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Even though the line between content and marketing content (or content marketing) is pretty blurry, there are some key differences coaches should be aware of.

Content is designed to be consumed by the audience. We see this in blog articles, YouTube videos, and podcasts. It’s entertaining or educational, and there’s nothing wrong with it. But, not all content is marketing content.

Marketing content is different because it’s designed to get the audience to take the next step with you.

Content alone is meant for consuming. Marketing Content is meant for converting.

On the last post, we talked about how to arrest your audience’s attention— the first key to making marketing content that actually converts.

Right now we’ll take a look at the second key principle of creating marketing content that gets prospects eager to take your next step with you.

Engineer Engagement

Once you have your audience’s attention, you need to engineer engagement.

Specifically, you need to design the content in a way that makes people want to watch it all the way through to the end.

Just up the road from me, there’s a gelato shop where I used to get hazelnut affogatos.

(That sounds delicious right now, by the way.)

Behind the counter, there was a TV always showing music videos. Most of the videos were modern, but every now and then, they’d have a video flashback to a song from the 60s or 70s.

The difference between those old videos and our modern videos is incredible!

I remember seeing a video of The Beatles that was about as basic as it gets. There was one fixed camera pointed at four guys singing and playing. They might as well have been standing there talking.

Even though it was The Beatles, the video wasn’t very captivating by today’s standards.

The next video they showed was a modern pop artist I didn’t recognize — maybe because the scene changed every second and I couldn’t tell the difference between the actors and the artist. It’s like they decided to cater to our modern ADD mindset.

The same thing happened it the next video. There was so much happening that my attention reset every few seconds.

The whole idea is to increase the viewer’s engagement and get them to follow the story of the video all the way through to the end.

We want to borrow from this music video concept a bit and get people to stick with you through the end of your marketing content. There are three ways we’ll make this happen.

1. Reset People’s Attention

First, we need to facilitate a change of state by changing the image, asking a question, or telling a story.

The reason my webinar slides look a certain way is because it resets the viewer’s attention every time I change slides.

Every seven minutes in my workshops, I try to have a state change. I’ll teach something for a few minutes, then have everyone do a quick group discussion, write something down, and call out an answer.

Why?

Because it resets the audience’s attention every time they come back.

On many of my blog videos, I add a logo animation every 30 seconds or so. The logo swings in with a sound effect every time I transition to a new point. Sometimes, this is to help edit the video together, but it also serves to reset attention.

2. Give Utility

People will stay with you if your marketing content has utility for them.

In other words, for people to engage with you and your content, it has to be useful, actionable, and solve real people’s real problems.

The more utility you can bake into your content — the more actionable it is — the better. Even if it’s not razzle-dazzle exciting, if it’s useful and scratches an itch they have right now, they’ll read/listen/watch it all the way through.

3. Go Native

Finally, find the most natural way to deliver your stuff and stick with it.

If you like to present, use video. If you like to talk, use a podcast. If you like to write, use articles.

Maybe you don’t even create the content from scratch, but instead, you find something useful and share it with your audience.

If you find that creating the type of marketing content you need to isn’t really your bag, then have someone else do it for you.

We’ve got a great project right now where we take training content and convert it into marketing content to use six months to a year in the future. From one piece of training, we’ll get three-minute videos, short blog posts, social media posts, and quote graphics without me ever touching it because it’s not my natural strength.

Going native also means putting your personality into your marketing content. If you’re care-free, happy-go-lucky, and fun, be that way towards to your audience. If you’re serious, be serious.

To get people to take the next step with you from your marketing content, you have to engineer engagement. People will stay with you all the way through your content if you reset their attention, make it as useful as you can, and be yourself.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this. Leave a comment below.

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