In past blogs, I’ve talked about the need to identify:
- Audience – Identify who your website needs to attract and support. Good websites anticipate who will be visiting and proactively plan for them.
- Search Strategy – How will visitors arrive at your site? What pages will they land on? What will they be looking for? Where will they come from? Make sure that your search strategy focuses on what the hivemind wants to learn.
- Content – What fresh content do you have to interest your audience? You not only have to plan for the launch of your website but for the many months after.
In this blog I want to concentrate on Content.
Content
People in the hivemind visit websites not to hear your sales pitch but to obtain content, either in the form of information or services. To fulfill that need, you need to generate new case studies, whitepapers, research reports, press releases, blog entries, product updates, industry overviews, comparison charts, and more. Content must be:
- Relevant – Don’t simply tell your story from your perspective. Create content that answers questions and satisfies the hivemind.
- Fresh – The Internet is a dynamic and interactive environment. Users expect up-to-date content. Don’t make the mistake of stuffing your website with filler content that has been directly transplanted from print. Advertising copy seldom provides enough detail. Brochure copy drags on, assuming the audience will follow a linear progression of information. While public relations copy forgets to sell.
- Well-structured – The content must be organized so that people can easily find what they are looking for.
While many types of content require objectivity, when you get the chance, make sure you tell your company’s story with some passion.
It’s easy to forget, but your company has an important story to tell — one that interests investors, customers and partners, a story with character, set in a particular place and time, with color, imagery, energy and perspective, a story that defines and differentiates. Finding this story requires time and effort, investigation and debate, filling-in and polishing.
You need to define your company’s story — its vision, values and intent — in a way that differentiates ideas, reflects passion, and confirms your organization’s relationship to the world.
Don’t settle for anything less.
As someone told me recently, “giving” is the new mandate of marketing. Give as much as you can. Give as often as you can. In fact, give away the most valuable information you have. But it’s not really giving as much as it is “trading”.
It’s common practice these days to trade information, that is, to ask for information before providing information. You tell consumers a little something about your company and its products, they tell you a little something about themselves, you tell them a little more, they tell you a little more — and over time, you create a mutually beneficial learning relationship.
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