Tell Your Own Story (Updated)
Update:
More data to support the idea that we have to tell our own story—that the media’s influence today is at a low point.
The percentage of respondents to Reuters Institute's annual Digital News Report that said they sometimes or often actively avoid the news is 42% in 2022, up slightly from 38% in 2017.
Interest in news among those surveyed in the U.S. fell 12 percentage points from 55% last year to 43% in 2022.
—————————————————————
The single biggest trend in the practice of public relations is the increasing prevalence of content marketing. We know that it wasn’t ever just media relations—even if others didn’t—but since there are fewer media outlets and less media usage, we are turning to content marketing to tell our story. This is encapsulated in the PESO model, the best available conceptualization of what an effective communication program looks like in 2022.
For our purposes, content marketing is probably not a great name. We’re thinking content communications.
Here’s the definition of Content Marketing from the Content Marketing Institute:
Content marketing is a strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly-defined audience — and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action.
We might edit it like this.
Content communication marketing is a strategic marketing communication approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and engage key stakeholders internally and externally a clearly defined audience — and, ultimately, to create drive profitable customer action a healthier brand.
Or “Tell Your Own Story.”
There are a dizzying array of mediums.
Articles
Blog posts
Whitepapers
E-books
Webinars
Infographics
Podcasts
Videos
Quizzes
Social media posts
A lot of people get lost in which medium to use. The key is to be strategic. (You also want to avoid the “that would make a nice post” school of content marketing.)
The Content Marketing Institute recently did a post on “8 of the Best Content Marketing Examples….”
It’s worth a read. Here are some takeaways I had:
The Power of Action and Proof
Showing purpose is increasingly important for today’s consumers. To me, it is vital to do more than provide platitudes. In today’s trust environment, action and proof are needed, even if the proof says “there is still more work to be done.” Action and proof build trust among our stakeholders.
CMI cites the case of Bulb Energy from the UK. And it’s a great example. This is a green energy company that quantified environmental impact individually for each of its customers and sent it to its stakeholders on a personalized basis. As a kicker, they used strong creative rather than spreadsheets.
BRAND IMPACT: This is next-level stuff. It builds sticky relationships, to be sure. Even more importantly, it’s the kind of thing that begs to be told, creating a new and authentic channel.
Cause-Related Marketing Lives
We all went through the cause-related marketing craze in the aughts. It’s back and now we just call it marketing…or communications. Study after study shows that people want their brands to reflect their values.
CMI cites a really strong case study here—Mr. Peanut. Yes, Mr. Peanut. According Sanjiv Gajiwala, Kraft’s Chief Growth Officer, the program—”A Nut Above”—was designed this way: “Instead of the brand talking about itself … the company wants to have more frequent, everyday connections.” The program gives smaller grants to people around the country.
BRAND IMPACT: Connect with the customer’s purpose and elevates the brand. Many small grants spread the impact and the focus on smaller victories helps to remove it from the politically divisive climate. And it is focused on action, not “core values.”
Create Value in Your Ecosystem
You can use content to strengthen relationships and build trust by providing useful content that extends beyond your product offering. CMI cites two examples. One is Salesforce with their “Leading Through Change” content initiatives launched just before California went on COVID lockdown. The project is an incredibly rich, expert-driven, and multi-lingual resource providing help when most people were at a loss.
Also, CMI cites The RAIN Group, which is a sales training organization. They produced a “Virtual Selling Toolkit” just as the pandemic moved sales out of lunch meetings.
BRAND IMPACT: Both brands made the businesses in their ecosystem more resilient in the face of crisis, a good thing for their business on its own. They also demonstrated with action their relevance to the companies they work with and built stronger and stickier relationships.
Highlight Your People and Their Work
I see this one being picked up more and more, but mostly by services firms and less by other types of B2B companies. In this example, PhotoShelter uses videos of its people putting the product into work—behind the scenes, if you will—and it emphasizes the product but also the people who make it work.
BRAND IMPACT: Customers increasingly expect you to be a good employer. Also, in areas where differentiation is difficult, highlighting your people can set you apart. Lastly, it strengthens engagement with your internal audiences as well.
Use Restraint
This is a bonus insight that is embedded in each of the examples in the CMI report. When we had to get stories by an editor, we knew we couldn’t just say any outrageous thing because it was going to come back on us. In content communications, we are the editor. We have to resist the urge to push the limit because over time it will erode trust. Not only is that the opposite of what we mean to do, but it also could eventually eliminate content communications as a tactic.
So if you sell hammers, you can’t put out “useful” content that always leads to more hammers as the solution to every problem. If you make a claim, you have to back it up with documentation. If you aren’t where you need to be, you need to say so. You have to be your own editor and people will respond to it. (More on this and other reputation management techniques in our ultimate guide).