What Seinfeld Can Teach You About Content Marketing
If you want to become a great content marketer, just look to Jerry Seinfeld.
Seinfeld, like most successful comedians, follows a simple routine. He starts with an educated guess about what material people will find funny. Then he takes a leap of faith, and shares that material with an audience.
Maybe the audience laughs. Maybe crickets chirp. Either way, Seinfeld goes back and makes edits, then tries again. Not every performance is a smash hit, but he learns something every step of the way.
Seinfeld and the Five A’s
This, says Brian Clark of Copyblogger, is the key to effective content marketing: the courage to experiment, and the tenacity to keep going. I heard Brian and Sonia Simone speak about this topic during Marketing Profs’ virtual conference last week.
Brian divides this process into what he calls the “5A Framework,” for the five elements of great content marketing: Continue reading
What Batman Can Teach You About Great Copywriting
Princess Jones is the evil genius behind P.S. Jones Communications, a boutique communications firm that helps you speak to your audience in a language they understand. Photo courtesy kevin dooley.
Batman is my hero. He’s not a superhero. He’s just a rich guy with mad fighting skills, a bad ass car, and a drive to right wrongs. But that’s enough for me.
I look up the Dark Knight and I often model my life after his teachings. Batman has even helped me fine tune my copywriting skills.
There’s an art to writing great copy – the persuasive wording on marketing and communications materials. Copy is supposed to connect the dots between a problem or need for the reader and get him to walk through the door where the client’s product or service waits.
I have a lot of copywriting heroes but when I’m in a very tough spot, I put on my cape and think: “What would Batman do?” Continue reading
Confessions of an SEO Copywriter
Confession: I have purposely inserted misspellings into my own writing.
I have rejected really good headlines and great lead sentences for mediocre ones that start with a keyword or phrase.
I have stifled the urge to delete redundancies. I’ve even added redundancies to get one more keyword into my writing.
For a former journalist, this is painful to admit. But for an SEO copywriter, it’s all in a day’s work.
Read the rest of my guest blog post at SEOSage.org.
Marketing That Sounds Like You: A Primer on Finding Your Voice
“People respond to the humanity, not the form. The voice, not the form. Put your whole self into it, and you will find your true voice. Hold back and you won’t. It’s that simple.”
–Hugh MacLeod, Ignore Everybody: and 39 Other Keys to Creativity
Whether you know it or not, you have a unique voice. It comes from the places you’ve lived, the jobs you’ve held, the people who have influenced you, and the experiences you’ve had.
Your voice gives you character. It helps people remember your message, and facilitates trust. Sadly, the first thing many business owners do when writing marketing materials (copywriting) is abandon their voice and imitate someone else.
Usually the person they imitate is bland, detached, and instantly forgettable. Continue reading
