 Thank you Vivian for your friendly introduction and thank you people in your room for being with us today in Ritzkenbrotterdam and Being here with me in the room because there is choice. There's hallway track. There is another wonderful talk, but you chose to be with me just housekeeping Little thingy the slides are going to be online. So please feel free to take pictures, but You'll have access to that as well. Okay? So before we dive into the matter, let's get to know you a little bit better first. Who of you owns the surface-based business? Thank you, and who of you is in charge of marketing for one? Awesome. Who of you has ever suffered from writer's block when creating content for their website? You remember that feeling when you're staring at your screen and that cursor is blinking at you like it's laughing and Then when you're driving that car Those ideas I gotta for not forget about that and then when you have the time to take notes Nothing stinks, right? All of you in favor of never experiencing that again. So these are three my three goals for you for today Discover some commonly made mistakes when creating content Get to know or review some commonly used concepts and strategies to make sure that we're all sort of on the same page and Consider ways to take this a level up so that you're creating content that resonates with your clients and your audience and So that it becomes much more fun and easy But first who am I to tell you about that? Well, I'm in charge of marketing for level level a full-service WordPress office right here in Rotterdam I started a few months ago and before that I've been a freelance digital marketer for over 15 years I've been using WordPress since 2007 and I love love Love this community for how encouraging it is and for how it brings people together from all over the world But we're not here to talk about me. We're here to talk about content So let's discuss some commonly made mistakes Number one not planning content at all Have you ever heard of the concept if you're failing to plan you're basically setting yourself up for failure? The thing is There will always be something more urgent There will always be something in the daily operations of your business that will distract you and when you're already Staring at that white screen and nothing is coming even as hard as a shake There's an additional reason to just run off and do that other thing and if you don't keep track of those ideas You will keep hitting that writer's block And as a result you will not build the confidence that comes with creating content consistently And you will not share that message that you have to share and you will not encourage those people That you are supposed to encourage in this world So mistake number two is not creating content for your ideal client And I will explain the concept of an ideal client a bit better later on for now Remember that the ideal client feels like your favorite clients and why is it so important to plan for this ideal client? Well, the thing is people do business with people and if they have the choice they rather work with the people They know like and trust So when they're comparing service providers They're basically trying to get the answers to four essential questions to decide whether or not there is a basis for no I can trust these questions are Do they understand and empathize with the dreams the goals and the fears and frustrations that I have as a potential client? Are these people qualified to get the job done? Is there some sort of a click will it be fun to work with these people and? Are they basically good peeps? Because what will happen if we run into a disagreement? Will they disappear on me? Will they go all defensive? And they will you they will use your content to get a first impression of all that Because ideally your ideal client consumes your content when they're Trying to get to know you and Ideally when they are getting to know you on your website They will get that sense of what is this writer doing in my head It feels like they've been there and they've done that and they've probably collected a stack of t-shirts on the way But it also feels that they're experts and then friendly experts and lastly Hmm. I actually like their sort there's their sense of humor mistake number three not planning for a buyer's journey People go typically throw the same steps when they're trying to accomplish a goal when they're trying to solve a problem And an ideal world your content supports them on their journey But if there's no logical flow in content if there's no clear cause to action or invitations for them to Get to know you better and if there's no follow-up in the form of shape of Campaigns your audience will forget about you and they will under they will be on their way and they might never come back to your website So to avoid these mistakes in the future, let's explore some commonly known concepts and strategies Number one your ideal client and that ideal client has the most common characteristics of your favorite clients in terms of demographics, so gender age group education profession but more importantly in terms of Psychographics like I said fears frustrations dreams goals But also core values because I personally think that if you're working with a company where There your goal your core values align. It usually works much better And if you know about these emotions going on in the head and the heart of your potential clients You can tap into that by sprinkling words in there that show them that you understand them and that you're like a ball an ideal client Has a need a Problem that that that person likes to solve or a goal that they like to accomplish But also a deadline as in some sort of urgency and they thrive on the mix of the personality and expertise of You if you're a sole service provider or of your team Lastly, like I said, they follow a fairly predictable path to purchase That path to purchase is also called a buyer's journey and this is the most basic version of that Three steps. So let's dive a little bit more into what these three terms mean Someone in awareness stage has discovered a problem and a sense of urgency For instance, their site has been hacked They're typically trying to learn more about that problem or about that goal in the case of the hacked site Why would someone hack my site? I have nothing Data-wise that they can abuse How would I even do that? I thought I was using a security plug-in What the beep is DDOS or a brute attack brute-force attack and And they're looking for types of options. So for instance, can I clean this myself? And if I do so, how much time will that take me? And how will I make sure that it gets cleaned at all and nothing is still there? If I hire it out online on a platform, how well I know someone is reputable or if I hire it out to an agency Is that not going to be like really expensive? Then someone in consideration stage Knows the types of options that are available is looking to find out the common pros and cons of those sorts of solutions and They want to know what sort of solution fits their vision their timeline and their budget best and In a decision stage someone has picked a type of solution For instance, they decide they're going to hire this site cleaning out to an agency They have created a short list of suitable service providers and They're looking to pick the one with the answers that are the best match to what they're looking for when it comes to the four Questions that I just explained. Do they get me? Do they empathize with me? What does their personality look like online and in person if you're having a meeting and are there any reviews available that? show evidence of all that Unfortunately this basic version of the buyer's journey has a very short-term focus It's focused on that first sale and it's a linear model Now in my opinion relationships aren't linear It's not like we're pulling people from point a to point B, right? and Some further digging led me into a more extended model that went past the first sale and is focused more on keeping customers long-term and Making loyal clients so happy that they keep referring new clients to you all the time And they love you so much that they will even stand up for you if they feel like you're not treated fairly online So let's have a look at these additional stages Someone in retention stage that's someone who made a first purchase and you'd like to like them to choose to do business with you more often It's oftentimes looking to make the most out of their first purchase and may need content to to get help with that they might not be entirely happy and content that would help them solve that problem that they run into or Easily to find page with what they can do and whom they can reach out to is it going to be really helpful And they also might be interested in purchasing add-on services If only someone were to offer that to them and if only someone were to explain to them like This would be what you could do next Then someone in loyalty stage has hired you more than once might be willing to write a review but Might not think of it themselves So a nudge might be helpful and they love to be surprised with little tokens of appreciation And then last there is advocacy stage. This is the 20% of clients that generates 80% of your income Not only by hiring work out to you But also by referring those clients at the time and they're the ones that will That are most likely to stand up for you if they feel you're you're not treated fairly and This group in my opinion needs to be spoiled rotten and yet this extended version of the buyer journey is still linear and I like I said don't believe in The linearity of healthy client relationships because would that mean that they have an expiration date? Personally, I think it's more about growing closer after all Within the internet marketing you hear a lot about the example of dating when people are explaining digital marketing Because it's hard to care for someone. You don't know there's a distance But after a first pleasant experience, whether that is a first date or a first business meeting You grow closer and trust increases So how do you take this to a next level? How do you group grow closer with your clients and how do you make creating content easier and more fun? for me it helped me to turn the linear model into a Model that I call circles of trust Where your advocates your most loyal clients live at the center of your business because you're closest with them and Then repeat clients come done first time clients then leads Then people who have heard about you and lastly the rest of the world You may be thinking but if that you're just changing the shape and that's it Well, that may seem but it also shifts the entire approach from pulling and pushing to inviting people and the circles symbolize infinity which is a much more long-term focus and Also, I think it fits much better with us WordPress people because we already love growing closer rather than pushing We already prefer offering value rather than pushing a deal whether someone needs it or not And we already thrive or no like and trust Does that feel about right? Hey And also mostly aligns with the stages of awareness Which I think are helpful if we don't feel the need to push or pull and The second big difference is all about implementation We start instead of working away from the outside in so visitors leads Prospects clients we start at the core So we focus on our advocates first and then on her lower loyal clients Then on the ones we'd like to retain and so on and so forth Your first focus there for is to Make your advocates raving about you by offering the best of what you have and then you start creating Systems to make your clients more loyal then your nurture your first-time clients into loyalty, etc So to help you keep up with To help you coming up with content There's another concept. I lead you to understand and it's called Pillars of expertise what I basically go your unique gifts to mankind It's the fields of expertise in your business the things you do to make your clients lives easier Let me illustrate that with some examples if you're in the hosting business for instance This could be your knowledge of setting up servers It could be about registering domains and it could be keeping websites secure So keeping the bad guys out If you're an agency this could be online strategy or rep accessibility Or your deep understanding of code that makes websites for and that brings me to a tool that Helps you going from theory to a content plan Is what I call the content matrix? It's in the shape of a matrix with the little squares in between Where the columns represent your pillars of expertise and The rows represent the stages of awareness and each cell Contains several content ideas whether that's a blog a video or follow-up email and Each of them help your ideal client get a step closer to solving that problem or accomplishing that goal and each of them has a Call to action to invite them to come closer But always starting at the core It could look like this and you could recreate this as a table in any sort of word process and document I'd like to recommend you to treat a document like this as an organic document So start one drop down some ideas then a few days later go back to it add some ideas and on the way if you think about something make a note in your phone and then add it again and If you were to create like three pieces of content for each little square Before you know it you'll have outlines for up to 50 or even over 50 pieces of content And don't forget to add a call to action because people may love your content But if you don't ask them friendly invitingly to take a next step They may find that distraction and they will be on their way again and mix it up a variety of content There's people that prefer to read there's people that prefer to listen. There's people that prefer to watch videos This could be an example of One of those content ideas so say for instance we are Organizing and VIP day for our very best clients and we need a landing page We need to follow up and we need to work on the content for that day The content outlines could be and this would be a long long form shape long form content because it would be a talk We could write about five ways to improve accessibility to boost ROI we could add some metrics that you could help keep track and we could explain some steps to get there and the call to action for them and For the email on the landing page would be hey bring a friend. We'd love to meet some people Who are also interested in this topic? So having seen an example. Let's have a look at the stages of awareness again where we'll discuss some ideas of content to create in Advocacy stage your goal is to keep your people happy so happy that they will continue to share their happiness and Get referrals for you, right? one of the ideas I just gave it as an example could be Customer appreciation days, but you could also bring a group of people within the same industry together to organize a mastermind About a topic within the industry or something. We all struggle with then another idea could be to create premium content and For instance, if you were doing research yourself, you could share that with this group first and then later on after having given them a head start start rolling that out to other stages and Like I said bring a friend is an awesome way for For for for advocate clients because they are already very happy about you and they know people in the same industry So it's something that really works Also Collaborate with these people if you are creating new products invite them in have a panel discussion Discover what their struggles are and how you can solve those but also if you are about to learn launch Minimal viable product have them in and test it for you because They're most likely to be honest with you because they will have the benefits of a product that works better as well And always when you're planning content Keep in mind how you can keep repurposing it because you're spending a lot of time on creating content So you may as well squeeze the most buck buck for your hour Then people in advocacy stage I Will recommend to share that premium content that best research with them second and you instead of bringing them in You could for instance do a webinar or create a special edition website White paper for just that group You could co-create content like case studies happy clients love to be featured in case studies and customer profiles and When they're still in the excitement of having that that case study published That is the perfect moment to ask them for a review because they're still on that very positive flow and are most likely to create something awesome Then people are loyalty stage Your goal there is to increase customer satisfaction and one of the ways to do that is an onboarding strategy for instance an email series Where you share the vision behind your company? The backstory of your brand but also some key contact persons to reach out to if they're not feeling happy a Group like that. I'm going too fast a group like that You are you could give little assignments ask them to do things. Are we already connected on social media? We would love to connect with you there Read this blog post because most of our customers are raving about it could help you too and by having them do that Following up on your suggestions. They're starting to see you more and more as an expert last also Customer service content is something that is really helpful not only for your existing clients But also for people that are using similar services and are not happy with the customer service at their service provider So for instance if you're a hosting company and someone struggles with a domain that all of a sudden doesn't do the thing that it needs to do And your content helps them solve that By the time they're up for renewal for the domain name and they're still not happy with that other register Where do you think they will go and this group? Thrive on well this group may be open for an upgrade, but you may need to offer that on the right time For instance, if you're selling self-study courses, you could send an email out automatically after two weeks Asking them how they are doing and by the way if they were to be struggling you also help you also offer one-on-one coaching and if you're launching a site after your Guarantee warranty period you could offer them a maintenance program Then people in decision-stage You're trying to nurture them into making that first purchase What you're trying to do here is help that customer find their best fit because we are not the best fit for everyone and if you're working with people that you're That where you don't communicate well It takes so much energy. So make sure that your your content reflects your personality and your expertise you could use content that helps them set priorities and compare products This is the group that loves to read case studies to see what sort of brands you already worked with and how you worked and What people actually said about how that they experienced that? If you'd like to convince people to Do business with you and they're still in that moment where they're in doubt scarcity-based offers really work like discount vouchers or Bonuses with an expiry moment People in consideration stage Need to be persuaded to pick the category. That's yours For this group I think pillar content the content that is long form and focused on keywords works really well because you already They already have gotten to know you a little bit. So they're more willing to spend time with you Long how-to articles with extended steps and lots of examples and The longer form lead magnets that they will need to sign up for before they get access to it White papers webinars these people are looking for more information for more in-depth information And then lastly the people in awareness stage. They don't know you all that well So they're maybe not willing to spend that much time and attention with you Which you could do is create content that is short and to the point Content that explains Some of the wise and the house some of the mistakes that they can make some of the lingo of the field Also content that raises awareness So what could happen if you don't act at all if you don't clean up clean up that hacked site What if you do business with the wrong people and not only on your website? But also in social media and what we see often is that people use their social media to post This is my article come visit And people may not click on it But if you instead you post snippets of valuable information Without clicking they still get to know some of your personality and expertise So keep that in mind when you're creating content So these were my three goals for you for today discover some commonly made mistakes get to know some concepts and strategies and Learn ways to take this a step up. I Hope I delivered all my promise and I'd love to hear your main takeaways and any questions I can answer