Why I Write Boring Stuff

To some, it might be utterly shameful to have someone call your writing boring.  It happened to me twice in the last six months.  Am I completely ashamed to admit it? Not really.  (Warning: I can be feisty as evidenced by #tracysfeistytweets and this previous post.  Not scared? Read on about why I wrote boring content.)

Scenario #1: “I want to do an e-newsletter article on X,” says the Entrepreneur.

Even the best writers have been there. Whether an independent contractor for an agency, a solo practitioner, or a freelance writer, the client (in this case an entrepreneur) uses the two dreaded words, emphatically, “I want.”  The decision has been made.  The idea has been handed to you to make real. There’s little you—as the grunt writer—can do to influence the topic decision.  You are not paid or contracted to advise, guide, educate, or instruct. Maybe you tried before and it fell on deaf ears. Maybe you have not been brought on as a trusted advisor.  Someone else in the organization might be expressing concern about the topic as dangerously close to becoming a technical dissertation.  (But isn’t heard.) In this scenario, you are paid to put words together that make sense under the buyer’s (Mr. Entrepreneur’s) direction.

[So I mumble to myself, and blog about it later] Against my better judgment to ask your readers (aka target market) what interests them, I will write your topic.  While normally I would advise that we at least brainstorm to develop content topics according to your audience (based on where they fall on the continuum Unaware>Aware>Understand>Believe>Act), I will write your topic.  Although I think your staff has valid concerns, I will ignore them and write your topic.

The Comment: “It’s not very exciting (translation: it’s boring) and it’s not going to win any Pulitzers.”

The Downfall:  It’s an educational e-newsletter article based on a particular topic that the audience probably does not care about in the first place.  Sure, it positions the company as an expert on technical execution concerning X.  But there is little marketing value in that if prospects don’t value having an understanding of X.  In fact, they may opt-out and therefore cease to be part of your reachable target market.

The Saving Grace:  Some readers might find it endearing that YOU are interested in and passionate enough about your field’s technical details enough to want to share them.  You probably won’t lose a sale for lack of passion for what you do.  Even if they opt out, they may remember your name because of your expertise. 

The Take-Away: Approach your writing project (whether marketing or any kind of communications) as a means to deliver value and quality as defined by your market, not you, based on research and input.

Scenario #2:  Web Page Content for a Small Business

I’m working with the ideal small business client.  She has the basics—a logo, a sparse but professionally built website, business cards, and a brochure. She also has a combination of factors I admire—past technical expertise in her field, curiosity, a willingness to understand marketing options, open to a variety of solutions, good decision-making skills, and an appreciation for the value of marketing and her hired marketing professional, whom she treats as a trusted advisor.

We agreed developing web page content for a specific service she’d like to promote was a top priority for the first phase of our work.  Three things are in short supply, however: time, money, and general awareness about the importance of the service.  Whereas PR and other efforts might help with the latter, more well-rounded communications efforts are hindered by the former.  The result was a more educational web page vs. a sales-y web page.  A call to action and rationale for choosing her small business as the service provider were included, of course, but much of the content was value justification.

The Comment: “It might be just me, but is it, er, kinda boring?”

The Downfall: It’s true that with a small budget and a lot of ground to cover, our communications sometimes have to do “double-duty”—informative and persuasive—at first. 

The Saving Grace:  Once we have a better sense of  key metrics (e.g., impressions, bounce rates, referring sites, keywords used, SERPs, etc.) and we expand content development across media and touchpoints (e.g., published  online articles, stories produced and covered by appropriate media, press releases, etc.), we can refine the content for a sales focus and off-load the “educational” stuff to more suitable venues.  In the meantime, the page serves as an awareness-generator about the problem you solve—which is not a bad thing!

The Take-Away: Having the means to produce and distribute multiple content types is ideal.  Get together with your marketing person to plan a communications strategy with the right messaging, collateral, and media and put a good budget behind it.  Reserve some investment for public relations, especially if awareness-building and community involvement are needed.

What are your thoughts on social media for companies and their brands?

This question was posed by my colleague Jen. Before I launch into the answer, a few words about blogging on this subject:

1. I’m going to respond within the context of micro and small businesses. My assumptions are that the brand is undefined, formative, or MIA.

2. I could write a whole article/white paper on this subject (and I might just do that!) but for today I am going to shoot from the hip and also try to keep it brief.

3. For brevity, and because you’ve introduced the B word, I’m going to limit my discussion of “social media” to what’s available and typically undertaken by this audience—not custom platform development or integrated marketing campaigns. Also, my comments will be highly generalized. And I will use sentence fragments.

Now, my thoughts on social media for companies and their brands.

If your company does not have an established brand or brand guidelines, does not have a brand strategy, or has not organized internal branding efforts, whatever you do/say “socially” will build your brand for you. It sounds simple and a given, right? Without a brand to align communications with or to test your tone against, you are not doing much to “shape” the impressions of your intended audience.

SIDEBAR: We assume that this is possible or we would not invest in any marketing, packaging, advertising, research, etc. (although not necessarily in that order) and yours truly along with 167,463 other people with the title Marketing Manager in the U.S. plus who knows how many others would not have a job (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Office of Occupational Statistics and Employment Projections, 2006).

But it’s easier to go off and do the social media thing, jump on the bandwagon and just participate, than it is to do the hard work of creating a brand. It’s seemingly cheaper, too—a fact that is not lost on small business owners. It’s when we ask questions of effectiveness that social media, when conducted in this manner, falls apart. That’s why I say “seemingly.” Building on Econ 101, if there’s no such thing as a free lunch, how much does a cheap lunch actually cost? Which leads to the question of who’s managing those impressions at what hourly rate. Or at least monitoring.

At the heart of social media is a conversation, and someone has to take the pulse. We have to listen and speak. We have to do both to connect with people, although some marketers will insist that you be a spokesperson. I think there are important usage decisions to be made. It will depend on your business and your relationships with others (and how that gets played out). I like to put it this way: Are you a megaphone, a two-way radio, or an antenna?

If you’re a megaphone, you’d better be (a) pointing in the right direction and (b) saying something worth listening to—as defined by your listeners, which really means you have to do some sort of listening, even if it’s not via social media channels. There are too many broken records, especially on Twitter. If u tweet about the same thing over & over & I don’t care about it, reverse marketing happens: Unfollow & boycott. (That’s 116 characters, BTW, and you can RT @tracydiziere.)

If you’re a two-way radio, you have to be comfortable with whatever comes back. And gracious. And accepting. When you open up the discussion for feedback, and readers use the opportunity to knock your service or product, you have to be able to respond positively. Unfortunately for micro or small business owners, who feel like they ARE the product/service, this isn’t easy. In the best case scenario, you have a process in place for capturing that valuable feedback, which would otherwise be very costly to obtain. Of course, it may not be representative of the entire market and it will trickle in vs. be conveniently culled, but it’s your data and you know how to use it to your advantage, thanks to your process. If you don’t have a process, don’t bother with social media. Community members, consumers, and would-be customers can (a) spot a faker a mile away and (b) will be even more disappointed if you don’t have an honest response that attempts to fix the problem.

If you’re an antenna, you’re picking up on what’s being said in social media circles that apply to your business, but you’re not contributing or launching anything. This is a good place to start. Listening can make your marketing efforts uber-effective, not to mention make you a more tuned-in friend, family member, boss, co-worker, consumer, voter, etc. Even as an antenna, you can acknowledge you’re receiving a signal on occasion. What you do with the information is important too. Use it to spark internal discussions, to understand consumer views, to track the competition, etc. Again, have a process for what you’re doing and a way of transforming content into data.

Finally, the question most people want to have an answer to: Should we do it at my company? Some marketers convince every client that they all have to be megaphones in all the usual suspects of social media—Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, Twitter, blogs, Ning, YouTube, etc.—and create their own communities or be left behind to die in the desert of traditional media. There is no question that mainstream media is freaking out, is in trouble, is still too silo’ed, lacks freshness, and has to change. To tell you to ignore that and go ahead with business as usual would be beyond foolish. But social media efforts are not one size fits all and I’m not selling you some elaborate plan for social media domination either (as if it were possible, duh, it’s democratic). I’m just saying small businesses need to consider all the factors that come into play when designing (that means professionally constructing an organized and creative effort) their communications strategy—regardless of media. Those factors include not only larger issues of who are we trying to reach and WWMBD (MB=my brand) but also who is going to do what, how often, how long, at what expense, and the most important considerations of all: What if, what if, and what if?

If you need an extra head to think those things through, mine is for rent. If you’ve made it this far, thanks for reading. And why not post a comment acknowledging your feat, calling me out, or lending your support for something I’ve said? Tracy Diziere & Associates is a two-way radio, but it’s awful quiet out there! Feel free to post your burning marketing questions as response to this or my previous post "Can We Talk?"

Increasing Sales Article Launching Tomorrow

Tomorrow I am sending out the Q2 newsletter article (yes, on the last day of the quarter!) on how small businesses and start-ups can increase sales. To read it, sign up to be on the distribution list at http://tinyurl.com/tdiziere.