Marketing is King, Content is Queen
Words are the foot soldiers that go to battle for your business. In this article, we explore why carefully chosen words remain the most powerful tool in your marketing arsenal.
By Hubert Kang
“Many companies have forgotten they sell to actual people. Humans care about the entire experience, not just the marketing or sales or service. To really win in the modern age, you must solve for humans.”
— Dharmesh Shah
I've marketed a lot of things in my career: Mattresses, Cookies, Frozen Dinners (but not frozen cookies), Software (yes, Hardware too), Educational Services, Weather data, Gyms, Professional Services. The list goes on.
What strikes me though, is that at the end of the day, sales and revenue wins for small businesses usually come down to solid messaging composed of simple words. Like tiny atomic particles in a grand scientific discovery, words are the base units, the building blocks from which colossal marketing structures are built. Words that are:
- Carefully chosen.
- Meticulously arranged.
- Edited, deleted, and formatted.
- Hand-picked for matching mediums.
- Spoken, played, aired, or read in just the right way.
In small business marketing, words are the foot soldiers that go to battle for your business — online, offline, on the air, really wherever you set them free. Words are powerful. Smaller units of a bigger campaign, but difference makers nonetheless.
For companies needing to create authority in the marketplace it takes on an even greater challenge. And in this microwaved, Instant Pot, attention-starved world of social media, it presents real challenges.
Patrick Winston, a former professor at MIT, had this to say about the three things that determine success. He listed them:
- Your ability to speak.
- Your ability to write.
- The quality of your ideas.
In that order.
Are you taking adequate time to really think about the words and campaigns designed to make the cash register ring? The words you post on digital screens, the narrative and story you speak to customers, the conversations you have with prospective customers.
3 Takeaways
Don't just describe what you do, tell them why you matter. In our consultations we discuss how there will never be anyone better equipped to tell your story with positive effect than you. Reach. Dig deep. Promote your business in a personal way and customers will lean in, listen, and vote with their wallets.
Accept that it isn't easy. Sometimes you'll write things that make you wince and recoil, wondering how it'll land. Those are the spots you want to find. It's like the muscle knot a massage therapist finds preceded by a loud scream. On the other side of that lies a message that may well resonate.
Leverage the lab and the world around you. We see 4,000 messages a day as consumers, what resonates with you?
1 Action
Your best customers are right around you. Would you buy what you're selling? If not, why not? Bring your best marketing messages to those closest to you. Ask for real feedback. Are you hitting the mark or missing it by just a bit?