Thursday, August 28, 2014

Why Brand Personality is the Best Thing To Improve Your Content Marketing

As I mentioned in my previous articles, the great content is always your key to better engagement, and in turn, more conversions. What's the key to great content? Make what you produce more personal.


To begin with, I would like to start the article by small introduction about content and say content is the driver of many brand experiences - and even if you sell a product, often your marketing and thought leadership content is the filler that keeps the relationship strong and healthy. 

Great Content means build Great Engagement! But it also defines a brand or author and helps people stay focused on the core message or value. Be it games or whitepapers or tweets or micro-sites, content is both integral and inextricable to the relationship. I'm also convinced that it needs to be more personal.

I believe everybody here knows that content marketing works and has a good impact. If it didn’t then the whole idea of using the internet for marketing purposes would be in dispute! Do you know why?

Well, the internet is an information machine full of content! videos, ebooks, whitepapers, press releases, Facebook, forums, blog posts, podcast, tweets, articles, etc. It’s all content isn’t it? 

However, the problem lies with whether or not the content marketing strategy you use will fit in with your personality or not. I would therefore say the automation of personality can have a big impact on content marketing success. As in any brand personality, the characteristics must be authentic and sustainable. Unlike "human interactions" where we use lots of clues - behavior, physical characteristics, attitudes, beliefs, and demographics - to form opinions and likability, a brand personality is built through every direct or indirect interaction with the brand. Introducing appropriate emotion into your message is another recipe for personality. Personality comes out naturally when you tell a story. Everything has a story behind it. The trick is in the telling. So content is a common interaction - usually indirect but often direct, too. 

Marketers have long given brands a "personality." The brand personality enables a consumer to express his or her own self - or ideal self - by participating with the brand. It is not your logo it is not your photo, it is your voice, design and reputation combined into one impression. Unlike product attributes, which tend to serve a utilitarian function for consumers, brand personalities tend to serve a symbolic or self-expressive function. 

If you’re not building any impact, you aren’t encouraging repeat business, and you aren’t creating curious new customers, meaning they won’t be there to convert later on. The key to brand impact, both online and offline is a content marketing strategy that focuses on shareable, valuable content. Having a large group of followers is meaningless if those people are not engaged. So the challenge is to how to allow the "real people" behind the brand to build a personal and enduring relationship that supports and doesn't usurp or dilute the brand.

As you create your content, consider how it impacts your brand and how people perceive you. Always keep an eye on the bigger picture. Personality is one thing—over-sharing is quite another.

The social nature of our digital lifestyles has led to a new level of "sharing" of personal information. While I don't think sharing private information in a business context is appropriate, sharing some level of personal information makes perfect sense. Yet, talking about the kids or your dog or morning commute via a brand account can extend the level of the brand relationship.

No one pretends that the brand is an actual human being, but it does have characteristics and a voice that speak through social channels. We all know and value that there are people behind that Twitter or Google + account and that those people have lives and interests and experiences. Exposing some of that personal information as part of the content strategy is certainly appropriate and builds on the perception of the brand level persona.

For example, you're sure to have amazing moments at your company that are awesome to share - like a promotion for someone on the team, or the launch of a new product feature, or the project that you implemented. Your reaction to those events is personal - but not private information - and thus makes the brand more real and connected to the humans that customers want to have a relationship with.

Relationships with your clients and prospects are what bring the buying life cycle to a natural close, resulting in a sale. Establishing a personality within your communications will help you develop that relationship and grow your business.

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