Rule 3: Choose a Variety of Sources for Your Content
Now that you have a good foundation of a plan, the next sections uncover the tactics for finding and creating great content. I encourage you to take a manila folder and label it “content ideas.” Keep this folder on your desk, and when you come across a great idea for content, put it in the folder. It’s a lot easier to write great content when you have a folder full of ideas to turn to.
Figure 7.4 Blue Penguin Development has a unique personality.
The following are some ideas we’ve seen our most successful customers use at Constant Contact. Some of them are easy to find or create yourself. Others are more challenging. All of them have been tested and proven successful by businesses of all types.
BE AN EXPERT
If you own a business, you’re an expert. At least, that’s what your customers believe. Even if you don’t think of yourself as a leading authority, you certainly know more about your business than your customers do. Use your newsletter as a platform to solidify your expert status by providing credible advice and information.
Share your knowledge with your customers. The easiest topics to write about are the ones that you know well. Because you live and breathe your business, you have insights and information that your customers don’t. Build your credibility by providing advice on timely issues that can help them in their daily lives. For example, a company that sells motorcycles might give its readers advice about riding in the wintertime, while a tax accountant may include tips for preparing taxes in January.
Justify purchase decisions for your customers. Your customers don’t have time to keep up with all the reasons to buy what you are selling. When you know about products and services that could be a great fit for them, tell them why. Write an expert article about the benefits of the services or products you have available. For example, a web designer who also offers search engine optimization (SEO) could write about how web site activity and online sales increase when SEO is implemented.
So how do you get great content ideas from your customers? Remember the old adage that if one person asks you an interesting question, then odds are ten other people are wondering the same thing. So when someone asks you an interesting question, write it down and put it in your folder. Simply answering customer questions can make for a really engaging newsletter.
If you are going to use this approach, you might also want to consider involving your customers even more in the process. By creating a “Stump Me” section of your newsletter, you can ask your readers to submit questions for you to answer. You can reward the question of the month with something special along with recognition in your newsletter on whose question you picked.
Michael Bartus of Home Twin Cities (www.hometwincities.com) does a great job of engaging his readers by including a simple one-question survey within his email campaigns. The question not only captures your attention by asking you some trivia regarding the area that Michael covers with his real estate business, but he also offers a prize for the first person to get the right answer. In addition to engaging his audience, this approach also helps build Michael’s reputation as a local knowledge expert, which is one of the keys for success as a real estate agent.
Figure 7.5 Home Twin Cities uses questions to gain reader participation.
RELY ON YOUR CUSTOMERS’ EXPERTISE
Another option is to make your customers the experts. Sometimes they have a simplified perspective, and they often value things about your products and services that you aren’t aware of.
Let your customers give advice. Instead of giving subscribers your tips, ask a few of your best customers what advice they would give other customers. For example, a gardening center might send an email newsletter with customer tips and ideas for creating indoor gardens. The gardening newsletter could include related offers for plants mentioned in the newsletter.
Be an expert interviewer. Interview your customers about their experience or expertise and share the interviews with your audience. For example, a travel agent might interview a customer who recently took a trip to one of its featured destinations. In this case, including a few photos from the customer’s trip would be a great addition.
Jodie Turner of Lucky Duck Web Design (www.luckyduckwebdesign.com) uses her email newsletter to showcase her most recent customers and their stories (see Figure 7.6). By enlisting her customers’ input into her communications, she allows them to sing her praises while benefiting her customers by driving traffic to their websites. Traffic to her clients’ web sites works out great for Jodie as well, since visitors see Jodie’s creations in action.
TELL A STORY
There’s nothing more powerful than an authentic customer testimonial. While collecting and sharing quotes from customers who have great experiences with your business is always a good idea, try including the following types of testimonial content in your emails for a fresh change.
• “Felt and Feels” articles. When writing an article about a customer experience, use the “Felt and Feels” approach. For example, an online jewelry retailer could offer a new engagement ring in the context of a story about a customer who Felt nervous about buying a discounted engagement ring online and now Feels that he made the right decision because of the quality, the buying experience, and the positive response from his new fiancée.
• In their own words. Ask some of your most satisfied customers if they would write a brief story (a few paragraphs) about an experience they had with you or one of your employees. For example, a hardware store customer might write about a home 
project that went awry and the difference the advice of an in-store expert made.
Figure 7.6 Lucky’s news and views features customer testimonials.
• Writing customer case studies. Customer case studies are stories that demonstrate a challenge, a solution, and a result. They are fun for your customers to read and can help you to further convince readers of your expertise or their need of what you offer. Start with the challenge your customer was facing (she needed to lose weight for a wedding), then the solution (a friend referred her to a weight loss program), and end with the results (she lost 30 pounds in six months and had fun doing it).
Flexperience (www.flexperienceconsulting.com) is a unique consulting agency. By connecting seasoned industry experts who are interested in part-time or flexible work schedules with companies looking for additional bench strength, it is able to create a win-win situation for its consultants and clients. By highlighting one of its consultants’ stories in each of its communications, it is able to keep its content fresh and engaging while continually demonstrating the depth and talent available within its organization (see Figure 7.7).
USING OTHER PEOPLE’S CONTENT
Another great source for content is referencing content written by others. Whether you are a landscaping company or a financial analyst, you come across information in your area of expertise that your average customer would never uncover. Accordingly, when you find an article that does a particularly good job of explaining something of interest to your audience, merely sharing this content can reinforce your value to the recipient. I would like to point out that it is NOT OK to simply lift someone else’s content as your own. If you are going to quote or reference someone else’s work, it is important to get permission and give the source proper attribution. If you come across a great article like that, print it out and put it into your manila folder. Be sure to note the source and author’s contact information so that you can track him or her down for permission to use the work.
LOCAL CONNECTIONS
Figure 7.7 Flexperience uses personal stories to reinforce its value proposition.
Another way to come up with engaging content is to connect with another business owner in a related industry and to write content together. For example, a restaurateur and a wine store owner could team together and create a monthly communication that pairs interesting wines with great recipes. As an added touch, you could feature those wines and recipes for that month at your respective businesses, and as Emeril would say “Bam!” You have some great content that has the added benefit of driving traffic to your business. Other connections that could be made:
1. A book store and a financial adviser where the financial adviser creates fun games for kids to understand saving and investing. The book store can then host quarterly coffee hours with the adviser where kids are invited to act out these games while the parents grab a cup of coffee and wander around the book store.
2. A nonprofit that collects coats for kids can connect with a retail store; for each coat collected, the person making the donation receives mention in the retail store’s Keep Someone Warm email newsletter.
3. A Chamber of Commerce can leverage its members for Advice from Our Local Members section of its communications and solicit business owners for their suggestions. This is a great way to deliver value back to your members, engage the local business community by making connections, and focus local businesses on buying products and services from each other.
Writing content may seem difficult on the surface, but every day you experience things that would make great content for your readers. It’s often hard to remember these ideas when you sit down to write, so try to add a topic or two per week to your content folder and you will always have a great supply at hand.
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