Marketing In 2014 – It’s About The Conversation

This weekend I listened to one of my favorite markeitng authorities, Paul Gillin on Mitch Joel’s podcast. Someone should really tell Mitch that Paul’s last name is spelled wrong on his blog site. It was a great dialouge and I came away with a lot to think about in 2014. One topic that stood out was the topic of “writing for conversation” I think Paul is on to something here and I believe things are headed in this direction.

Many articles today are simply bulleted items with lists of tips or concepts. It appears that some people have taken to content marketing by posting a bunch of key informatin with not a lot of meaning behind it.

So what does conversation writing look like? I think it is more than just listing or regurgitating what other people have written it is more about wriing from the heart and articulating points which actually produce some results. In my own work, I am starting to see more and more signs of conversation marketing opportuniites.

Siri – Most people have tried asking Siri a “specific question” . If we are looking for a pizza restaurant in a city, we dont say, “pizza restaurant”, we say “what is the best pizza restaurant in (you fill-in the name of your location). This is what conversation is all about.

As a marketer, I must tell our stories and explain to people what separates our company from the others using specific “topic” conversations and get away from writing key word phrases.

Google Hummingbird – This major change, really impacted keyword search terms. I used to pride myself on writing for Google with particular key word phrases, (two or three words) or keyword domains( two or three word domains). I used to rank pretty high for these type of phrases. This type of marketing went out the window on Google.

As a marketer: Now I need to buid a stronger dialogue which emphasises particular topics. This means I need to write with more authority and talk more specically about topics rather than in general terms. In addition, I need to make sure these conversations are ocurring on social media platforms too. I cannot just rely on people finding company information on a website or blog site. In addition, I need to make sure I am writing in a consistent manner to insure a proper presence.

Some other areas to look at in 2014

Develop a writing style that includes graphics and a color scheme that is pleasant to the eye. Formatting will be a higher priority for me. Many times I see people write articles with 6 point font and paragraphs which include 10 – 20 sentences.

1. Brevity will be more imporant than ever.


2. Communicating with everyone and connecting with the elite. There is a difference. You can’t ignore anyone when it comes to social media, but you do not need to develop a connection with every person you have a conversation with.


3. Some of the best people to connect with are the people who are not on social media every hour of the day. This is so true with connections on Linkedin. I believe Linkedin has really showed me that there are a number of great people I need to be connected with for personal branding as well as for connecting via B2B.

Summary

Start writing to create conversations and discussions. This is where the deeper connections will result. Make it a goal in 2014, to write content that is different than the rest and helps create more discussion. More to come in 2014.

Image courtesy of Nutdanai Apikhomboonwaroot / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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