One of the things that people do kind of say that they struggle with an awful lot is finding which channels to promote their content on. Do you think there are like certain channels that are better than others for promoting your content?
I think if we're talking about B2B, I would always say LinkedIn as a given, to be honest. That said, we do have clients that come to us and maybe they've already got, for example, a Facebook page or Twitter page that's gathered a good following or Instagram, for example, or whatever it might be. And actually, you know, those channels can be really good, especially if you think about how you can vary the content. One thing we always recommend is create some content pillars. You might have like company news, you might have sort of service based content. You might have kind of thought leadership content. That's more about your industry. Create that plan. And then when you're working on things like your email plan or your social media plan, think about where they're going to slot into the plan.
Okay, so hello and welcome back to Digital Marketing From The Coalface, where I have I've kicked Dave off his usual seat as lead for these. And he's busy doing something else today. But I am joined by Kelly, who is the director of a content marketing agency in Manchester called. Yeah, Manchester, very far away from us called Making You Content. Kelly, I don't know if you want to do a quick intro of you and the company.
Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for inviting me on. Firstly, Alex, and as you said, I'm the director of Making New Content. We're a content marketing agency based in Manchester. Our sweet spot is copywriting, which is what my background is. And I think that's kind of what what you're wanting to get into the nitty gritty of today, isn't it, with content and how that all comes together. So looking forward to talking a little bit more about that.
Yeah. Well, I think it's one of the major kind of pain points for a lot. So a lot of our listeners are kind of marketing managers or company owners, and they're running kind of B2B or B2C businesses. Um, and I think content is one of the things that we get asked about the most really, I think it's a major hurdle for a lot of people. I think it's kind of the, it's everyone's go to advice, isn't it? When you're marketing online content is king. And I think a lot of people feel pressure to kind of go out there and write lots of content about their business, write about the things they know. Um, but I think that's actually quite difficult sometimes, especially now there's the overwhelming impression is that it's a very crowded market and everyone's making a lot of noise and it's quite difficult to stand out. So I don't know if that's something that, you know, you, you have experience with really like helping businesses to stand out and kind of make more of an impression.
Yeah, definitely. And I think you're right in that businesses know they need to be creating content, but it's kind of like, why and what for? Like we sometimes get people come to us and they're like, oh, you know, we need to be blogging. And I'm like, okay, well, why do you want to blog? What are you trying to achieve? Who are you trying to talk to? Like what you do? Someone that'll have read somewhere you should be putting out a blog a week, but they won't really have any understanding as to why or whether that volume is appropriate for their business, because it isn't always appropriate to be putting out that much content from a resource perspective. But also, as you say, who's going to read it? What are you going to do with it? And so we always kind of go back a step when people come to us about content really, and just actually try and understand, you know, what is their business? Like, are they B2B, as you say? If so, you know, do they have one audience? They have several. And, you know, for example, recruiters, they have candidates and they have clients. And sometimes, you know, some of those businesses just want to really speak to the clients, for example, but especially in the current market, they might need to speak to both. So we always kind of say to, to brands, especially, you know, if they wanted to stand out and they're in quite a noisy market is like, just really go think about why you want to be promoting your services and what it is. You've got to say it's different. Um, and it's not always about the volume. Sometimes it's about doing one thing like a hero piece of content, as we would call it in marketing. And, you know, like I was sticking with the recruitment theme. The common thing is like doing a salary guide, but it could be something else that's downloadable and really a lot of effort into something that's going to give you more of an evergreen piece that you can do marketing around, and that all of a sudden then you've got a campaign rather than, you know, just putting out a random blog about whatever you can think of every week because it's quite tiring even. Yeah, it's.
It's tiring. And it is funny, isn't it? Because I know, I mean, certainly like from my perspective with clients, you know, the number of times people have come to me and said, oh, you know, I tried that blogging thing. I did it for two months. I wrote kind of eight blog posts. Nothing happened. It was all rubbish. Like, it's a waste of time. But I think you're right. It's that kind of like strategy first, isn't it? It's like you've got to know what you're actually trying to talk about and then kind of write something. Yeah. Like you say, it could just be one massive blog post that does really well for the next year and a half, but it's kind of narrowing that down, isn't it, and finding the right idea. So that's interesting.
It is funny as well because, you know, we had that very same issue when we started out as an agency because we were when we started out pure copy, like we just copy and we'd get, we'd win clients that wanted blog support and we'd help them create some really, really good articles. And then a couple of months down the line, you'd be like, well, why have you stopped uploading them to the website? Or you've got them all live, but you've not posted them on social. And then they turn around and say, oh, we need to pause because we're behind or we've not.
Because it's not working for them.
Yeah, our service really wasn't sticky because of it. And so that's why we actually moved into social media because we realised actually what a lot of clients struggle with is the distribution of the content once it's been done. So, you know, it's all very well putting time into creating content, but you really need to think about how you're going to get that in front of people, whether that's email, you know, ads, organic, social and and have that plan ready so that you can be getting the content out there. So yeah, it's, it's something that a lot of people think about is, okay, let's get the strategy right. But you also need to make sure you know, you know, how you're going to get it in front of people because it doesn't just happen itself, even with the best SEO, that's going to take time.
So yeah, no, absolutely. I think that's, that's the key. Because yeah, sometimes it feels a little bit like screaming into a void, doesn't it? You kind of writing blog posts. They're not getting any traction. Nothing's happening. So it's really interesting though, just to kind of unpick that, that idea of having a promotional strategy for your content before you dive in and actually start writing is, I think, something that a lot of businesses lack. But I mean, how so? How do you go about kind of coming up with those strategies, I guess, for, for clients?
Yeah. Well, I guess obviously with the kind of clients that we're working with, they'll usually work with us on a routine basis. So then we would build out a quarterly plan, um, for the content, but I mean, for people that are doing this in house, I don't want to use this as a pitch for our own.
Sorry, it'll end up that way anyway, but we try and avoid it.
The yeah, I think the key thing is to kind of go when you're kind of looking at why you're doing it and what you want to achieve. One thing we always recommend is create some content pillars. So for example, you might have like company news, you might have sort of service based content. You might have kind of thought leadership content. That's more about your industry. Create that plan. And then when you're working on things like your email plan or your social media plan, think about where they're going to slot into the plan. Is it an evergreen piece that you can put out several times? You might be able to put it out, you know, um, when it, when it goes live, you might also be able to push it, you know, a month later or even a few weeks after that. Um, or is it something that might be like, for example, we have a client that does apprenticeships and it's just been National Apprenticeship week. So is it something that you're going to have to pedal out quite quickly.
Topical. Yeah.
Yeah. Do a lot of noise about so that you get the value out of it while it's still relevant. And if that's the case, for example, okay, you could put the blog on the website, but then you could repurpose it into, um, into say, a PDF that you could send to clients, or you could repurpose it into a carousel for LinkedIn. So, you know, when people swipe, swipe along, or you could send it out via email in a newsletter. So we've really got to think, especially if it is a topical piece, okay, this has got a shelf life of a month. How are we going to squeeze every bit of value out of that value?
Yeah.
So that's something that I definitely recommend thinking about. But also, as I say, you know, trying to break your content down. So it's not just, you know, company news pieces or just like, you know, sort of fake content and just trying to keep it really varied because especially when you're building a social media plan, you people will soon tire if they see lots of the same content or SEO content that's going out on social all the time, for example, which never reads as engaging, uh, As a social piece. It's really topical.
It's funny actually, because we found with promoting this podcast, for example, that we were, you know, every time we did an episode, we'd post about it on social media, for example. And after a while, just kind of like that fatigue set in where people were just less interested because we were doing it so often, we had to kind of mix it up a bit and find ways of pushing the episodes in different directions. But I think that idea that you're, that you're kind of honing in on there, where you kind of take a piece of content and think, how much more can I get out of this? How can I break this up into a lot of different things? I think that's really key, isn't it? Because like you say, this is it's laborious to create for a lot of people. It takes time to sit down. And I'm talking earlier about like a salary guide or like, if you're going to write like a kind of big how to article or whatever, there's a lot of resource that goes into that. And I think that idea of finding different ways to repurpose it is a really powerful kind of way of getting more for your time, really, isn't it?
Yeah, definitely. And something as well that can work really well with that is, is like if you're, for example, if you've got an expert in your business. Um. Or maybe, you know, an expert in the industry that you've got a good relationship with. Are you doing like a case study with them rather than just kind of writing it up? A really good way to do it could be to similar format to what we're doing now. You know, get them on a Zoom call, ask them the questions. And then, for example, the writer, whether that's internally or externally, has basically a transcript to go off that makes it super easy for them to create the content. But then you've also got a video that you can edit, repurpose where you've got all the same kind of things as soundbites. Um, so that's a really good way as well of thinking about, okay, how can we be really clever with the way that we're producing content? Um, and a lot of people find it a lot easier to have a conversation like this and then produce a blog off the back of it, which is pretty much the same content in a different form. So yeah, there's loads of ways to get creative. It's just just a question of trying what works for you really.
That's smart though. I really like that idea because I think, you know, just just thinking about the kind of B2B businesses that we often work with, one of the kind of key things is they'll they'll want to demonstrate deep expertise of their subject matter, but they'll have only one or two people in the business that actually kind of have that expertise. Right. And they're normally buried head down in doing the job rather than kind of talking about it. But that idea of just kind of, yeah, like you say, do an interview with them and then spin that into six different types of content is a really powerful way, I guess, of, of maximising your. Yeah. Internal resource. That's really cool. So when you work with clients, you often do stuff like that where you're kind of interviewing like a key person in the company and then turning that into content.
Yeah, exactly. Because, you know, often one of the questions we have when we work with, with a new business, especially if they're in a sector like finance, property, tech, um, which businesses we do well, sectors we do a lot in, um, they'll kind of be like, well, how are you going to write about what we do because we're not in industry? And then they're gobsmacked. Like, I don't understand how you're going to be able to write about what we do. And sometimes it is just a question of going away and doing some really good research. And sometimes, you know, we don't need the input from the client, but you will always tend to find that you get much better content. If you do have that input and you say, the way that we'll usually go about that is we'll say, right, let's get the content plan in place. And let's say that we know we want to interview or have a call with Joe Bloggs about his expertise in, I don't know, I'm trying to think aerospace. Let's just go for something. Um, and so, you know, we know that we want to put our blog in March about that. So let's get a call booked for the end of February and tee him up with the subject of what we want to speak about. We'll only need fifteen minutes of his time. And then we put him on a call. We ask loads of questions that are really tease out the information we need, take loads of notes, type really fast, and then go away and re and purpose that into a blog for them to sign off. Now that could either be something that's coming from the company, um, or something that works really well is um, doing thought leader pieces coming from that person, especially if they've got a.
Good.
Profile. Those pieces do brilliantly. So, you know, sometimes it's a question of actually trying to emulate their voice and write ghostwrite something for them, basically. And but sometimes it's just a case of trying to get the bits you need to write an authoritative piece for the brand.
Yeah, yeah, I'm with you. But it's interesting that you mentioned the idea of like kind of thought leadership coming from a person, because it's something I think we're seeing more and more of. Isn't it like LinkedIn, medium channels like that, where people are not posting content necessarily to their own blog. They'll post it to those kind of like third party sites. And then like you say, kind of see it for their own blog or, you know, spin it into social media content. But it's, it's all about the kind of people behind the brand rather than the brand itself.
Definitely. Yeah. I think, I think people are coming to understand in B2B that how important the personal element of, of the brand is. And those figureheads, because, you know, they're the people that people buy from people, don't they? And they're the ones who are going to be able to like, communicate the message in an engaging way to people that they're already connected with. Um, so it's something that I think you should always factor in when you're building your marketing plan as a business is, okay, who do you have in the business that can be an ambassador, that can support the content creation, whether that's internally or with an agency, but that can also be that person that's, you know, showcasing the work that you're doing on their to their network on LinkedIn and the likes.
Yeah. So speaking of, so like, just to quickly touch on this, although I don't expect you to have a definite answer. One of the things that people do kind of say that they struggle with an awful lot is finding which channels to promote their content on. I mean, obviously you guys, like you say, have kind of moved into the social media space kind of specifically for that reason. Do you think there are like certain channels that are better than others for promoting your content, or do you think it is just a case of have a go at all of them?
Um, I think if we're talking about B2B, I would always say LinkedIn as a, as a given, to be honest. Um, that said, we do have clients that come to us and maybe they've already got, for example, a Facebook page or a Twitter page that's gathered a good following and actually or Instagram, for example, or whatever it might be. Um, and actually, you know, those channels can be really good, especially if you think about how you can vary the content. So for example, you know, you might have, if you've got loads of things to talk about as a business and let's say you're going to post every day, Monday to Friday, that's still only five posts that you've got in a week, and you don't want to bombard people and doing loads more than five. So it might be that, you know, if you've got someone's brought cake into the office or someone's birthday, you don't really want to waste a post on happy Birthday to Carol. By the time you've got around all your teeth, you won't have any more posts pop out. So so those kind of things are perfect for Facebook, Twitter, you know, quick posts, Twitter. You could easily post three times a day and, you know, keep people engaged. So especially if you've got a lot to talk about, I'd say having other channels is great because you can pick and choose what you put on LinkedIn, which will be the, you know, the big pieces that.
You kind of hero content, if you like. Yeah.
Yeah, exactly. Versus you're more sort of, you know, uh, if you're trying to people actually say, you know, or not using things like Facebook or Instagram for business, but especially if you're trying to recruit, um, in the current market, I think having that personal more sort of face of the brand channel where you have the space to, you know, put out things about people's pets or putting out someone's birthday or, you know, cupcakes in the office or whatever it might be, or someone's doing a run for charity. I think those channels are great because they really give you an opportunity to showcase what it's like working for the company and.
Like, yeah, like that kind of interior view.
Yeah, one hundred percent. Yeah.
It's interesting, isn't it, as well. Because the other thing I want to touch on very briefly, if you don't mind, although like if this is kind of too personal shout, but I noticed you did something quite brave recently on LinkedIn. Um.
I wouldn't pick up on that.
But it's interesting though, isn't it? Because I saw the response that post got. So, Kelly, for people who don't know who aren't tied into a very small LinkedIn bubble of agency people, and Kelly was posting, you're posting about giving up alcohol, weren't you? Which is like quite a, I think, a personal thing to talk about really on a business channel. But I mean, I saw the response it got, it gets people talking. Do you think there's like a do you think there's something to be said for B2B companies doing more of that kind of stuff where it is a bit more kind of brave, a bit more personal, a bit more about individuals rather than the company.
Yeah, definitely. Um, it's interesting because you will always get the this isn't Facebook brigade who jumped. And I.
Did say that to.
A couple of those on, although it was interesting, a lot of people then jumped back in and be like, you know, who sets the rules for LinkedIn? Right. Um, but yeah, I posted on there, I guess I did it to hold myself accountable because I knew if I did a post that had loads of people that I, in my network view it, I'd be a lot less likely to give in because I'm very stubborn.
When people follow up in a month, you'll be like, uh.
Albert's Schloss having a glass of wine, and I can't have that. So, um, yeah, so I guess when it comes to personal things, I mean, we're talking specifically here about personal brand rather than the company brand. One thing I would always say is if you are looking to build your personal brand, you can't do that without being a person. And you know, it's all very well promoting, you know, client wins or services that you're offering and talking about that. But ultimately, like I was saying earlier, you know, people buy from people. And in terms of what is going to resonate with someone, the fact that you offer really quality service and you've just won this client and they're so happy, great people will be happy for you, but it's not going to resonate with people in the same way that something like, you know, admitting that you're going to give up alcohol and saying, you know, actually it really affects my work. And, and kind of going into detail, I did. The reason why that got so much traction. I think it's on one point five million views now, and it's eight thousand eight and a half thousand likes, over a thousand comments. It resonated because so many people have either been on that journey or are in a similar boat where they're like, oh my God, I have the same issue. You know, I'm not getting any enjoyment out of drinking. You know, networking events are always drinking heavy. And I got so I've got hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of LinkedIn messages from people saying like, you know, oh, I've been in the same boat. ET cetera. ET cetera. And I actually have got some business out of it as well, where I did a pitch on Tuesday and, well, I had an initial call with him last week and I had the pitch on Tuesday and he said, you know, the only reason I came across you was because I saw that post and I've quit alcohol ten years ago. And he said, you know, obviously the pitch went well. We didn't just win it on the post alone. You know, he said when you were invoiced me over the coming months, you can do that knowing that quitting alcohol got you that business. So, you know, it just goes to show like people will open up themselves a lot more if you do the same with them.
I think that's the key, isn't it? I mean, we talk a lot. Certainly I talk a lot on this podcast about trust and kind of establishing trust if you like. But I think the reality is, like you say, people will never trust a brand, they'll trust the people behind the brand. And ultimately doing something like what you did is, is brave in the sense that I guess it could put people off, it could make some people not want to work with you. But ultimately, at the end of the day, the people who do want to work with you because of it, you'll have a much better kind of starting relationship with them, I guess, won't you?
So yeah.
And.
I would say as a caveat is I don't think personal brands should just be personal or times. And one thing that I actually do with my LinkedIn, I committed at the start of the year to do a post a week, because that's what we do for our clients if we're doing their brand. And I was like, well, I should be doing the same. Um, and what I tried.
It's funny. It's funny, isn't it? How often in marketing we do not take our own advice and not do the things we do for our clients?
One hundred percent. So that was one of my New Year's resolutions. I'm going to do a post every day, every day, every week. And what I do is I have a Google doc where sometimes I'll have an idea way ahead of time, you know, or there's something coming up on a certain week and I'll put it in and other times it'll be something really sort of of the moment, like my post about alcohol. But what I'll do is once I've gone through and planned it or posted it, I'll highlight there's four colors that I've got through the document. So I've got marketing posts that's kind of sharing best practice and expertise about marketing. There's leadership, which is talking about, you know, running a business or being a boss, and there is company news. So sort of, you know, end of the month, you know, these are the things we've achieved as a business. And then there's personal. So in my head, when I'm looking at this post at these sort of week by week, I want to make sure I'm not posting too heavily down one route or the other, so that over the course of, say, a quarter someone's got that follows me has got a good mix of marketing insight, leadership, insight, and then also an idea of NYC. So that's what I would say is make it balanced. If you're doing a plan, try and develop some pillars and you don't have to stick rigidly to it, but have it in mind so that you don't, you know, turn your LinkedIn into a Facebook page or equally just kind of get too focused on like what you offer.
It's interesting, isn't it? Because I think that planning process, I was just about to say, one of the first things that kind of comes across is that you're really organised with your content, you know, like what you're going to talk about. But I think it's really interesting because that that kind of hybrid approach that you're describing there, where you have like a plan with pillars or subjects that you know, you want to touch on, but it's not like a rigid plan is, is kind of key really, isn't it? Because when you try and plan too hard, like I've produced spreadsheets for clients before with like, you know, this week we're going to talk about this thing next week we're going to post about this thing. There's going to be a blog post about this, and it's kind of four months in the future. And as soon as like something crops up or they decide that they don't want to kind of post one of the posts anymore, the whole thing kind of falls apart really quickly. But what you're describing, I guess, is much more durable.
Yeah, exactly. It's having a framework, I guess I'd describe it of in which you produce content, but then giving you the flexibility to adapt to stuff that's happening, you know, in the news or within the business so that you can kind of, you know, move things around with that without, like you say, breaking the system.
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. It's interesting though, isn't it? Actually thinking about it in more detail, one of the things I guess that we're saying really is that if you're going to do a content plan for your company is sit down before you do it with other people in the company, I guess, and make sure you have a decent idea of all the different things you're going to cover off roughly what you want to talk about, and then just not wing it, but be flexible. You know, play around with things. Don't don't get too kind of stuck in a really rigid sort of mindset where you have to post about certain things because I guess that's how you make unfun, isn't it? And once things become unfun, nobody wants to do them anymore. So.
Yeah. And people can tell when content going out is really planned, kind of especially on a post going back to post about people can tell when it's kind of really just, you know, it's been done by somebody else or, and it's kind of just following this, this sort of rigid plan. It just doesn't feel natural, does it? And ultimately, you know, the thing that people will forget a lot of the time with social media is it's a two way conversation. And if you're just posting a rigid plan out to the world and not looking at what you're getting back in terms of engagement or what else is going out on in the world, it's not going to be as relevant to people, especially over time as you say, when your content you plan for months ago starts going out and things have moved on.
Yeah, it's exactly it, isn't it? You have to be flexible. You have to be willing to roll with the times. So yeah, um, just kind of picking up then. So one of the things I wanted to really wanted to talk to you about as well, um, just coming on the back of, off the back of this idea of kind of planning, um, content out in advance is the whole idea of like finding a voice for your brand. Because I think that's another thing that a lot of people who are listening to this and thinking, you know, I've never really done much content before, but I really want to start now. I'm going to go out and kind of figure out what I want to talk about. It's then a case, I think, isn't it, of like, how am I going to set myself apart from the competition? How am I going to make myself sound genuine, I guess. Do you have any advice around that process?
Yeah, I mean, I think it's always a question of going back to your audience and understanding, as you say, like, you know, who are you talking to? I think in a B2B market, that's probably a little bit easier because in B2C, it's like, well, what demographic are you speaking to? What are they interested in? What shops do they buy from? So B2B, I do think is a bit easier because you're looking more at job roles and problems that they have and trying to get the messaging right based on that. Um, which is something, by the way, I would always recommend is really, really trying to drill down into the challenges and motivations of that persona and B2B tone of voice. Um, but I guess the thing that we actually did an article on this recently was that you've also got to be prepared that that tone of voice might change over time. Um, and going back to the B2C example, at the moment, you've seen those things in the, in the news where like over energy, like read the room wrong because they did a blog saying you should, oh yeah, if you're cold and like, you can tell that you can see how the breathe happened there, can't you? Like, let's create a lighthearted piece aimed at mums that are at home. Um, you know, and they've, they've clearly like stuck to a very clear persona because they even say about kids and dogs and, um, but obviously it completely missed the mark because it missed the fact that at the moment most people are really struggling to pay their energy bills and they have this light hearted, fluffy piece adding absolutely no value and it's just not right. So I would always say read the room. And based on the current climate, um, similar.
Interesting though, because just going back to what we were saying earlier, I feel like that brief where, you know, somebody said, okay, let's write some like, you know, clearly kind of actionable advice for people who are stuck at home with their kids and their dog and need to bring the heating bills down. If they'd actually spoken to a subject matter expert and come up with five tips that were actually helpful like that, that could have worked really well, right? It would have been timely, it would have been of interest, it would have been really shareable. So it's all just coming back to that whole idea of like, you have to actually know what you're talking about, don't you? Or involve an expert rather than winging it.
Yeah. Yeah, definitely. I think, I think that's definitely right. Um, but I guess to apply it to a B2B framework, for example, um, you know, if we were, if we were talking to recruiters, going back to that, I don't know why I keep using the example, but, um.
It happens.
It is very different at the moment, isn't it, for candidates and people having a nightmare trying to get candidates. Whereas, you know, twelve months ago it might have been a completely different messaging framework. Uh, you know, the market being on the other side. So yeah, it does change over time. But one thing that I would say is try and build out some brand guidelines. Now, you know, there's several ways you can go about that. Um, you know, if we're working with clients from the start, we'll often do like a workshop and then we'll develop the tone of voice, we'll get everyone involved and kind of set it in stone from there. But obviously not all people have the budget or time or don't see the value in that, to be quite honest with you. Um, so what we'll always try and do when we're working with clients is kind of have a Google doc that's a very dynamic document that we update all the time based on feedback that has kind of things like, you know, use these words, don't use these words, um, sort of certain rules or notes about the audience. So for example, we do some work in housing and there's a constant debate. Do you call them residents or tenants? Little things like.
That. Yeah.
Customers or clients or having a document that's for you know, that everyone can refer to that kind of sets in stone terminology or kind of, you know, rules. Do you say it is or it's so having a document like that is really helpful just to get the basics right, because otherwise what will happen is, let's say you've got someone managing your socials, someone writing content internally, and then someone like a, you know, an acting assistant that might be writing an email, you're going to have a really just disconnected tone of voice. If everyone's producing content with no central reference point.
And you see that sometimes, don't you, with brands where you're like, you'll read something and it'll be really kind of jokey and lighthearted, and then you'll see like a really serious social media post and it's like, you almost feel like you've got whiplash a little bit like.
Yeah, one hundred percent. So consistency is key. I mean, it's interesting you mentioned that you sort of about social versus email, for example. You know, you might have to vary tones for different platforms or different audiences if you've got several personas, but at least if you've got that kind of overall rule book or, or I say, I say rule book, but guide it will help. And, you know, some brands, bigger brands, they will actually invest time into going, okay, how do we speak on social? How do we speak in a blog? How do we speak on our website? And obviously, for most small businesses, that's kind of overkill really. And it's just a case of being sensible and going, okay, what's right for what platform and what is our general voice that we want to kind of, you know, be true to?
Yeah, I like the idea of it being a kind of living document as well, not being like, you say, a rule book that's set in stone, but something you can actually add to over time. There's a funny story. Um, when me and Kelly, um, first worked together, um, I was a different agency heading up their digital marketing department and I actually got, um, Kelly when you were just starting out, I think to write some content about lawn mowers. I'm sure you'll remember this. It's for a client called Green Reaper. Um, and we threw so much lawn mower content at you, but the reason I raise it is because it was a really interesting one. The brand was called the Green Reaper, which is a pretty jokey brand name, right? But they had this like really serious tone of voice. And when you started writing content, over time, it became much more kind of jokey and funny. And it was really interesting because the client loved that and they kind of were like, oh, this, this is resonating so much more. People really like it. People are really enjoying reading it where they weren't before. Like, let's kind of keep that up. And it's interesting because sometimes you do really have to be quite flexible, I think, don't you, with your brand voice and not get to kind of set in stone with it one hundred percent.
Yeah. And adapting based on feedback, I think is really important over time. You know, you see the biggest brands in the world, they don't set out with a logo in, you know, in nineteen hundred and then have the same logo. Now they've evolved it. McDonald's have evolved their brand, evolved their brand, and it's still the same brand, but it's just fit for purpose in the current in the current time. So that feedback piece is really important. And there's easy ways to measure that as well. Like for example, on social. See how your. Um. See how your post with emojis perform versus the ones without. You know, see how you're more authoritative posts resonate versus the ones without. And obviously there's so many factors that influence engagement on a post. So it can be that can be a bit crude to kind of put it the way I have. But, but just kind of, you know, test and measure a little bit and then try and be consistent based on what you, what you've learned from that process.
It's interesting you say that because over the years, I've become a really staunch advocate for testing absolutely everything. But I think that's the part of the puzzle that a lot of businesses miss, really, isn't it? It's they'll do these things, but it all kind of like the forethought is there, the planning is there sometimes, but they never actually kind of measure and they can't adapt because of that. So they'll just keep doing the same wrong thing over and over again. So I guess that's like a another tip really, isn't it? If you're trying to do your content plan or whatever, make sure that you've built into it some capacity to kind of measure and adapt as time goes on. I mean, is that something that you find yourself kind of helping brands do a lot, like get into that mindset of measuring things or.
Yeah, definitely. Um, I find that it depends on the client, but kind of similar to what you're saying there. You know, some clients will be really will have a really good line of communication with. So let's say we do like a campaign and it goes out via email. You know, we'll be in close communication as to how our emails performed, what, you know, why it's performed well. We think, for example, maybe the subject line of that was was different. And that's why it really stood out and really working closely with them, others where we have like less of a line of communication, it's a lot harder to get that circle of feedback. And then that puts you in a different position as an agency that's working with a brand, because you just have to keep doing the same thing and you can't adapt when actually you as an agency have the capacity to adapt and work with them to optimise what they're doing. And so I think if you are working with an agency, my tip would always be to be really transparent with feedback because ultimately marketing is always based on assumptions. And even so, the best marketing agency in the world, they're going to base what they're doing on a set of assumptions. And so just because it might not perform well in the first instance doesn't mean that they failed. It's a question of, okay, let's have a look at it. How did that perform? You know, did it do well? Could it have done better? Did it flop? And then sort of optimising and adapting your plan together based on that? Because I think that's where a lot of businesses chop and change the companies they work with because they think that they, they need to find the company that has the silver bullet when actually they need to find.
The silver bullet. Yeah. You have to make the silver bullet. It comes with time, doesn't it? Yeah.
He is finding people that you can work with really well that understand your business, care about your business, and then working with them to get the best outcome. Because, you know, if you're just going to chop and change and look at different agencies, that can get you better results than the one before, you ultimately aren't going to get the long term results that you need.
It's interesting, isn't it? Because it's, it's one of those things where I think with other areas of marketing, people have a lot more patience. Like with PPC and with SEO and stuff like that. You know, everybody understands and appreciates, oh, it's going to take six to nine months before we start seeing results. It'll take a few months before we get the right kind of like pick of keywords or whatever. But when it comes to content, people are very like, they either like it or they don't. I think that's really frustrating sometimes, isn't it? Because it's like, you know, at the end of the day, this is like you say, eventually you end up working with somebody who gets your brand. But those relationships never kind of start out like that. It's never like an instant chemistry thing, is it? You have to kind of work at establishing that rapport. Yeah.
Especially to be where, you know, it can be the terminology and the industry can be so complex. You know, it's, it is a question of building that relationship. And I guess trust, as you say, as you said earlier, building that trust both ways and building that understanding of each other.
Yeah, we work with quite a lot of oil and gas clients. And when I first started working at Reddit, um, I wrote some content for an oil and gas client and they were just like, what is this? Like, none of these words are right. Like, this is none of the terminologies, right? Do you know anything about the oil and gas industry? And I was like, well, no, but I can learn. And like, luckily they were willing to kind of sit down with me and work through it. And then we got to a place where, you know, like, I can just kind of bash out content really quickly for them now, but it takes time and I don't think you can skip that, can you? If you want to work with somebody long term, you have to put those hours in at the beginning of the relationship, I guess.
Definitely. Yeah. And the same comes for, you know, bringing someone on internally, you know, bringing someone on in-house, you know, if you, if you're looking to bring on, you know, a copywriter or social media manager, you need to, you need to be prepared for the fact that it's probably going to be a six month journey and get them to a point where they're sort of firing on all cylinders. So, um, yeah.
So it's interesting. That was very smooth that I was just about to say. And one of the other things I really wanted to talk to you about today was obviously this, this whole idea of kind of hiring writers because I think this is another really prickly issue, especially for people who are the marketing manager of a, of a B2B company say. And they, you know, they know plenty about all the different marketing channels, but maybe they don't know enough about content to feel comfortable hiring a writer. I think that's a really challenging thing to do, isn't it? Try and hire somebody that you're going to entrust with speaking your brand voice from there on out. And I just wondered if you had any tips. Obviously, you employ writers, I guess, all the time. Really?
Yeah, I think the first thing I would say is to try and understand whether you need someone full time or you or not. Um, a lot of people, they'll say, you know, I'm always amazed at how when people hire full time writers, they're like, oh, you know, we need to do a blog a week and we need to do an email every month. It's like, that's not a full time.
That's not someone's full time job, is it?
No. Yeah. It's like, what are they going to do the rest of their time? Often people are, you know, bringing people on for these roles where they really don't need a full time resource. Um, and, and obviously then, you know, you've got that commitment. But obviously, having said that, you know, I'm not here trying to, you know, say no.
I mean, like I say, we try not to use these as a pitch, but at the end of the day, we believe in what we do, don't we?
So yeah. Yeah. But I do think, you know, whether in any case, it's always good when you're hiring, um, a writer sort of looking for a full time person is to get them to have a go at something because writing, you know, we've spoken about this before, haven't we, Alex. You know, you can see it and you can get whether they've got the talent or not, even if all the words wrong about your oil and gas business, you know, and fluff up all the terminology like you can tell whether they've got the natural talent for it or not. And ultimately, you know, I was once told by someone which has always stuck with me, you know, you can, you can teach anyone anything with the right attitude. And if it's just a question of helping that writer understand your business and understand your, your language that you need to speak in, that's going to be a much easier job than actually teaching someone that knows your industry to write. So yeah. So yeah, I always say give them a test piece. We always find if we're hiring writers, that a blog is a really good test piece because you can just say five hundred words. It shouldn't for an experienced writer. It shouldn't take them any more than two hours to write it. Really. Um, so it's not asking for a great commitment of their time, but it will just give you something you need, especially if you've got several writers and you give them the same brief to compare and contrast and understand, you know, whether you, whether you want to take them forward.
You can see instantly when you do that, like stack a couple of blog posts next to each other, whether somebody can write or not. It's one of my personal pet peeves of the internet, to be honest, is that the kind of like democratisation of it, at a certain point, just everybody decided that they could write copy professionally. And we just kind of inundated by these people who claimed to be writers and just couldn't really. But yeah, I guess you're right. Test, but but be looking more, I guess for that natural talent that, you know, does this read well and sound engaging rather than nitpicking over vocabulary and stuff like that? Because ultimately, yeah, that's the bit you can teach someone. Yeah, that's a really good tip. Um, yeah. I mean, to be honest with you, we've covered a lot of ground here. We've been doing this for forty minutes, apparently, which it doesn't really feel like, but, um, I guess, yeah, hopefully we've covered off stuff that's really useful to everybody, whether you're just kind of starting out doing your own content in-house, whether you're thinking of hiring a content agency. Hopefully there's some useful tips and advice in there. Um, is there anything else you wanted to cover off Kelly or do you think we've, we've covered everything.
I think we've really put the world to rights to be honest.
Yeah.
So yeah.
That's everything you ever need to know about.
Everything you need to know. Um, but no, thank you so much for inviting me on. It's been really good catching up with you, actually.
No, it's been amazing. Yeah. It's been a real pleasure. And, um, if you're listening and you want to ask any questions, um, or follow up on anything we've mentioned here, just write in and until next time, that's all from me.