Tag Archives: Anne Janzer

9 Marketing Books That Would Make Great Gifts

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Books make great gifts. They’re easy to wrap. You don’t have to worry about peanut allergies or gluten intolerance. And the best of them can have a long-lasting impact – the gift that does, in fact, keep on giving.

With that in mind, here are a few suggestions for books to give people in the marketing profession, based on my own, personal reactions. I’ve reviewed several of them already on this blog.

Branding Basics for Small Businesses by Maria Ross (NorLights Press). I read the book after hearing Maria speak recently. Despite the title, her no-nonsense approach to branding works well for businesses of all sizes. She offers great advice about brand consistency.

The Difference: The One Page Method for Reimagining Your Business and Reinventing Your Marketing by Bernadette Jiwa (The Story Of Telling Press). This book is a fast but inspiring read, calling us to create a real difference in customers’ lives.

Epic Content Marketing by Joe Pulizzi (McGraw-Hill Education). Pulizzi compiles everything you might need to know about content marketing in one place. It’s the modern content marketer’s go-to source. I reviewed it here.

Everybody Writes: Your Go-To Guide for Creating Ridiculously Good Content by Ann Handley (Wiley). If you love Ann Handley’s writing, here’s your chance to find out why it’s so good. This book offers insight into how to make marketing writing both fun and personable. Even if you’re an expert writer, you’ll find things to love in this book. See my blog review here.

The New Rules of Sales and Service by David Meerman Scott (Wiley). David Meerman Scott redefined marketing several years ago with his New Rules of Marketing and PR. In this latest text, he highlights the challenges of ongoing customer engagement after the sale. The topic is relevant for marketing professionals, as the divisions between marketing, sales and service are shrinking.

Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman (Farrar, Straus and Giroux). He may have won the Nobel Prize for Economics, but marketers everywhere should offer thanks to Kahneman for explaining our irrational (or lazy) thought systems. This book reveals the vagaries of human decisions and thoughts.

To Sell is Human by Daniel Pink (Riverhead Books). This book is less about sales and more about human nature, empathy, and persuasion. It’s an entertaining read filled with useful insight for marketing.

True Story: How to Combine Story and Action to Transform Your Business by Ty Montague (Harvard Business Review Press). With all of the buzz about storytelling, this book insists that brands must go further to storydoing. Montague describes how an authentic corporate metastory transcends marketing and informs business actions. See my review here.

Winning the Story Wars by Jonah Sachs (Harvard Business Review Press). This book elevates marketing to another level, calling on Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey, cultural myths, and Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Sachs calls for an end to marketing through inadequacy, promoting instead an approach he calls empowerment marketing. See my quick review here.

I still have a long list of books I plan to read, and I’m adding more every day. If you have suggestions to share, let me know. I might review them here.

Minimum Viable Messaging for Startups

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Few things make a content developer (aka writer) happier than a complete product messaging roadmap. For details, see What the Writer Wants from a Product Messaging Document. We know that content development and review cycles will be smooth sailing if there’s a well-developed product messaging map at the start.

But as with any rule, there’s an exception – the early stage startup.

Product messaging is critical in any business, start-ups included. But in an early startup, product messaging has a shorter shelf life than a peach in summer.

In the early stages of a product or solution’s life, messaging is bound to change, no matter how much work and research you’ve put into the messaging process.

What’s your minimum viable product messaging?
In The Lean Startup, Eric Reis recommends coming out with a minimum viable product and seeing how the market reacts. This protects you from spending a time (and money) on the wrong strategy.

Marketing teams can take a similar approach, even when the solution is ready for production. Come up with a minimum viable messaging platform, then test and perfect it based on its reception.

The elements of the minimum viable messaging map
An ideal messaging document is concise, so you can change it easily. Most startups go out the gate with the messages that their founders and investors feel are most important. If those messages don’t resonate with buyers, you want to know quickly.

The startup messaging map includes all of the main points of the standard product messaging map in a condensed version. Doing research is good, but experience with real customers is better.

Here’s what the product messaging map might look like for a startup:

  • Target markets/buyers: Start with just one or two, and assume there are others you don’t know about yet.
  • Key pains addressed or problems solved: Identify the key issues you’re trying to address and what people are doing about them now. Continue to listen to the market to validate those pains. Your solution may solve problems you don’t even know about. Did Apple know that the iPad would be a hit with octogenarians? No, but my mother is one of its biggest fans.
  • Top benefits: Identify what you think the top two or three benefits are, then let early customers tell you what they think based on their actions. They may surprise you.
  • Competitive differentiators and unique value proposition: Start small and test the messaging about why you’re different. Things you think are critical may be unimportant to customers.
  • Key features: Choose a few essential features and see which are most interesting or important to early users.

Put the most energy into testing the target market and top benefits. The key features and value propositions depend heavily on the value that people perceive they are getting from the solution.

You can track what people think about your messaging in several ways:

  • Use your content:  structure the website by benefits and features, and track where people click and read.
  • Track which kinds of content they download from your site or which blogs they read.
  • If you have insight into product usage, identify which features people are using.
  • Use customer research for additional insight.

Be ready to rewrite and revise the content produced in the early days, because it almost always changes. Revision isn’t a sign that you failed in your messaging – it’s a sign that you’re learning.

If you have other strategies for handling messaging in the fast-changing start-up world, please share them in the comments.

Content Marketing: Past, present and future

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Want an illustration of how far content marketing has come as a practice? I was at a wedding a few weeks back, speaking with someone who does video for brands. Just to try it out, I described myself as a “long form written content developer” and he knew what I meant.

I’m not a writer anymore, I’m a long form written content developer. Try to tweet that!

How far we’ve come
When I started this blog more than five years ago, I had to define the term “content marketing” to people when I met them. Now it’s one of the hottest topics in marketing. See the Google Trends graph for content marketing in the last five years.

Screen Shot 2014-09-08 at 4.39.03 PM

Content Marketing World is in its fourth year as a content marketing conference. It had more than 2,500 attendees this year.

Content is part of many job titles: Director of Content Strategy, Chief Content Officer, Content Marketing Manager, etc. Content marketing is mainstream.

Where we’re going
On one end of the spectrum, some marketers feel left behind by all the hype. At a marketing meetup in San Francisco a while back, someone asked me in hushed tones, “What does content marketing really mean?”

I gave her a quick answer – it’s about understanding what your prospects and customers need and then making sure you can help them at all points of their journey with content. If you’re in this camp and want a fuller explanation, I’d recommend that you read Joe Pulizzi’s book Epic Content Marketing. I’ll review that in a blog soon.

On the other end of the spectrum are the expert practitioners who use content not just to drive sales, but also to add value to their brands and solutions. These people understand that content is itself an asset of value.

For inspiring examples, see this blog that Michael Brenner posted recently about branded content hubs that are becoming valued destinations: 20 Amazing Examples of Branded Content Marketing Hubs.

In these examples, content marketing does more than simply driving leads through a sales cycle – it is adding value to the overall brand and strengthening relationships with existing customers. And that, in my humble opinion, is where the future of content marketing leads.

Measuring content marketing effectiveness

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How do you measure the performance of your content marketing?  LinkedIn recently introduced a Content Marketing Score to track and benchmark the performance of content on the LinkedIn network. This effort highlights a larger issue – it’s tough to track the effectiveness of content marketing efforts.

We’re not great at tracking marketing in general

The most recent release of the Duke CMO Survey confirms the scope of the problem. Conducted twice a year through the Duke Fuqua School of Business, the survey is a rich source of information about trends in marketing. You can see the overall results here or drill down to the results split out by industry characteristics and look for what’s happening in B2B marketing.

One interesting difference between the B2B and B2C responders was that B2B marketers were significantly worse than their B2C counterparts at quantitatively proving the impact of their marketing efforts.

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Source: The CMO Survey (February 2014), Figure 3.7, Highlights and Insights Report

When it comes to short-term impact, B2C product marketers can prove their effectiveness at more than twice the rate of their B2B colleagues.

Near half of B2B marketers claimed ‘qualitative’ proof of their marketing effectiveness without the hard data to back it up. And almost 20% had no idea at all. Because content marketing is a growing part of the B2B marketing investment, it most certainly contributes to the problem.

Measuring content marketing is difficult

Measuring effectiveness of content is difficult, particularly in B2B. Content marketing often helps the buyer through a journey, and sales can rarely be attributed to a single piece of content or interaction. Different metrics are appropriate at different stages of the content cycle.

For a lead generation piece, a high number of downloads or registrations may be the best measure of success. A piece designed for a specific buyer persona late in the sales cycle may reach a small number of people but play a critical role in revenue.  I once wrote a white paper intended for one specific prospective customer of an early-stage B2B company. Given the size of the deal and the importance of the customer, creating the paper was well worth the time and effort.

That being said, you should certainly try to track the effectiveness of the content marketing investment as best you can. Just realize that it’s an imperfect art. And remember that your social media and content marketing efforts may trigger the ‘offline’ discussions that ultimately deliver big results. Thanks to Heidi Cohen and her blog on P2P Content: The Content Nobody Measures for advocating the importance of the offline world!

Content recycling do’s and don’ts

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The biggest challenge that many content marketers face is creating enough content to reach prospects and customers at the right places and times.  Re-purposing or recycling content is a critical strategy.

When you recycle content, you can amplify your message, reaching different parts of your target audience at different stages of the decision cycle. For example, the content developed for a single webinar could be recycled into white papers, blog postings, infographics and videos.

But there’s an important distinction between ‘recycling’ or repurposing content and simply re-using it.

Think of the analogy of a glass bottle. When you re-use it, you simply wash it out and use it again in exactly its same form.  From an environmental point of view, this is great because it takes the least energy.

The same is true for  re-using content across channels – putting a press release on your social media sites or in your blog takes less energy than actually doing something with it.

Here’s the catch – from the reader/viewer’s perspective, it’s clear that you’ve basically punted and chosen the low-energy strategy. And that doesn’t work in your favor.

Worse, content designed for one use (such as a press release) doesn’t usually work well in other channels.  The social media world is filled with examples of content re-use gone wrong.

Content “don’ts”: Looking lazy or clueless

  • Don’t automatically push all your Facebook posts to Twitter. It’s frustrating to read a truncated post on Twitter, in which the call to action has been cut off or the message cut in a way that makes no sense.
  • Beware of pushing press releases, verbatim, to social media sites like LinkedIn.  At the very least, write something pointed and relevant about the ‘news’ in the comment, then attach the release.
  • Don’t cut and paste big chunks of content, verbatim, across white papers and ebooks (with the exception of boilerplate text or definitions). When someone encounters the same paragraphs in different places, they’ll either put it aside thinking they’ve already read it, or conclude that you’re a small-time operation without adequate resources.

4 steps to successful content recycling

It doesn’t take a lot of effort to repurpose content appropriately.

  1. Identify any limitations or characteristics of the target(s) for your recycled content (Twitter, Facebook, images, blog posts, etc.)
  2. Think about the audience for that medium. Are the people who visit your blog the same people that might go to your page on Facebook?  LinkedIn? If not, you’ll need to adjust the style and/or messages.
  3. Rework the content with the audience in mind. Take snippets or pull out certain key sections to amplify in different ways. Rephrase or rework the ideas – so even if the same person sees it in both places, they’ll still follow through.
  4. Think across media  – create an infographic for a paper, for example, or a video from an ebook.

Yes, it takes more work to recycle the content appropriately than re-using it without change, but you’ll ultimately get more value from that content.

Content marketing, technology and sustainability

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Laptop on stump is charging with help of natureAfter spending many years writing about the role of technology in business, I’m expanding my horizons to explore technology’s role in sustainable development. I’ll keep writing here about content marketing and technology, but I’m also starting a parallel blog on technology and sustainability.

Creating a more sustainable world is the next big challenge of technology, industry, governments and cultures.  I’d love to be part this effort. And as a content marketing professional, I’ve learned a few tricks that can play a role.

Tell stories:  Governments, NGOs, individuals and businesses alike are all taking steps towards a more sustainable future. But their stories are often swamped in today’s news environment. I’d like to amplify some of the positive stories of change – particularly in the area of technology, where I operate every day.

Meet the audience where they are: This is a content marketing premise that can be applied equally well to “marketing”  sustainability. For example, Patagonia dedicated two pages in the middle of its winter catalog to an article by the company’s founder about the “responsible economy.”  The pull-quote for this story was, “I think the simple life really begins with owning less stuff.”  Sure, Patagonia shoppers already love nature, but it was refreshing to see this message happen right at the place where people are looking to buy.

Understand  human psychology: It’s easy to feel a sense of helplessness when confronting the problems of climate and sustainability.  Yikes, the ocean is warming?  What can I do?   Unfortunately, one common response is to turn away and focus on simpler or more pleasant things.

A study by C.J. Hutto and colleagues at the Georgia Institute of Technology found that on Twitter, people who posted positive messages gained the most followers. (Good writing was also a contributing factor, I’m happy to say.)

That’s not to say that we should hold off on the bad news – other studies show that people pay more attention to bad news than good. But if you want to encourage people to take action and to amplify your message, it’s best not to make the case too hopeless. Give people something to move towards, rather than run away from.

If you’re interested in following this journey, visit my new blog, Technology and Sustainability. I welcome comments and suggestions.

Executive ghostwriting strategies

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iStock_000011092102XSmallIn honor of Halloween, I thought I’d write a post about ghosts – more specifically, ghostwriting for corporate executives.

In today’s content marketing world, everyone wants executives to demonstrate “thought leadership” by writing articles and blogs. However, not every brilliant executive is equally brilliant as a writer. And even those who do write well rarely have the time to dedicate to it – writing requires uninterrupted time.

The increase in business blogging is driving a rise in executive ghostwriting.  As with the spectral varieties, there are many types of executive ghostwriters.

The drive-by ghost

Sometimes the executive’s only input adding their name at the end of the process. The executive often has little to do with the creation of the article or blog, other than final approval.

This happens fairly often with corporate blogs – someone in marketing is actually writing for the executive. Bylined or contributed articles on websites or magazines are often ghostwritten in this way.

The collaborative ghost

Much more fun, from a writer’s perspective, is  collaborative ghostwriting, when the  writer and bylined author work together to create something that is better than either of them could do individually.

Using this approach, the finished piece reflects the stated author’s thinking but may be enhanced by the writer’s perspective and by the process of asking questions and delving deeper. And chances are it’s written better and/or faster than the executive could manage alone.

This type of collaborative ghost-writing requires:

  • An executive that is willing to spend a little time thinking about topics and discussing them with a writer, and
  • A writer who is good at listening and flexible enough with tone and style to make the finished piece accurately reflect the bylined author’s thoughts and personality.

How do you collaborate with a ghost?

The answer to this question depends on the personality of the bylined author and the subject matter.

I’ve used many methods for collaborating with executives. Often it’s as simple as a phone call, perhaps with a follow-up question via email. Sometimes collaboration requires meeting face-to-face or face-to-whiteboard. And sometimes people prefer to do a short written ‘brain dump’ of their ideas in an email or a bulleted list.

For the writer, this kind of collaborative ghost-writing can very rewarding. It’s fun to exchange ideas with people who are knowledgeable about technology.  It’s a challenge to create the right tone and style, not only for the author but also for the intended use of the piece.

The only drawback is that you cannot easily tell the world at large about your published work. Since the ghostwriter has no byline, there’s no obvious record of your involvement.  And publishing the fact that you wrote it seems like a betrayal of trust.

Ah, the perils of being a ghost.

The next time you’re reading a pithy article or blog post by a CEO, see if you detect a shiver down your spine at a particularly nice turn of phrase. Maybe you just felt the presence of a ghost.