Content marketing is the great equalizer. Even the smallest of companies can get in the game on favorable terms against enterprise competition with an effective content marketing program. Yet many so-called experts make content marketing seem too difficult for the average businessperson with tales of "storytelling" and "viral content creation." Most of these self-absorbed egomaniacs never speak with customers and couldn't sell ice to a dying man in the desert. My advice? Don't listen to them.
I, like most small business owners, embrace the DIY ethos. For those that don't know what DIY means, it stands for Do It Yourself and was embodied in the spirit of World War II vets who chopped, cut and rebuilt cars to transform them into unique hot rods that reflected their unique personalities.
I came of age in the late 70s, so my DIY spirit was built from following (and idolizing) punk rock bands like The Clash. The Clash were working-class yobbos from the Brixton section of London who, despite their lack of native musical ability, rose to be arguably the premier band of their era (1977-1982.) They despised the over-produced disco and progressive rock music of the time and created their own brand of roots/rock/reggae that was fundamentally basic, but had a ton of heart and soul. To use a modern-day term, they disrupted the music industry by creating DIY music that caught fire with rock and roll audiences. To this day, the late, great Joe Strummer is my muse and I think of him when I write content that some consider controversial.
Tips to be a good SMB content marketer
So let's bring this back to the realm of the small business owner. If you're like me, you're a salesperson, a manager, a marketer, a financial executive and you deliver excellent customer service. You're not a preening narcissist who sits in an office covered with One Direction posters and "tells stories." Who cares? - create content from your heart that resonates with the audience you're trying to reach.
Two of my favorite writers on content creation are Barry Feldman of Feldman Creative and Shannon Johnson of HubSpot. Both recently wrote articles on the very subject of DIY content creation. Although both are thought leaders in the content marketing field, they provide great advice and encourage people to just do it without jumping on the nexty shiny object that some lame-brain comes up with. Here are some of their thoughts on content marketing.
Shannon Johnson - "what it takes to be successful isn't always what you would imagine."
Shannon recently wrote a must-read article entitled, "
Shannon's take on storytelling, "Stop obsessing about storytelling. You are not Pixar. Even if your content is valuable, it’s probably not what your prospects consume for fun. It’s what they consume so they can be better, faster, smarter, or otherwise more efficient at their job so they can go home and then read fairytales to unwind." That may be one of my favorite paragraphs of the past year!
Shannon on creating content, "You can forget almost everything you learned about writing in college.....College education having little to do with your ability to write is both a good thing and a bad thing. For some people, it means you have to unlearn some things. For others, it means there’s hope because you don’t need an English or Journalism degree to be a successful content marketer."
These are just a few of the pearls of wisdom included in the article referenced above. If you're new to content marketing or want to step up your game, I highly recommend you read the article. And then read it again. And then bookmark it.
Barry Feldman - "Your involuntary responses to writing by the rules extinguishes your impulses in an instant."
The title of Barry Feldman's recent article, "If You Think You Can't Write, You're Wrong", belies his support for "non-writers" who want to create marketing content. I highly recommend Barry's blog for SMB content marketers.
Barry's take on ingrained thoughts that we all need to unlearn:
"You were taught sentence structure. Grammar. You learned how to write reports, then essays, poems, and stories. In high school you learned how to write for college. In college you learned how to write for business.
Each progressive step involved mastering more meaningful forms of writing. And now, given you understand exactly how to write a resume, sales letter, proposal, website, press release, white paper, and so on, you are a confident professional writer.
Right? Wrong?
Though it surely sucks, you learned how to conform to the norm."
The message? Write from your heart and avoid conformity. Again, I highly recommend Barry's blog for business people who want to create eftective content marketing.
Summary
In summary, don't get distracted by self-promoting geniuses who make it seem like you need to be Gabriel Marquez Garcia to be an effective content marketer. If you listened to mainstream advice, you never would have started a business in the first place. So follow your heart and know your audience - the rest is all twaddle.
