In the world of business and sales, words are powerful. Copywriting not only involves captivating and educating your audience, but also choosing the right words to say. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that your choice of words could cost (or earn) your company a sale. When it comes to copywriting, every detail counts. The idea isn’t to walk on eggshells with your copywriting, but you do want to be aware of word choice and the message you are signaling to your clients.
Almost every word has its place and purpose, but there are several that you want to avoid when you are copywriting for sales or your website. These are what I like to call “the worst phrases in content marketing.”
Content Marketing Tips: What to Avoid
Content marketing may seem like it’s for everyone (see “You Don’t Need to Be a Brand Publisher To Win At Content Marketing” on Moz), but remember, there are some words in general you should be avoiding to stay on the right road. If you have these words and phrases on your own website, consider it a red flag: it might be hurting your conversion ratio.
Our Product is The Cheapeston The Market. If you are in a hurry to downgrade the value of your product, the word cheap will get you there in a heartbeat. Cheap is not to be confused with affordable; affordable is a gentler and more positive way to emphasize a cost effective price point.However, cheap may bring the connotation of flimsy and invaluable. If you must include a low price point in your copywriting, stick to affordable.
We Are Offering One of The Best Things Available in Our Industry. Maybe this is a personal pet peeve, but the word thing really makes my skin crawl. It is extremely vague, generic, and does nothing in terms of describing value. The word thing should be used to describe an object when you don’t know what it is, or how to even go about describing it. Merriam Webster describes the word thing as an object whose name is not known or stated.Does that really describe the product or service that you have to offer?If you are writing about a product with the goal of generating a sale, describe what is in in detail. Then focus on its best qualities — also in detail. Generic terms don’t encourage conversions.
Allow Us to Serve Your Needs. Yet another vague phrase, allow us might be one of the most unconvincing terms to use when trying to make a sale. Furthermore, you are putting the cart before the horse. In order for your client to want to allow you to help, you need to describe in detail why you are their solution.Again, details matter to your clients. Don’t assume that you automatically have the sale just because you believe in your product or service.
We Will Try to Resolve The Problem as Soon as Possible. If you are looking to instill confidence and encouragement in your client, refrain from using the word try. Try sounds like you will make an attempt, but there are no guarantees to the outcome.Even though there are never any guarantees in life, it is much more ensuring to your client to say that you will find a solution vs. you will make a mere attempt. You don’t want to make false promises, but you do want your client to feel confident in your capabilities.
Industry Jargon Overload. While this may not be a specific word, overwhelming your potential client with too much industry jargon can easily cost you a sale. When was the last time that you were motivated to buy something because you were overly confused? I’m willing to bet never.When it comes to describing your products and services, stick to the basics. One of the rules of copywriting is to make sure that your 80-year-old grandmother can understand what you are trying to say. Of course, this does not apply for those who have a highly specific target audience that already understands industry jargon.Otherwise, make your copywriting simple and easy to understand.
Free (When It’s Really Not). Free might sound harmless enough, but unfortunately it can come with negative connotation. Your clients are smart and know that almost nothing is truly free. Not to mention, the word free is often used as a bait-and-switch to lure in clients for a sale. Think about those phony smartphone commercials that promise a free service, only to find out that you must sign a contract to get the benefits.No one likes to be strung along. Unless your offer is truly free, don’t advertise as such.
I Don’t Want to Generate More Business. Yet another phrase more than a word, negative and sarcastic phrases will never put your message in a positive light. This trick has become popular around the Internet, especially when you navigate away from a page and are stopped by a pop-up. If you have to insult your client into buying, you might want to re-evaluate the value of your product.
Don’t Try to ‘Boil an Ocean’. If at all possible, avoid using clichés. Chances are that your clients have read those clichés time and time again, and they aren’t doing you any favors. With all of the wonderful copywriting books, tools, and online resources available, surely you can write a few words that will capture the attention of your audience. There are tried-and-true methods that were established decades ago that still apply today. Give it a try.If you can’t seem to get it just right, hire a pro. Your message will be well received, easy to understand, and help you attract business instead of unintentionally turning it away.
Too Much We, I, And Us. If you take anything away from this advice, too much of you in your copywriting will never win over clients. People care about their needs and how they can use your products to solve problems. Win your customers over by showing value in your product and making your focus entirely on them.
Copywriting doesn’t have to cost you money. In fact, it can earn you quite a lot of cash.
Keep your content writing and copywriting focused on your audience, easy to grasp, and steer clear of words that cost you money. Learn more about what to avoid with these “7 Deadly Sins of Content Marketing” on The Guardian. Have you seen any other bad content marketing bits out there? Share in the comments!
As a small business owner, the concept of content marketing makes you raise an eyebrow and ask yourself lots of questions that might include:
Do I really need a content strategy to speak my mind and bond with my clients? Couldn’t I just let the words flow freely?
Don’t let your upcoming experiences provide the answers to these questions.
Trying to convey your messages without a well-researched, documented content marketing strategy would be like trying to steer a ship without a helm. In this case you would probably drown in a sea of disparate content pieces that do not actually add value to your audience and don’t do a great job at representing your business.
6 Reasons Why Content Marketing Is Here to Stay
The good news is that it’s never too late to see what successful content marketing is all about. According to a Forbes article, the content marketing industry was worth no less than $44 billion dollars in 2013. Aren’t you curious to find out what’s behind the strategies that have filled the pockets of so many individuals and corporations? Some see content marketing as an elaborated soft-sell advertising tactic, while others interpret it as a method of telling a company’s story in a unique manner. Regardless of your take on this matter, we give you six reasons why content marketing won’t be going anywhere in the near future.
Give The Man Premium Content, and He Will Come Back for More. Addictive content enables you and your readers to become close. Original, palatable and relevant writing with a substance always triggers feedback from one’s audience. Naturally, in this case the key to success is consistency. Those who like to consume your stellar food for thought on a regular basis will always be hungry for your fresh topics. They will land on your page repeatedly and advise their friends, colleagues, parents and grandparents to do the same. On top of that, a constant flow of content allows you to build and maintain a solid community around your brand, product or service. According to an article published by Search Engine Journal, exceptional content facilitates a stimulating conversation between you and your public, while a strong community amplifies the message that you are trying to send through your writing.
Having a Solid Content Strategy Is Like Having Money in the Bank. Some inexperienced business owners who are not familiar with the mechanism of online markets may tend to think that crafting and implementing a content strategy is a tiresome process that doesn’t actually deliver major benefits. The numbers reflected by recent stats debunk this misconception, proving that content marketing is one of the most powerful moneymaking tools that all companies can and should rely on, regardless of their size and goals, in order to increase their revenues. The fact that 90% of B2C brands rely on content marketing to inform and educate their consumers definitely proves a point in this context.
Content Marketers Sharpen Their Pens and Broaden Their Horizons. According to a white paper entitled 2015 Benchmarks, Budgets and Trends- North America, published by Content Marketing Institute, this year 35% of all B2B marketers affirm that they count on a documented content marketing strategy, while 48% say that they have a content marketing strategy set in place, but in this case we are talking about an undocumented version. The same source reveals other interesting aspects, including the following ones:
Content marketers now use separate content marketing strategies to target 4 audiences, on average
42% of all surveyed marketers publish fresh content daily or “multiple times per week” to fuel their content marketing program
In 2015, marketers are currently working on 13 content marketing initiatives, on average
The new trends identified by this source indicate that content marketing has evolved a great deal throughout time, expanding its influence and its inherent series of benefit. At this point, skilled marketers can develop, test, revise and monitor not one but four (or more) distinctive content marketing strategies designed according to the particularities of their segments of public. Another important aspect underlined by this white paper is that 70% of the B2B marketers employed by companies of all sizes are creating more content than they did one year ago. They use on average six channels to distribute their pieces of content and are always keeping an eye open for new opportunities that may take their content marketing program to a whole new level. The increased enthusiasm and determination manifested by marketers show that content is a mighty king that will never be dethroned and also suggests that a little bit of strategic thinking and in-depth research can take you a long way.
All the Big Players Are Investing Big Bucks in Content Marketing. If you want to keep up with the Joneses in any field of activity, you have to identify your own role models and follow in the footsteps of the most successful giants. This doesn’t mean that you have to turn yourself into a copycat; chances are that you don’t have the resources that a major corporation relies on anyway. In this case, the key is to borrow, steal and reinterpret in a clever manner, while adapting every single idea that inspires you to your own strategy, developed according to your budget, audience and goals. Brands that we all know and love show us that content marketing is the key to reaching audiences, creating communities and achieving bigger goals on a daily basis.
Let’s take a quick look at some awesome examples:
Colgate has made a name for itself as an expert in its field not necessarily by talking like one, but by keeping its prospects close through its Oral and Dental Health Resource This online resource provides useful, punctual tips on a great variety of topics, all related to the mission, vision and purpose in business of this giant company that has established itself as a promoter of a correct oral hygiene. Here one could stumble across more than 400 instructional articles, interactive guides and videos that address all your questions and concerns. Written in a friendly tone, these pieces of content are easy to digest and provide valuable pieces of advice that may just get the Tooth Fairy out of business.
Coca-Cola has already explored the tremendous power of content marketing. Its Content 2020 marketing strategy revolves around the idea that all marketers require an increased amount of relevant, original and pertinent content to maintain a strong bond with clients and prospects. These days, marketers are no longer distributing content every once in a while, hoping to close a sale with just one piece of content. The 24/7 connectivity has changed the rules of the game, and now marketers feel stimulated to work around the clock to craft and distribute world-class content. According to Marketing Week, this huge corporation has decided to ditch traditional ad agencies that used to provide their creative ideas and focus mostly on a new, collaborative and extremely ingenious approach to content creation and storytelling. More specifically, as this suggestive and entertaining video reveals, Coca Cola is determined to evolve from creative excellence to content excellence, while provoking conversations through the stories it tells. This content marketing strategy has everything it takes to deliver exceptional results: after all, we all love good stories that we can relate to, and we all love a certain type of carbonated soft drink, don’t we?
RedBull. RedBull is another respectable brand that hardly makes any compromises when it comes to rolling out its unique content marketing strategy. Designed to keep the brand on the same page with adrenaline junkies and extreme sports fans, the content marketing strategy employed by RedBull gravitates around videos that are fun and engaging. The creative minds that are behind RedBull’s content marketing strategy know that its fans want excitement, adrenaline and a certain unique cool factor- and this is exactly what they deliver. The energy drink that gives us wings may or may not be a mix of coolness and adrenaline in a can; however, one thing’s certain: RedBull has managed to capture the attention of a worldwide audience, counting more than 3.7 million subscribers on YouTube. RedBull definitely knows how to stay into the spotlight by organizing and promoting unique, jaw-dropping events and building a solid content marketing strategy around them. The Stratos Jump performed by Felix Baumgartner was watched by no less than 8 million people. Naturally, the incredible event went mainstream in a matter of a few seconds, as the “death-defying” experience was instantly explored by some of the most reputable media outlets worldwide. For those seeking a maximum level of exposure, it can’t get better than this. Multiple videos were posted on YouTube, on RedBull’s official channel, while its website was teeming with blog updates and other exciting fresh pieces of content that celebrated Felix Baumgartner’s extreme initiative.
GoPro provides powerful video cameras and accessories that are basically suitable for any activity that you could image. This is what we all know. But what exactly is its content marketing secret? GoPro explores our need of validation. We could all use five minutes of glory, couldn’t we? GoPro stimulates its prospect to become real-life heroes. Moreover, clients are encouraged to capture incredible moments and share them with the whole world. By turning customers into brand evangelists, GoPro manages to achieve its marketing goals with minimal effort, while letting its fans do most of the heavy lifting. According to Business 2 Community, GoPro sells big and succeeds in increasing its brand awareness by tapping its fan’s love and appreciation for its product. Its team of marketing specialists is constantly surfing the Internet looking for videos produced using a GoPro camera. Naturally, they gather and use the ones with an elevated emotional and aesthetic value, in an attempt to cater shareable content. Moreover, as a great storyteller, GoPro brings all these experienced together and turns them into the nucleus of a solid community. With a content strategy that is always ready to tap the overwhelming potential of social media platforms, GoPro counts more than 7.9 million fans on Facebook and more than 3.2 million followers on Instagram, proving that sustained marketing efforts are always rewarded.
Content Marketing Is the Miracle Maker That Even the Budget-Minded Businesses Can Afford. It’s always so easy to abandon a great idea before actually thinking about the easiest methods in which you could apply it. Yes, competition can be quite intimidating, especially when you’re counterparts are sitting on the pile of gold, while you’re pinching pennies. But this doesn’t mean that content marketing is the magic wand that was designed exclusively for the (already) rich and famous. On the contrary, any type of business can profit from the benefits that a solid content marketing strategy has to offer, as long as it focuses on the following aspects:
Short-term and long-term goals
Strategy
Production
Content atomization (the process of deriving multiple small execution methods from one big idea, according to Convince&Convert)
Amplification (the process of marketing the marketing- in other words, this step encompasses all the integration tactics that you employ to make your message heard on a larger scale)
Tests and Measurements
Good Content Never Goes on Vacation. Here’s another reason why you should rely on content marketing to take your business to a whole new level: a good content strategy will work even when you won’t. Quality web content will always be read, commented upon and shared 24/7, even when you’re in a meeting or on a vacation. These days, content is treated like a first-class product. Used wisely, this type of writing can open the doors to countless opportunities to drive revenue via your other sellable services or products that define your business.
Content Marketing Is Seen as The New Conversation Between Brands and Their Public
So there you have it: a personalized content marketing strategy is the fundamental aspect that differentiates you from your competitors, making you unique, channeling your ambitions in the right direction and creating a stronger tie with your audience.
An article published by Forbes defines content marketing as “the new conversation.” Indeed, successful, result-oriented content marketing is all about the ways in which a brand’s culture get mirrored and reinforced in its daily actions. The companies that nail content marketing are the ones that make a difference in their customers’ lives, provide value (inform, entertain and educate) without asking for anything in return and prove their realness every single step of the way. All in all, the fact that savvy corporations make millions by simply rolling out clever strategies based on premium web writing proves that the future of content marketing is as bright as the sun in July.
You! Yes, you over there, searching Google for inspiration to create an epic content marketing plan. I know it’s easy to get stumped with all of the information available or you might simply need a few examples of different successful endeavors from some epic companies. Heck, as a content marketer, even I get stumped (once every few million minutes).
In this blog, I am going to do an in-depth case study of the most epic of the epic to inspire your content marketing. More specifically, I’ll take a look two content marketing pillars who have created the foundations of what a great content marketing strategy is all about! This should give you some basic inspiration that you will be able to take with you to your next content marketing meeting.
Let’s take a look at the company that gives you wings, and the company you use to film when you get those wings.
Red Bull’s Stellar Content Marketing: 7 Key Features
If you aren’t a big fan of energy drinks, chances are you still know about Red Bull and can recite their slogan from memory, “Red Bull gives you wings!” Regardless of lawsuits stating the drink does not, in fact, give one wings, Red Bull’s slogan is a great example of just how this company wins at content marketing. Let’s look at a few other ways they’re a content marketing juggernaut.
1. World Records Were Broken. Can We Ever Forget the Parachute from Space? I was one of the millions that tuned in for Red Bull’s Stratos jump from the edge of space in October 2012. It was an incredible thing to watch and what a feeling of realizing you’re watching history in the making! If you weren’t one who watched or happen to know nothing about it, Felix Baumgartner did a free fall from the very edge of space and represented Red Bull. While it happened over two years ago, Red Bull is still using this highly successful campaign over at their Stratos Team website. It was a great way to not only advance the energy drink, but to also promote science and space travel.
Just how effective was this jump, in sales and marketing results? An Econsultancy report said they had 900,000 Facebook interactions on jump day, and sales of Red Bull rose an entire 7% to a figure in the billions within six months.
Now, I understand that not everyone can break a world record in their content marketing, but this company went to the extreme and did that—and it got them somewhere! If you have a crazy, record-breaking idea for your marketing: well, who’s stopping you from doing it?
2. Red Bull Uses Excellent Sports Action YouTube Videos. While most of Red Bull’s customers are not those who participate in extreme sports or high action events, they do know that it is a great marketing scheme. The company utilizes YouTube to provide videos to their over 3 million subscribers using different extreme sports in a video series. They have a series about racing in Seattle, as well as featuring individual sports such as mountain biking, parachute jumps, and extreme truck racing (in snowy conditions!). You can catch all of their videos by heading to their YouTube account. Prepare for some major action-packed adventures!
In addition to Red Bull’s extreme sports videos, Red Bull also live-streamed events such as Lollapalooza. Those who couldn’t get to the music festival were able to watch it live on Red Bull TV, which was another great marketing scheme from this awesome company.
3. They Put Their Customers First. One of the major ways Red Bull wins in content marketing is that they always put their customers first. This is a great way to interact with their client base and make people feel welcome. While their customers might not necessarily participate in extreme sports or the other events Red Bull sponsors, their client base still enjoys watching them. The company states that the product is completely secondary. What comes first is what the customer wants and how the company can deliver and meet those wants and needs.
4. Red Bull Uses Multiple Formats for Content. Red Bull understands the need for multiple content formats because they understand people consume it differently. Because of this, the company not only uses their awesome digital marketing skills, but they also utilize a magazine, social media, images, and blogs (depending on the campaign). This is a great way to reach out to their audience in enough ways to keep reaching a significantly wider audience. You can find more about their overarching content at their awesome website, Red Bull Media House.
5. They Make Marketing More Than Just a Department. Their media house states they are not the only ones responsible for coming up with these stellar content ideas. Red Bull believes that they can get some of the best, most effective campaigns by involving their entire company. This is a great way to make sure they are not only engaging their customers, but their employees as well. Happy, engaged employees can mean major success for any business! Consider asking your employees to help come up with some awesome marketing campaign ideas or things they’d like to see from your company. Your employees are housing a wealth of information and if you neglect it, you can miss out on some pretty epic inspiration!
6. Red Bull Has a Strong Slogan. As I mentioned earlier, the incredibly memorable slogan did bring about a lawsuit (people sure can get lawsuit happy, can’t they?). Regardless, you cannot deny that Red Bull has created one of the best slogans. Why is it one of the best? Because whether you consume Red Bull or not, you know the slogan already. How many of us have it memorized? Let’s see; recite the slogan with me now! “Red Bull gives you wings!” This is a great example of creating a memorable slogan that helps people remember your company quickly and easily!
7. Let’s Not Forget Those Awesome TV Spots. Along with their memorable slogan, something no one can forget about is Red Bull’s amazing TV spots. They’ve been around for quite some time, and we all know what they look like. Those odd little cartoons with silly, overdramatized voices in hilarious situations are something that have made and are currently making a huge impact. Check out a few of their 2014 TV spots!
GoPro and Their Epic Marketing Strategy: Looking at 7 Memorable Features
GoPro hasn’t quite gone to the extreme of the Stratos jump, but their product may have recorded even more extreme activity.
This company is another great pillar in the content marketing world. Their strategy is quite similar to Red Bull’s by focusing on a lot of extreme sports and awesome adventures. However, they do aim to reach out to everyone, trying to include those who don’t participate in racing trucks through and over snowdrifts. In short, pretty much anyone can pick up a GoPro and record what they’re doing!
If you’re interested in extreme sports and hilarious things animals do, then GoPro’s video campaigns are perfect. Let’s take a look at their content campaigns and how the company is so successful with them.
1. Capturing Epic Moments from Fans for Fans. There are many fans of GoPro whether they are cattle farmers in Missouri who want to check up on their cows in the back of their 50-acre land or are athletes catching hair-raising stunts. GoPro likes to feature videos and content from their fans on their YouTube account, which is a great way to ensure that their clients get content that interests them. While they might not feature every video that is submitted, it still gives a great chance for their fans to provide content for other fans. Such a cool way to promote engagement while getting content you know clients want to see!
2. Teaming Up with Another Powerful Team – Red Bull. One thing GoPro knows is that a successful partnership can make for an even more successful product. Just how did Red Bull capture some of their more amazing stunts? How did GoPro get the funding to sponsor well-known athletes? The two companies joined teams and have created some incredible content together. If you’re unsure about partnerships working in your favor, just take a look at GoPro and Red Bull’s successful pairing! Remember, you can always team up with someone who can benefit from your company such as Red Bull benefiting from GoPro. This works amazingly for both companies!
3. GoPro Utilizes an Epic YouTube Strategy for Their Brand. GoPro also has an incredible YouTube strategy that any company, large or small, needs to take into consideration. Many businesses might spend a significant sum of money for getting some awesome, professional quality videos, but they forget something very important – YouTube is a social media channel! What do you need to do on a social media channel? Well, you need to be social, obviously. GoPro makes sure to engage with their fans on their YouTube channel by responding to comments. While this seems rather small, it is really a huge step that helps promote the company further and bring in even more engagement on their videos.
4. They Promote Engagement by Providing Content their Clients Want. Another way that GoPro promotes engagement is by giving their clients what they want to see. Most of their client base probably wouldn’t be too interested in seeing a cattle farm from a GoPro camera. However, they are interested in seeing epic content such as extreme sports and cool moments from firefighters and other professionals. They provide this to their client base and get a high amount of engagement, which helps promote the brand further. This is important to all content marketing schemes because you need to make sure your audience gets what interests them.
5. They Focus On Telling Stories in Their Content. As I’ve stated a number of times, storytelling is a great way to connect with your audience and drive engagement. This is exactly what GoPro does, and it has proven to be amazing for the company. They provide stories through video or they will share a video and later share the story surrounding it. This helps to make the content relatable to the audience, and bring about more social shares, engagement, and interest. This is actually a great way to become viral since people simply love stories. We all love stories because they give us the chance to relate and feel something whether warm fuzzy feelings or awe.
6. GoPro Doesn’t Just Promote Extreme Sports, but Regular Life. It seems like GoPro could lose a big chunk of their audience if they only focused on extreme sports. The company seems agree with that thought because they not only share extreme sports videos, but they also share videos of regular life or things that aren’t necessarily someone skydiving. They have videos ranging from a firefighter administering oxygen to a cat to a dad videoing his baby slowly falling asleep, according to NYdailynews.com. They want to sell their product to people who live regular lives and don’t frequently do death-defying stunts. This has provided a plethora of videos of silly things and a few sad videos like what a dog does when its owner leaves.
7. They Know Which Social Channel is Perfect for Them. When it comes to social media, we all want to use as many channels as possible to have the best reach. However, this doesn’t work with every company and you need to know which platform will work for you. This is exactly what GoPro does. While they have Facebook and Twitter, the company knows that there is one particular platform that is absolutely perfect for them – YouTube. They make sure to market their YouTube channel frequently, which is helping them build more and more subscribers. This is a great example of finding the channel that will work for you. It might not be as obvious for your company as it is for a camera company, but you can find out through analytics and seeing where you get the most engagement.
Ready? Set, Get Your Extreme On
You don’t have to go the way of Red Bull and GoPro, but now is the time to get to some extreme content marketing and copywriting. You can easily modify the inspiration taken from these two companies and morph them into something that will make your business highly successful! What are some things you’ve learned from this blog?
I hope you are able to take away the importance of storytelling, social media, and client engagement along with many other ideas from these particularly epic companies.
Let me know some of YOUR favorites in the comments!
All you have to do is head to your local grocery store to notice Thanksgiving is almost here. There are turkeys everywhere and all of the essentials for a Thanksgiving Day meal. There is nothing quite like walking into a store and smelling pumpkin or pecan pie baking in the bakery, and my stomach grumbles at the thought of delicious food that my family plans to make. I’m sure you’re in the same boat!
It is a great day to give thanks, spend time with family, and also offers a unique marketing chance for all companies (if done correctly). I am going to take a look at the history of Thanksgiving, what it has morphed into in the modern age, and the some brands who have incredible marketing strategies! Don’t worry; I’ll also give you some great tips for your Thanksgiving content and marketing.
The Story of Thanksgiving: A Brief History
It’s hard to miss the basis of Thanksgiving Day history when you head to your kid’s school or the local library. You see tons of adorable little pilgrims and Native Americans in their paper gear, giggling and showing off their cornucopia drawings. What is the full history, however?
In 1621, the Pilgrims celebrated a day of thanksgiving to show thanks for the crops and harvest they had. They were taught how to grow crops on the land by the now infamous Squanto who helped them not only with crops, but also by being a translator between the pilgrims and his tribe. His tribe leader even donated food to the pilgrims for their festival. Historians believe it lasted three days as many harvest festivals in the 1600s did. Three days? Can you imagine three days of turkey, stuffing, and pecan pie? That would be a great tradition to re-kindle, don’t you agree?
After the initial day of thanksgiving, there were a few more celebrations in later years, but it was never officially recognized as a civic holiday until the 1800s. In 1863, Abraham Lincoln declared that there needed to be a national day of thanksgiving and remembrance, and thus Thanksgiving Day was born. To make things easier on everyone (much to future generations approval) the celebration is the fourth Thursday in November.
While we still celebrate Thanksgiving Day on the fourth Thursday of November, the day has seen a lot of changes. Some of our traditional foods aren’t entirely traditional to the feast the pilgrims had, but it is still fun to celebrate this long lasting holiday here in the States. Let’s take a look at the modern times Thanksgiving!
Current Day Celebrations: My, My, How Time Changes
There have been many changes to the holiday, namely that of football and the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. People gather around the TV to watch these festivities, which is a far cry from what the holiday used to be – family sitting around a table together. People still do this, and many families have rules that the TV must go off at a certain time in order to be together and talk. However, television plays a major part in many Americans’ Thanksgiving celebrations.
The hallmark aspect of Thanksgiving is obviously giving thanks for what we have. It started out as a religious holiday where people gave thanks to God for all that he provided. However, it has steadily changed from being religious to something where families discuss what they are thankful for, without attending religious services. Some local churches may have events, but nowadays the most important aspect of Thanksgiving is spending time with family. Many times this incorporates a lot of traveling whether driving or flying to meet with extended family.
There are many amazing traditions that we now have in the modern era of Thanksgiving, and many hope to never see these go away. These are:
Eating turkey baked in the oven with sides of mashed potatoes and gravy, green beans in different forms, pie (lots of pie), and stuffing. The meal changes from family to family and depends on the location. The South has seen more people deep-frying turkeys and many on the East Coast seem to prefer cranberries with their meals.
Turkey Day football! What makes the American Thanksgiving uniquely American is the fact that we can watch our favorite sport – football.
We love parades, and there is never a shortage of those leading up to and on Thanksgiving with the most famous being Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.
Donating to charity and feeding the homeless on Thanksgiving Day. This is something many families will join together to do on Thanksgiving and celebrate the day together at a later time. People hand out Thanksgiving meals to those in need, providing amazing charity.
And of course, the day after Thanksgiving – Black Friday. The name doesn’t harken to the Grim Reaper, but to where businesses’ budgets will be after shopping is finished.
Now that you know the history and how it morphed into our modern day celebration, I am going to look at a few brands that have marketed for Thanksgiving in perfect ways.
The Top 6 Brands Who Do Excellent Thanksgiving Content
1. The NFL. No one can out-do the NFL when it comes to Thanksgiving Day marketing. They know that this holiday is a big day for them and they make sure to put their best forward. The NFL makes sure to use every channel of social media they can push their Thanksgiving Day games and provides schedules as soon as possible for viewers to plan out their day.
In 2013, the NFL knew that if they were going to reach an audience quickly, they needed to be on Instagram. In fact, the social media site announced that it had some of the highest traffic on Thanksgiving, which makes sense as everyone wants to show off their meals. The NFL published a schedule on their Instagram account, making it accessible to their followers. Such a neat idea! This is a great example of knowing where your client base will be on social media and how to market directly to them.
2. Oreo Has a Great Idea for Leftovers. Another genius ad campaign that is still relevant was Oreo’s suggestion with what to do with Thanksgiving Day leftovers. It created the Leftover Dessert Taco, which included bits from your favorite desserts from the day and the Oreo filling. All you have to do is simply take out the filling, add your desserts and fold – there you go, your own Dessert Taco! This provided a great DIY lesson while also promoting the brand without making people feel that they were being forced into buying Oreos.
3. Starbucks to the Rescue! The holidays are always a fun, yet exhausting time, which makes Starbucks a prime candidate for coffee lovers everywhere. The chain knows this and makes sure to market as much as possible. While not a Thanksgiving trend, the chain released their red cups early, which, of course, brought in several coffee lovers who love those red cups! They also provide people with the ability to buy a Thanksgiving Blend coffee that is perfect to drink why giving thanks and celebrating. No matter the season or holiday, Starbucks does its best to meet the needs of their clients and bring in some pretty snazzy revenue!
4. Of Course, There’s Always Betty Crocker. Thanksgiving is a holiday that Betty Crocker never takes from granted, providing people with recipes that are perfect for the day. They have an entire section of their website dedicated to Thanksgiving and various recipes people can use. They make sure that you know you can use Betty Crocker products, but still make it easy for everyone. Betty Crocker also makes sure to take social media by storm, and utilize the one channel that people readily scour for last minute recipe ideas – Pinterest. They have a whole Pinterest board dedicated to Thanksgiving, giving people a great selection of recipes to choose from when using their smartphones. Quite the smart idea, don’t you agree?
5. We All Know About Macy’s and the Parade. Everyone loves the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and many people tune in, in the morning while starting to bake and cook. There are many people who countdown to this event, which means Macy’s can really benefit from it! In fact, they have an amazing interactive website helping people know what to expect, the route and the lineup.
This is great for people who plan on attending, but also great for those at home who want to plan their day around it. While it might not seem like a genius marketing move, many people look on the name of Macy’s with a sense of happiness, making many people willing to purchase items from the store. When you see a Macy’s store, you might think of Thanksgiving and Christmas, simply because of their genius campaigns over the years.
6. TJX Corporation is Closing Their Doors on Thanksgiving. In recent years, more and more stores are opening earlier and earlier for Black Friday. However, this has sparked a lot of controversy as many don’t believe companies should be open and have sales on holidays.
While closing on Thanksgiving isn’t some grand Turkey Day marketing campaign with emails, newsletters, and decorations, it is a great move for the TJX Corporation and is a smart bit of marketing. In fact, many people are saying they plan on shopping at TJ Maxx and Marshalls more, especially before Thanksgiving, and on Black Friday. This will undoubtedly bring in a lot more revenue for the company.
What can you learn from this for your Thanksgiving marketing? Always encourage your customers to spend time with their family. Avoiding doing sales pitches on Thanksgiving Day, and save it for the days and weeks before or the day after. This shows you care about your customers and employees, which is a great way to promote your company in the minds of customers!
How Can You Get Stellar Thanksgiving Content?
While these are major brands, it is possible to get some stellar Thanksgiving content for your campaign. You don’t need to wait until next year to start some of these ideas, either! They go hand-in-hand with the Christmas holidays as well. A few ideas to take into consideration are:
1. Encourage People to Give. One thing that sets the holiday season apart, especially Thanksgiving, is how much people are willing to give and volunteer. Consider finding a few non-profits to sponsor for Thanksgiving and encourage your client base to donate time or money. At first, this may seem like something that could lose you money, but many people view businesses that help non-profits or charities in a very positive light, impacting your revenue in big and amazing ways. When you encourage people to give, offer it in an easy way for them to access the website to give donations. If you are a storefront business, ask people when they check out if they’d like to donate and consider having a jar nearby to place the money in.
2. Give Out Thanksgiving Day Relevant Content. When you create content around Thanksgiving, make sure you make a few pieces more Thanksgiving oriented. You can say what your company is thankful for, have designs of turkeys and other traditional Thanksgiving décor, and highlight various charities. You can find numerous ways to make content that is relevant to the holiday while also helping to promote your business. You might even find more people that are willing to shop with you if you have some sort of tie-in with the holiday. Relevancy is everything in content, and what is more relevant on Thanksgiving than pie and turkey?
3. Participate in a “30 Days of Thankfulness” On Social Media. A recent trend over the past few years has been social media users updating and tweeting #30DaysofThankfulness. They list one thing each day that they are thankful for until the end of November. It isn’t always something mind-blowing, but it gives people a way to be positive in the holiday season. Consider doing something similar with your business. Update your social media sites with what you are thankful for, and urge your followers and clients to reply with what they are thankful for, as well. A great thing to do is feature a few of these by re-tweeting them or sharing them on Facebook for others to see. This will help encourage more engagement from your client base, and get everyone in a positive mood, which is something we all need right now.
Take a note from some of these great brands for your Thanksgiving Content Marketing and make something memorable and fun for all! Create your own ideas or follow the above suggestions to create a campaign and be prepared to grow and tweak it throughout the coming years. You’ll be quite happy with the results when you celebrate holidays with your client base!
From all of us here at Express Writers, we would like to wish you and yours a very happy Thanksgiving!
Have you made a great content campaign, but struggle with making it successful? One of the main reasons a great content marketing setup isn’t working is simply that you might not be directly marketing for your customer’s intent and needs. You need to change this up, and tweak your campaign, but how? You can understand what your client wants by simply researching and getting to know them. I am going to walk with you to help you figure out just how to achieve this and make that incredible campaign a successful one!
How Can You Get To Know Your Customers?
Getting to know your customers isn’t as daunting as it sounds. You’ll find that it can actually be quite easy if you take a few simple steps and apply them to your content campaign. Here are a few excellent ways I’ve found that you can get to know your client base:
1. Send Out Email Surveys For Clients To Complete. According to an infographic from QuickSprout, a great way to get to know your client base is to ask them questions. You can always do this via social media or blogs, but you might not get the response you want or need. Instead, you should consider doing email campaigns with a complete survey. Allow your clients to answer both multiple choice and opinion questions. This will help you get several participants, as some people might prefer multiple-choice answers, and others might want to make sure their voices are heard through comment boxes. A few questions you can ask are:
Do they like what your company has to offer?
What do they want to see from your company?
Why do they want these changes?
Is there anything that makes them unhappy? What about happy?
Find out if there is anything they’d suggest to make your content more effective.
Ask them their favorite websites (outside of social media) to gather information from.These websites can help you tailor your content to suit your audience, especially if multiple people in your client base visit similar pages.
2. Be Part Of The Buying Process As Soon As Possible. There are several times where you might feel that things could’ve gone a lot smoother for you and the customer if they had only brought you in sooner. This is something several businesses miss the mark on, but by becoming involved in the buying process as soon as possible, you are able to learn more about your customers. This can help you see any problem areas in the buying process, and how you can make things easier for future clients. A few ways to do this are to always allow your clients the ability to contact you throughout the buying process or have them talk to a sales associate for larger products or services. This will help both of you out while also helping you learn about your customer base.
3. Pretend You Are The Customer. This is vital because it can show you areas in your business that need to be improved. When you are starting to gather information about your customers, you should take the opportunity to stand in their shoes and pretend you are interested in your product. Ask yourself the questions a customer would ask and look to see if you have the answers readily available. If you are having a difficult time with this, head over to a site you’d be interested in buying something from and think about what questions you want to ask that company. You can see from their layout whether or not they’ll have the answers, showing you any holes in your own content marketing or what you are actually doing right. Just be willing to notice when you’re doing something wrong. This is one of the best ways to learn, even if it does hurt your pride a bit.
A great strategy big businesses take is creating a buyer or client persona. A buyer or client persona is a fictional “character” that you create to help you figure out what your customers want, and tweak your content for them. While this isn’t always exact, it can help direct you in the way you should go with your company. It can help you better craft surveys, getting the best information possible, and it can help you create new marketing campaigns that you can tweak as you learn more about your live client base.
How Can You Market For Your Customer’s Intent And Needs?
Now that you know a few ways to gather information about your clients, just how can you market to them with this information? I am going to look at a few great ways to incorporate your knowledge to better market for your customer’s intent and needs.
4. Publically Answer Frequently Asked Questions. Don’t just leave this up to your FAQ page, but actively answer them. First of all, this can offer excellent blog content. Secondly, you have the opportunity to give clients a more in-depth answer to certain questions. This might not be the case with all of your FAQs, but you might find that the more you answer frequently asked questions, the more likely you are to receive other questions from your clients. You can even consider hosting a blog series of “ask us anything” where you answer questions sent in by clients. This is not only a great way to answer questions people have, but also might help with improving blog engagement. This also offers you the ability to teach your clients through your blog, which is something that is vital for engagement and keeping a strong client base.
5. Use Your Social Media Accounts To Answer Questions. Another great way to market to your customer’s needs is to utilize social media. It offers you a great opportunity to answer questions, but it also helps you learn more about your clients through how they interact with you and what they feel is more important. While surveys can give you concrete data, you can also use intuition, basing things off of how a client reacts to a post. You might find this handy to help create a better social media campaign, tweaking things to meet what your clients want and need.
However, don’t fall victim to having a lot of traffic, and not engaging with your clients. One company I came across had incredible client traffic on their Facebook. It was amazing! However, the company wasn’t taking the opportunity to answer questions and engage with clients who were more than willing to engage with the company. The company did a great job at publishing and promoting content that clients liked, but failed at actually engaging with their clients.
6. Make Your Client Feel Important; Get To Know Them. You can make clients feel important whether you respond to them on social media, send emails to them, or respond to blog comments. You can also make them feel important if you take the time to get to know them. Many might feel that you are far too busy to talk with them, yet if you make an effort, they will greatly appreciate it. This is a great way to make sure you get an incredible client base, as well as maintain it. If you have a strong client base, you might find that they are willing to tell their coworkers, friends, and family about your business.
7. Never Be Afraid To Try Out New Things. According to the article I used earlier from Ideally Marketing, you should also never be afraid to experiment with your content marketing. Sometimes, you might find it difficult to get adequate answers, which means you should experiment with a few things to see what works. Oftentimes, companies are afraid to do this because they prefer staying in a comfortable setting, but it can be greatly beneficial. You never know when you are going to find that one magical idea that is really going to make your business hit that successful boom.
When you experiment, you can always tell your client base that you are trying something new. Take this as another great opportunity to survey your clients and find out how they feel about your new methods. This will help you find out if it will be successful, and can also help you figure out a few small tweaks to make it perfect.
In Closing, Be Thorough, But Always Ethical in Your Content Marketing
As you start to research your client base more, you will be able to tweak and tailor all of your content perfectly for them. One thing to be careful of is that you handle all of your research in an ethical manner through surveys, data collection from your own site, and other ethical ways. You’ll be quite happy to see just how well your content marketing campaigns do the more you learn about and work with your client base!
