Content marketing think like a publisher chapter 3 you’re a publisher think like one

In the rush to adopt content marketing as a tactic, too many marketers forget that if you’re continually publishing, you have to think like…a publisher.. Chief among those challenges is

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You’re a Publisher.

Think Like One.

“Rolling your own media brings with it a new set of challenges.”

IBM recently published research finding that about 80% of

those who begin a corporate blog never post more than

five entries They stop Give up Leave it abandoned by

the side of what was once called the information

super-highway

And that’s just blogging.

The Internet is littered with never-updated websites,

near-tweetless Twitter accounts, expressionless Facebook

pages, and no-one-home YouTube channels In the rush to

adopt content marketing as a tactic, too many marketers

forget that if you’re continually publishing, you have to

think like…a publisher.

Increasingly, marketing is no longer about buying media

(the advertising model) Media is cheap—or often even

free But rolling your own media brings with it a new set

of challenges Chief among those challenges is coming up

with enough content to fill all those blank pages, blog

posts, profiles, and such, and doing so on a regular basis,

not just in a one-off burst of week one enthusiasm.

And hey, this is really nothing new Coming up with new stuff to say has been an

issue for content marketers since the days of the corporate newsletter Only now,

there are even more virtual pages to fill with even more information—and in more

multimedia formats

Who’s good at solving that dilemma? Publishers If you want to win at the content

game, it’s time you started thinking like one

In short, brands are media Marketers are editors, or at least need to start thinking

like editors and producers if they don’t want to come up shorthanded So herewith,

steps toward publisher-think help marketers get beyond that accusatory blank

white page and start thinking like a true content professional

Here are 14 steps to get you there:

1 Know your audience—This couldn’t be simpler or more self-evident,

but the importance of knowing who you’re producing content for

can-not be overstated Customers? Prospects? Fans? Industry peers?

Colleagues? The media? Some or all of the above? Selecting topics and

tailoring messaging is a whole lot easier when you know who’s on the

receiving end

2 Define key themes and messages—Now that you know who you’re

addressing, what is it, broadly speaking, you want to communicate to

them? Don’t just focus on your product, service, or business here, but

do some thinking as to how it relates to an audience’s real-world

con-cerns If you’re a local business, you may want to weave broader local

themes into your content If you’re hawking something with a high

consideration curve, education and learning may be part of your

mes-saging Use your knowledge of your audience, your tone of voice, and

the broader informational environment in which you reside to inform

themes and messaging

3 Establish a frequency framework—Half the journalists I know (and

being one, I know quite a few) say they write for periodicals because

they need deadlines to produce something In the trade, it’s called

feed-ing the beast You may not need to blog, or write, or tweet, or

status-update every day, but once per month is probably not adequate, and

you risk the whole endeavor tipping off the cliff Create a schedule for

content updates, and adhere to it Map out potential stories, features, or

other content in advance so that when the deadline looms, you’ll have a

sense of what’s due Falling into a rhythm beats falling out of visibility

altogether

4 Create a detailed editorial calendar—An editorial calendar plugs

directly into the frequency framework Just as your local newspaper has

P a r t I C o n t e n t M a r k e t i n g B a s i c s

a food and dining feature on Wednesdays, an expanded entertainment

section on Fridays, and home and gardening every Thursday, mapping

a type of content to your frequency framework is a great step forward

in terms of making relevant content happen on a reasonably frequent

schedule

5 Develop regular features and rubrics—Creating a few regularly

appearing content elements is one of the oldest editorial tricks in the

book Comics, horoscopes, weather, and film listings help round off a

newspaper’s offerings and keep readers coming back for more

Moreover, when you have these regular features, they’re all but

auto-populating Highlights of the week, links to other relevant content, or a

quote of the day are just a few down-and-dirty ideas to keep the flow of

content constantly bubbling

6 Interview—Interviews probably belong in item #5, but they are notable

enough to warrant discussion on their own Are your own ideas drying

up? Talk to others, whether they’re experts in your field, enthusiastic

users, or people in your company Make a list of potential interview

subjects, and consider making interviews a regular content feature

7 Go multimedia—Content isn’t limited to text alone, of course Images,

photos, videos, and audio files expand and enhance your content

offer-ings Blogging? Posts accompanied by a graphic image draw attention

to themselves and attract far more clickthroughs than naked-text posts

Don’t take my word for it—give it a shot Your web metrics bear this

one out

8 Enlist expert contributors, and provide them with guidelines—You

don’t have to go it alone Look around at your coworkers, colleagues,

and professional network There are lots of potential content

contribu-tors out there Often, all you have to do is ask, either for one-off

contri-butions or regular features You’ll want to consider a budget item in this

category to incentivize timely and authoritative contributions from

really desirable commentators

9 Create User-Generated Content—User-generated content is, of course,

a whole new route to ensuring content is created for you, be it

com-ments, ratings and reviews, or contests With clearly defined guidelines

and expectations and a little bit of polite asking, you may be surprised

at how much content is created for you rather than by you

10 Opine and editorialize—A frequent stumbling block to content

cre-ation is when the creators think they’re obligated to be first to break a

piece of news Unless it’s news about you, this is not a winning strategy

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C h a p t e r 3 Yo u ’ r e a P u b l i s h e r T h i n k L i k e O n e

It’s a big Internet out there, and news is

traveling at the speed of fiber optic cable

News has become commoditized It’s not

easy to get the exclusive scoop on a

revo-lution in the Middle East, or who just

won the pennant By the time you’ve

typed it, it’s on the web wall-to-wall

Leave breaking news to the pros Divest

yourself of the notion that you’re a

reporter and instead become an expert

observer and interpreter of what news

means to your audience Establish

your-self, your company, or your brand as a

thought leader, not as a deadline reporter

11 Turn on comments and feedback—Whatever digital platform you’re

creating content for, ensure comments and feedback mechanisms are in

place, easy to use, and monitored This not only creates a platform for

participation, it’s a gauge of how well you’re doing, what excites and

interests your audience, and will doubtless feed in ideas for shaping and

improving future content Communicate, but don’t lecture or preach

12 Listen—Listen to what others in your space are saying, and do so

out-side the parameters of your own comments section Set up topic alerts

for your relevant themes Get out there and participate in what others

are saying within your arena of expertise It’s the editorial, not to

men-tion the social media equivalent of leaving the house

13 Recycle—Once a piece of content is published, nurture and evolve it.

Publishers follow up on news, track trends as they develop, and return

to stories to examine long-term effects They may cover a news item

and then editorialize or voice an opinion about the development They

add video or graphics to embellish a point that was made in print You

get the idea: Create more opportunity for the content that you have to

get out there

14 Capture—In a number of respects, publishing has always been a form

of lead-generation Consumer publishers use subscriber, viewership and

newsstand information, and data to profile customers, and they market

those numbers and demographics to their advertisers

Business-to-business (B2B) publishers capture leads for that purpose, and often also

to market ancillary products and services to that audience, be it

research reports, conferences, or other special offers

P a r t I C o n t e n t M a r k e t i n g B a s i c s

“Divest yourself

of the notion that you’re a reporter and instead

become an expert observer and

interpreter.”