Create engaging content by focusing on 'me' (not on 'you')
Source: Marketing Optimization podcast, episode #42. Interview with Dan Kaplan.
Definition
‘Engaging content’ is content that generates links, likes and shares.
3 step strategy
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Research the topic people are interested in. Look on forums and question/answer sites. Find what people want to know.
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Create highly relevant content on that topic. Make content about ‘me’, content that will make ‘my’ life better.
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Find influencers online: popular bloggers, people with thousands of followers on Twitter. Build personal relationships with those people and think about how you can make them look good by spreading your content. Give them content that they want to share, content that will help their audience. This way you will take advantage of existing network.
Examples
Bad. Low engagement
Content is all about them and how good they are: “our products”, “our chefs”, “our industries”. Content is written very well but it will not generate many shares because it is not helpful to ‘me’.
Good. High engagement
It is more user-centric. It is about ‘me’. It has “recipes”, “videos”, “articles” that are useful to ‘me’ and improve ‘my’ life. This is kind of content that gets shared with friends.
Other tips
Repurpose good content
If your blog post has many shares/likes take this topic and say the same thing through a different medium: infographic, video or a slide presentation. This way you can reach those people who consume information through other distribution channels.
Take popular content that other people created and repurpose it. Give original author full credit. Then reach out to the author: “We liked your article so much that we created a video based on it. Let me know if you want to share it and I will send you a link.”
Track your conversions in Google Analytics
Measure conversions in Google Analytics. Setup goals to track your conversions:
- Sharing
- Buying
- Getting phone number
- Sending a message
