If you work in content marketing, this week’s Podcast Recapper is a must-read.
Episode eight of Xero Hour, hosted by Saul Colt, featured C.C. Chapman, bestselling author, keynote speaker, in-demand marketing consultant and content marketing expert.
“Content marketing is one of those interesting things,” Chapman. “What I like to start with is defining content which I say is everything you need to create and share your story. That can be anything in the tools, the techniques, and the way you do it is different.”
He continued: “I like to argue that all marketing when it’s done right is content marketing; a blog, or a print ad, or a tweet, or a podcast like we’re doing now. It all comes together.”
Cavemen drawing on walls telling stories is marketing, he noted. Look at how word-of-mouth began during the town crier hear days.
“The real smart marketers know that content has always been there but the tools we have no make it so much easier to create on the fly. You still need skills, but you can create it.”
One of the reasons brand get lost on Instagram is because it hasn’t enabled links, we learned in the podcast. Nothing can be hyperlinked expect for one link in your profile, so marketers freak out and start doing silly things like posting banners and brochures. It’s like Web 1.0.
What Instagram empowers brands to do is it gives people a true sneak peek inside their lives, Chapman said. No matter what company you work for, you’ve got intriguing events going on around the office, so you can take pictures and personalize the Instagram experience. It shouldn’t just be product shots. If your Instagram feed is just glamour photos of your products, no one’s will want that. They can get that from your website or Facebook. You should show the making of the product.
Experiment, figure out, look at competitors, find out what works
How you approach content marketing depends on your brand, the themes you use, and the voice you decide to emplo.
“One of the best things about the Tnternet is that you can shine a light on other stuff,” Chapman noted. “Newspapers are notorious for not linking out to people they talk about in stories, or the original photograph, or the original photograph that inspired their stories, and that’s stupid. That’s what makes the internet a beautiful thing, is the fact that all of a sudden that retailer you’re talking about I’m going to go over and check out this other brand, but I’ll come back because this person isn’t just saying look at me, look at me, look at me.”
Be on social platforms so other brands can link back to you, point to you.
And don’t neglect blogging. “At the end of the day you own your blog. It’s not going away.”
As for sharing your brand arc, storytelling can be taught, but you are either really good at it or not, and can learn the basics, but either you have it or you don’t. He added, “Turning it into an artform is in your DNA.”
The startup rollercoaster
The glamorous side of entrepreneurship is what gets all the media attention, but it a dark and crazy road, Chapman said. “I’ve always had the entrepreneur vibe in my body but it’s really difficult. As we talk right now I’m in a weird spot where I’m having more of those nights of ‘oh my God what am I gonna do,’ than ‘wow I just landed this really awesome client,’ and it gets really scary. There is something to be said for the stability of getting a paycheque every week. That is very reassuring.”
Through his startup career, he’s enjoyed a daily education. “Always be a lifelong learner,” Chapman advised. “You always want to learn new things, to constantly be exposing yourself to new things, and then everything you learn share it with others. I remember Eric Rice said ‘learn everything you can, and share everything you know,’ and that has been my guiding principle for a really long time.”
