why it doesn’t produce results for other companies.
Here’s the story…
British sculptor Sir Jacob Epstein was once visited in his studio by the eminent author, George Bernard Shaw.
The visitor noticed a huge block of stone standing in one corner and asked what it was for.
“I don’t know yet,” Epstein replied. “I’m still making plans.”
Shaw was astounded. “You mean you plan your work?” he asked. “Why, I change my mind several times a day!”
“That’s all very well with a four-ounce manuscript,” replied the sculptor, “but not with a four-ton block.”
Some people complain about content marketing these days and try to insinuate that it’s no longer effective (or has never been effective).
But that’s not true. What is true is that content marketing done ineffectively is ineffective and content marketing done effectively is effective.
You see, in order to build a solid, monumental content marketing plan you have to think more like a sculptor than a writer.
As you are about to see from the content marketing statistics below, there are individuals and companies who are still seeing results from their content marketing.
That means that the difference between those who complain about content marketing and those who praise content marketing comes down towhether they wing it or whether they take time to plan out their content marketing strategy.
Ineffective vs. Effective Content Marketing
But that’s not all. If you want to create effective content marketing in 2019, then here are three of the things you’re going to need:
You need a documented content marketing strategy (a plan).
You must create content that consumers find interesting and helpful.
You must not just create content filled only with dry information and facts. You must create content that uses stories and/or harnesses the elements or power of stories.
BONUS POINT: You’re going to also need how to tie in direct response principles with your content marketing to maximize its impact and results. (Stay tuned to this website to learn how to do that.)
3 Powerful Content Marketing Stats (Infographic)
The stats below will help you to see why the three things that I mentioned above are so important, if you want to succeed with content marketing in 2019…
Sources of Content Marketing Stats
If you would like to learn about the above statistics, then check out these sources below:
In 2018, only 39% of content marketers have a documented content marketing strategy. That number, however, jumps to 65% among top performing organizations. SOURCE: CMI & MarketingProfs
70% of consumers want to learn about products through content as opposed to traditional ad methods. SOURCE: Mdgadvertising.com
55% of business professionals say a great story captures their focus and keeps them engaged with content. SOURCE: Prezi.com
Affiliate Link Disclaimer
NOTE: This site uses affiliate links to Amazon. If you click on a link and are taken to their website, we might make a small commission. But we only link to or recommend products or services that we like and think are actually good and helpful! The commission is not worth it to recommend books or products we don’t believe in.
The “Father of Advertising” Reveals His First Love and Secret Weapon
Screenshot of David Ogilvy Revealing Why Direct Response is Better Than General Advertising
The late David Ogilvy is considered by many to be “The Father of Advertising.”
He is admired and studied for incredible insights into, and understanding of, effective advertising. In fact, Time magazine went as far as calling him “the most sought after wizard in the business.”
Well, you might be surprised to hear this, but David Ogilvy believed in the power and effectiveness of direct response marketing.
In the video you are about to see, Ogilvy reveals that direct marketing was the secret weapon he used to grow his agency, Ogilvy & Mather!
In fact, he calls direct response his “first love” and says that he tried for forty years to get the advertising community to understand the importance of direct response.
In this video, David Ogilvy shares some insights that expose the exact reason why whenever I teach marketing to marketers and business professionals, I always teach them that direct response marketing is the foundation of all effective marketing.
My Similar Goal(s)
And in the same way that Ogilvy tried to convince the advertising world of the importance of direct response, my goal is to help the content marketing industry the importance of direct response.
But that’s not all. I also want the direct response industry to see the importance of content marketing.
David Ogilvy: We Sell or Else (VIDEO)
Description of the video: “Renowned Advertising guru David Ogilvy gives a brief speech on the importance of direct marketing.”
Two Quotes from This Video
In the above video, Ogilvy gave this amazing prediction to direct marketers…
“I predict that the practitioners of general advertising are going to start learning from your experience. They’re going to start picking your brains. I see no reason why the direct response divisions of agencies should be separate from the main agencies. Some of you may remember when television people in agencies were kept separate wasn’t that idiotic? I expect to see the direct response people become an integral part of all agencies. You have more to teach them than they have to teach you. You have it in your power to rescue the advertising business from its manifold lunacies.”
– David Ogilvy
Later he reveals just how important that he believes direct response is when he says…
“Nobody should be allowed to create general advertising until he has served his apprenticeship in direct response.”
– David Ogilvy
If you haven’t already, I’d encourage you to watch the video right now. And if you already just watched it, then watch it again. It’s that important.
If You Would Like To Discover More of David Ogilvy’s Insights
If you’d like to learn more of his insights into direct response and advertising, and you don’t already have his book, then you should grab a copy of it.
Here are some of the things that he talks about in his book:
• How to get a job in advertising • How to choose an agency for your product • The secrets behind advertising that works • How to write successful copy—and get people to read it • Eighteen miracles of research • What advertising can do for charities
NOTE: This site uses affiliate links to Amazon. If you click on a link and are taken to their website, we might make a small commission. But we only link to or recommend products or services that we like and think are actually good and helpful! The commission is not worth it to recommend books or products we don’t believe in.
NOTE: The post you’re about to read is one that I originally wrote for ContentMarketingInstitute.com. (The original post is here.)
I am posting it here because it’s a great example of direct response marketing and content marketing principles working perfectly together.
P.S. Make sure to learn about my free checklist to help you apply this strategy. ———-
The Founder’s Unexpected Death
J.I. Rodale, the founder of Rodale Inc., publisher of Prevention and several other magazines, was dead at the age of 72. What was even more shocking was where he died.
As a guest on The Dick Cavett Show, Rodale suffered a heart attack onstage as the host interviewed another guest. (Cavett and the guest were unaware until they commented to Rodale and he didn’t respond. The show never aired.)
The promoter of health in media was gone, but his legacy carried on. What does this have to do with content marketing?
Everything.
Not because of the interview, but because of the publishing company Rodale left behind.
He left behind an understanding of the magazine industry that would propel Prevention to become one of the world’s largest magazines (10 million monthly readers).
What I want to do today is reveal how Rodale Inc. did that, and help you apply it to your owncontent marketing strategy.
2 Reasons Why a Magazine Exists
In my e-book, 51 Content Marketing Hacks, I share the real reason that magazines exist with a quote included in The 1910s by David Blanke and attributed to ad executive James Collins in 1907:
There is still an illusion to the effect that a magazine is a periodical in which advertising is incidental. But we don’t look at it that way. A magazine is simply a device to induce people to read advertising. It is a large booklet with two departments – entertainment and business. The entertainment department finds stories, pictures, verse, etc. to interest the public. The business department makes the money.
These purposes are the same ones on which every effective content marketer must focus:
Providing interesting content
Making a profit
This simple concept is like most foundational concepts. The power isn’t in knowing, it’s inimplementing the concepts.
Rodale (and those at Rodale Inc. after him) implemented these concepts so well that it became a science. In 2014, Rodale publications reached an all-time high gross readership of 37.7 million readers.
But how did they do it?
Rodale Inc.’s 5-Step Content Marketing Strategy
I accidentally discovered Rodale Inc.’s strategy.
It all began when my wife started receiving Prevention magazine and Rodale began to send her promotional magazines (magalogs). The next thing I knew she ordered some of those books and products promoted in those magalogs.
You need to understand something.
Unlike me, my wife doesn’t like (or even care about) marketing. For her to read these marketing materials, like them, and respond to them meant Rodale was doing something right.
That led me to pay attention to its efforts and research its current and past practices.
The 5-Step Strategy That I Uncovered
The results are revealed in the five-step strategy.
1. The only purpose of content creation is to gather a specific audience
Rodale Inc. never creates content for the sake of creating content. It always has a specific audience in mind. All of the content is designed to appeal, attract, and help that audience.
Rodale has created different content verticals for many markets, including:
Bicycling
Children’s Health
Men’s Health
Rodale’s Organic Life
Prevention
Runner’s World
Women’s Health
Each of these verticals attracts and benefits a unique group of people. Let me use one of its most recent verticals to show how Rodale does it. In March, Rodale created a website called Eat Clean. You can see the detailed vertical audience it plans to attract as described in the site’s press release:
With an often irreverent, always authoritative tone, EatClean.com will be the gathering place for clean-food insiders and experimenters, uncovering the latest trends, innovations, opinions, products, and recipes.
Rodale’s mindset on creating content is different from that of many marketers. Others usually focus on a generic audience. They create content for “urgent” reasons such as a blog post is scheduled; it’s a topic we’ve wanted to discuss; it’s something everybody else is talking about right now.
But they first should answer the questions important to their content marketing strategies:
Who is the specific audience we are trying to attract?
What do they want to know?
What do they want to share?
Rodale always creates content with purpose and on purpose.
2. Focus on subscribers, not readers
I once heard author and podcaster Paul Colligan say, “I am not focused on listeners. I am focused on subscribers.” This should be true for content creators of all kinds. Why? Readers are great, but subscribers are what really matters.
Why is focusing on subscribers so important? It allows you to use what Seth Godin calls “permission marketing” and what old-school marketers thought of as “two-step marketing.”
It enables you to do five powerful things:
Uncover a specific audience that wants to hear from you by letting them raise their hands and identify themselves.
Gain permission to contact them.
Create content that is expected and anticipated by your audience.
Build a deep relationship with your audience.
Contact your audience for free (or be paid as the magazine subscription model provides).
Email marketing has shown to be much more powerful than any social media tool. And physical mailing lists always have been an asset that every business should grow.
Of course, Rodale appreciates it when people walk into a bookstore and buy one of its magazines. But Rodale isn’t focused on single-copy sales; it knows subscribers offer the most value.
Never forget that is true for you, no matter what type of content you are creating.
3. You effectively sell to audience members by channeling and directing their existing desires
Rodale Press once paid famed copywriter Eugene Schwartz $54,000 for four hours of work. His book, Breakthrough Advertising, is considered a mail-order classic. In it, Schwartz reveals something important that Rodale Inc. learned and implemented with precision:
This is the copy writer’s task: not to create this mass desire – but to channel and direct it. Actually, it would be impossible for any one advertiser to spend enough money to actually create this mass desire. He can only exploit it. And he dies when he tries to run against it. Let me repeat. This mass desire must already be there. It must already exist. You cannot create it and you cannot fight it. But you can – and must – direct it, channel it. Focus it onto your particular product.
Did you catch that?
You cannot create a desire for your product or service. It doesn’t matter if you love your product. All that matters is that your prospects desire it. That’s not only true for copywriters. It’s true of all successful content marketers.
You must know what your audiences’ desires are and how to appeal to them.
How can you do that? Think of your content marketing as a way to discover the desires of your audience.
Write for a specific audience and pay attention to how that content resonates with them. See what gets the most comments and shares. But that’s just the beginning. Talk to those subscribers on whom you’ve been focusing and ask what they want.
Rodale constantly studies the desires of its audiences. It looks at trends. It even conducts an annual survey to get consumers’ reactions to specific areas and types of information.
You can see how Rodale used its research to describe the desires of the Eat Clean audience by looking at this comment from Editor Sarah Toland in the press release:
People are more in tune than ever with the relationship between what they eat, how they look and feel, and how our food affects the planet. Everywhere you shop or eat now, you can find some food label – whether something is sustainably sourced, real, natural, pure, non-GMO, local, gluten-free – that raises more questions than it answers.
Eat Clean helps people negotiate this crazy landscape and figure out how to ‘eat clean’ in a way that makes the most sense for their own health, goals, and ethics.
Rodale understands that unless it knows what a specific audience wants, it can never create solutions that they will buy.
You must never forget this. It’s the key to success in sales conversions.
4. Create multiple ways to fulfill those desires
Once you know the audience’s desires, you can create the things that they want to buy or position what you already offer in ways that appeal to them.
(Rodale doesn’t reveal this anywhere that I’ve been able to find, but I bet that it uses the surveys to help identify the solutions that it sells to its specific audiences.)
The key to doing this effectively is to remember two important things:
People have different content-consumption preferences.
Some types of content have more perceived value than others.
With this in mind, Rodale created all kinds of different info-products, products, and services to appeal not only to the different desires of its audiences but to the different ways the audiences want to consume information.
In addition to magazines, Rodale offers books, products, an online university, and host-branded events. Now obviously, you don’t want to create all of these solutions at once. Start with one idea and build from there. How can you get ideas on where to start?
Look to the content you’ve created for format ideas.
All of the content you create must be designed to attract and help that hungry crowd with money. Your products and services must meet the needs and/or desires that a crowd of people with money has.
As I explained then, “… You probably have some content that you could repurpose and sell …” such as:
Blog posts into audio recordings
Audio files into videos
Videos into webinars
You are only limited by your creativity.
Rodale knows that to help your audience the most, and at the same time maximize your profits, you must create many types of solutions for your prospects to buy.
If you want to maximize your sales, then you must do the same.
5. You must use ‘content selling’ to see real results
The other thing Rodale does that many content marketers do not do is they rely on more than content marketing — they also rely on content selling.
Content marketing can take you far but without an offer or ask, it’s difficult to get a sale. At some point, you must focus on content that intentionally sells.
What’s the difference?
I recently heard Todd Brown of MarketingFunnelAutomation.com give this powerful explanation on the difference between marketing and selling.
I’ll paraphrase it: Marketing is when you talk about the prospects – the prospect’s situation, needs, wants, and what’s in the best interest of your prospect. In other words, what they should be doing to alleviate their problem … Selling is when you talk about you, your product, your product’s benefits, features, advantages, risk-reversal, bonuses – that’s selling.
In other words, content marketing is content focused on attracting members of an audience, educating them, and helping them.
Content selling is content focused on why the audience members should buy what you are offering.
Rodale doesn’t just focus on content to attract its audiences (magazines = content marketing). It also is focused on content that offers a solution (magalogs and sales letters = content selling).
That is why Rodale is so successful.
That’s why my wife has purchased things from the company. Its magazines alone would never have been able to accomplish this success.
Too many content marketers never ask for the sale. They waste much of their content marketing efforts.
Rodale never loses sight of the two purposes of a magazine – to gather an audience and to make a profit. This balanced focus and the powerful way it is implemented are the keys to Rodale’s amazing success.
If you want to see better results, then you must do the same.
Download My FREE Checklist in Our Member’s Resource Area: 5 Questions to Get You Started – Plus Checklist
IMPROVE YOUR CURRENT CONTENT MARKETING STRATEGY
Using Rodale’s model that I discovered, you can ask the questions in this guide to develop the best answers which will help you to improve your content marketing strategy.
CREATE A NEW HIGHLY EFFECTIVE CONTENT MARKETING STRATEGY
Not only that, I have also created a checklist in this guide that is based on these five steps that will enable to create a highly effective new content marketing strategy.
“The 5-Step Content Marketing Strategy Checklist” (Based on a Strategy Used By the World’s Largest Health and Wellness Media Company)
You can grab your copy for free in our Member’s Resource Arena.
I am going follow my own advice in this post and ending with this short paragraph of content selling.
If you liked this post, then you will want to grab a copy of my book 51 Content Marketing Hacks, which was nominated for Smallbiztrends.com’s 2016 “Small Business Book Award
In it, I reveal the powerful, unexpected ways content marketing has been used throughout history (by Benjamin Franklin, from Star Wars, Disney, etc.)
It will inspire you and give you a lot of great ideas for your content marketing. You can learn more about it here. (By the way, it has been highly rated by top experts on Amazon.com.)
Claude C. Hopkins is considered one of the great advertising pioneers.
Even though he lived from the years 1866 – 1932, his ideas sound surprisingly modern and are still as applicable as they always have been.
Here is and example of what I am talking about. Claude believed that advertising existed only to sell something and that all advertising should be measured (analytics) and justified by the results it produced (ROI).
Claude Hopkins: How Remembering That People Are Selfish Can Help You to Be a Better Content Marketer
If your marketing in general, and your content marketing in particular, is only focused on you and your company’s needs, then your content marketing will never be as effective as it could be.
Read the Claude Hopkins quote below and really think about what he’s saying and why he’s saying it.
If You Need to Copy & Paste the Quote, You Can Below
“Remember the people you address are selfish, as we all are. They care nothing about your interests or profit. They seek service for themselves. Ignoring this fact is a common mistake and a costly mistake in advertising” ― Claude C. Hopkins, Scientific Advertising
What Are You Going to Do About This?
After thinking about the above quote for a while, take a look at your content marketing or direct response marketing and then really ask yourself:
Is my marketing focused on our prospect’s selfish needs or just on our own selfish needs?
If you have any thoughts about Claude’s quote and/or any experience (positive or negative) with this truth, then leave a comment below and let us know!
