 In the world of content, video is king. Welcome to the We Are Slam Show where we share marketing agency insights, best practices, and ideas to help your business or brand grow. My name is Tyler Kelly. I'm the co-founder and chief strategist here at Slam Agency. We have offices in St. Louis and Miami. And here at Slam, we know that effective content is the only content that matters. You hear all over the place that content is king. And that's true, but only when it's effective. And so today, I want to share with you my tips for creating effective content. Now, if you're listening to this podcast, then you represent about 80% of our audience because 80% of our audience is listening, whether it be on Spotify, iTunes, or on another podcast network. And by the way, if you're listening on one of those networks, subscribe. But if you're not listening, then you're probably watching. And why is that? It's because that we also produce this podcast in video. Why video? Because video is the type of content that makes a huge difference. I want to share some stats with you. Including a video on a landing page can increase your conversion rate by up to 80%. After watching a video, 64% of people are more likely to buy your product online. 65% of executives will visit a marketers website after they've watched your video. 39% of executives will actually call a vendor after watching a video. And four times as many consumers would rather watch a video about a product than read about it. What does this tell you? In the world of content, video is king. Now, I know it's not perfect yet, meaning it hasn't reached its full potential, but it's definitely happening. So as a marketing director, you need to this year go all in with video. That's one of my secrets. You got to go all in with video. You have to make sure in everything that you do, there's a video component, whether it's a Zoom call, whether it's a Facebook live or a Facebook premiere. Figure out ways to incorporate video in everything that you do, knowing that you're building the foundation for content success in 2020 and beyond. Now, I also do a podcast called Innovation City. And these interviews are the perfect pieces of evergreen content, which we release on a weekly basis. And when I say evergreen content, I'm talking about like a large chunk of content, which is like the pillar, right? It's the pillar that all your other content would lead to. So in the case of Innovation City, we have a 30 minute interview. And what we do with that interview is we do audio and video, and then we break it up into chunks. We do video teasers. We pull out quotes from the interview and we create graphics with those quotes. We do promotions with the guests. What you want to do is you want to remix your content in a way that connects with the way that people use the networks where you're placing that remix content. So if it's on Instagram, if it's on IGTV or something, there's a certain way that people interact with IGTV. Number one is you have to flip your phone to see it, or you have to produce content vertically in order to watch it and it not be weird, right? So figure out a way to produce content for that medium, for that channel. On Facebook, people interact and engage with types of content differently than they would on Instagram or on Twitter. Figure out for each network, what's the format that works for your audience, and then remix your evergreen pieces of content in a way that fits for each of those networks. Don't syndicate remix. That's a big tip. If you're new to content, this word evergreen might be new to you, but it's exactly what it means. I also think I might have mentioned pillar posts. These are words that come from back in the day, like when blogging just became a thing. You'd have these two 300-word posts, that blog posts that were in effect teasers or just snippets that would lead you to bigger posts, right? The bigger posts are what the search engines wanted because that's where all the meat was, right? So you had a 1500, 2500-word evergreen or pillar post with two 300, 350-word posts that led back to that. And this is how blogging really started to gain steam is through this philosophy, through this methodology. And so here we are in the world of video, video being so huge in terms of content. Here we are, we're applying the same principles that we applied to blogging 10 years ago to video. We're remixing and we're creating an evergreen machine. So I want you to sit down in front of a whiteboard with your team and I want you to begin to brainstorm ideas for this evergreen kind of content. It's the type of content that doesn't, it's not necessarily dated, it doesn't get old, and it defines you as a brand. This is where you need to lend your voice and become the expert. In a previous show, we talked about consumer journey mapping. And in order to do consumer journey mapping correctly, you have to know what types of content are going to captivate, motivate, and inspire people along each of the five levels of awareness. And so if you've built this map out, then you know, at each point, at each place of awareness, this is a type of content that could be evergreen that I could place my voice in the discussion, in the conversation, and begin to build a brand that people are aware of who we are and what we do. Once you've created that list, and at that point, I want you to circle the things that really stand out and could be evergreen, and then begin to create content. Start off with the blog post that will get the ideas running. It will help you develop the content. And then from there, sit down and think about how can we make this a video? Now, not everyone's going to want or be able or have the capability to sit in front of a camera and talk to their audience, but there are ways that you could utilize video without being in front of a camera. Now, my final tip is this, advertise to your audiences. Now, this is key, and the reason it's key is because, number one, your audiences are the people that you're going after. These are the people that you want to see your content. These are the people that you're targeting. These are your segments. When I say advertise to your audiences, I want you to advertise to the people that are your potential customers, that are your customers, that you're looking to bring back in and become repeat customers. Advertise to these people. And what does this assume? It assumes that, number one, you know who your audiences are and you've segmented them and you've created audiences, whether it be in Facebook or Google, that you can actually advertise to. So I'm not talking about just like putting a video on Facebook and boosting it to everyone that likes your page because everyone that likes your page may or may not be a buyer of your product or service. So take a step back. Think about, who's my customer? Where are they online? Do I have their contact information? Can I create a custom audience? And if I have created that custom audience, what types of content can I share with them that I can advertise and pay for them to see that will captivate, motivate and inspire them? At the end of the day, people do business with brands that they like and trust. How is likeability built? It's built through this idea of familiarity and you do this by advertising to your audiences. So to wrap it up, when they say content is king, I want you to remember that only effective content is king. Go all in with video because video is where it's at and video is where it's going. Remember to remix and not syndicate. Create a machine for your evergreen post. Write it out and say these are the areas where we see ourselves becoming a thought leader and finally advertise to your audiences. This is how you can begin to create not only content for content's sake, but effective content that captivates, motivates and inspires people to action through advertising and marketing. Now, if you've enjoyed this show, do me a favor, subscribe, rate and review. If you're watching on Facebook or on another network where you can leave a comment or click a like button, do it for me. And if you're a marketing director, business owner or founder who is looking for ways to incorporate content, not just any content, but content that will move the needle, content that will have an impact, content that will make a difference, then reach out to us at We Are Slam. You can find us online at slamagency.com. Click the free consultation button. We'll be happy to help you. Thank you for tuning in and we'll see you next week.