Tag Archives: target audience

How I Expanded 1 Idea Into 31 Pieces of Content

Whenever I see these pieces that proclaim that the author can help you brainstorm x ideas for content, I ignore them. For better or worse, I have no problem coming up with content ideas.

And when I come up with the content ideas, I don’t just use them in one piece of content. I’ll use the idea in several pieces of content. Yes, I love repurposing.

I think I’ve set a new record for myself over the last few days by creating 31 pieces of content from a single idea.

This post talks about:

The post doesn’t aim to tell you how you should create and reshare your content, but perhaps while you’re reading the post you may get some fresh ideas that fit your own working practices.

Three years of preparation

Before you can share content in numerous places, you need numerous places to share your content. It’s obvious, but it’s true. After all, it would be repetitive to post the exact same content multiple times in the Bredemarket blog.

So since I started Bredemarket in 2020, I not only developed the Bredemarket blog, but I have also developed (or made use of) other social platforms.

But how many social platforms should you use? In July, I noted what the experts advise, and how I responded to that advice.

If you’re starting out in business, you’ve probably heard the advice that as your business branches out into social platforms, you shouldn’t try to do everything at once. Instead you should make sure that your business offering is really solid on one platform before branching out into others.

Yes, I’ve been naughty again and didn’t listen to the expert advice.

From https://bredemarket.com/2023/07/18/is-bredemarket-on-your-favorite-social-platform/

The July post lists all of the social platforms that publish Bredemarket content, but for brevity’s sake, I’ll just note a few of the platforms:

  • Four pages on LinkedIn, not counting my personal profile (we’ll get to my personal profile later).
  • Four pages/groups on Facebook.
  • Other image/text platforms such as Instagram and Threads.
  • Two video-only platforms: TikTok and YouTube.
  • Numerous audio outlets for my podcast.
  • My personal X account.

To the content marketing experts that say that I should just concentrate on LinkedIn and ignore everything else, note that I then have a 0% chance of reaching non-LinkedIn users. Who knows? Perhaps that TikTok video may result in a conversion that I couldn’t have made otherwise.

One idea

The idea that struck me last weekend was not original to me, and it’s been bouncing around in my head (and on these pages) for some time now. But I thought I’d reword it in a different way. After a few tweaks, I came up with the following statement:

Your Customers Don’t Care About Your Product’s Technology

As you will see, I continued to tweak the statement, but that’s the one that I put in my Asana “Content Calendar” project.

The Asana task that would eventually result in this blog post. Only the first subtasks are shown; as you will see, there are many more.

As I would subsequently reflect, I thought that companies knew that you need to focus on the customer rather than focusing on yourself, but I see too many companies that are self-focused in their marketing. They emphasize the amazing technology features of their product.

I want to put a stop to that, and if necessary I will help companies create customer-focused marketing materials. For a fee, of course.

But enough about me. Let’s illustrate how that one idea can expand into multiple content pieces.

31 pieces of content

So now I had to write about how customers don’t care about your product’s technology.

Content 1: Blog post

The first step was to work on the content required for a blog post on the topic. By the time I was done, the post (now called “Your Prospects Don’t Care About Your Technology“) included:

  • An image, sourced from Wikipedia, of a technologist doing technology things.
  • An image, designed by Freepik, of a customer ignoring someone prattling on about their technology.
  • The “customer focus” illustration that I have used frequently in the past.
  • An animated GIF that beckoned readers to the landing page, described below. The GIF includes the first two images listed above, plus a third from the landing page itself.
Create Technology Content That Converts

Most importantly, the post included all the text that made my original point (“Do you know why your prospects are ignoring you? Because they don’t care about you. It’s all about them.”), along with my argument for customer focus, and my concluding call to action to find out how to “Create Technology Content That Converts.”

Content 2: Landing page

And “Create Technology Content That Converts” was the title of my landing page. Often I put the call to action on the same page as the original point, but sometimes (as in this case) I separate the call to action for a more focused presentation. Plus I have the option of having multiple blog posts point to the same landing page. This post points to the landing page, for example (click the GIF above or one of the other links).

The landing page dug more deeply into why and how Bredemarket can help you create a customer-focused message, talking about the questions I ask, the types of content I can create, and the process.

From calendly.com/bredemarket. 

The landing page concluded with the call to action encouraging interested parties to schedule a meeting on my recently-improved Calendly page, email me, or use my contact form. (Or subscribe to my Mailchimp mailing list.)

Once all this was done, everything was set. People who read the blog post could (if so inclined) go to the landing page, and people who read the landing page could (if so inclined) contact me.

But only if they saw the blog post in the first place.

If they don’t find the post on Google or Bing, and if they’re not already subscribing to the blog, then how will they get to the blog post?

Content 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8: Information pages

There are numerous themes that continuously pop up in the Bredemarket blog, and I have created “information pages” (pillars) that link to all of the content that I have written on these themes.

From https://bredemarket.com/customer-focus/

Now perhaps you won’t do all of this, but if there’s a place on your website where you should mention your new blog post, be sure and do it.

For example, if you wrote a blog post about Topic X in 2021, and you’re readdressing Topic X in a 2023 post, then go back and update the 2021 post to say that you have new thoughts on Topic X. Then the people who find your 2021 post can go to the new post and get the latest information.

Content 9: Audio podcast

My podcast is more accurately described as a mini-podcast, because each episode is usually only 1-2 minutes long. Perhaps someday I’ll create hour-long episodes, but not today.

And on Sunday I created a 2-minute episode with a new take. After noting (as I said above) that sometimes we know things that people don’t know, I declared:

Am I smarter than General Electric? Yes I am.

From https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/bredemarket/episodes/Why-Should-I-Care-That-General-Electric-Uses-AI-e2aaenl

I then described a really bad General Electric press release that focused on GE technology and not on customer needs.

Then I plugged the blog post, which was linked in the episode description. And I resued the “technologist doing technology thinks” image from the blog post.

Now I only list this as one piece of content, but really it’s multiple pieces of content. Not only can you access the episode on Spotify for Podcasters (formerly Anchor), but you can also access it on Spotify itself, Apple Podcasts, and numerous other podcast hosting services.

From Spotify.

After this, I returned to the blog post itself and looked for other ways to share it.

Content 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, and 17: Bredemarket LinkedIn and Facebook pages, showcase pages, and groups

Because the blog post explicitly mentioned “technology” in the title, the best fit for a reshare of the blog post was on the Bredemarket Technology Firm Services LinkedIn showcase page (reshare here) and Facebook group (reshare here).

Why do I have a myriad of LinkedIn and Facebook outlets?

Because often people who are interested in technology don’t care about identity, and people who are interested in the Inland Empire don’t care about technology, and people who care about Bredemarket in general don’t care about every identity company reshare that I post.

And of course, some people who love LinkedIn hate Facebook, and some people who love Facebook hate LinkedIn.

So I could have just shared this to the technology outlets, but this particular post had a broader application. Inland Empire businesses, identity companies, and general marketers all have the problem of referring to self rather than the customer.

So I reshared the original technology shares to the other relevant groups.

From LinkedIn.

Content 18: Instagram carousel

You know how the Instagram experts say that you should post reels? Or you should post carousels? Or whatever?

I say that you should post a healthy balance of all sorts of things.

I wanted to reshare the blog post on Instagram, so I posted an Instagram carousel post using the two images from the blog post and the “money” image from the landing page.

Even though Instagram is a terrible platform to reshare content on other platforms, because the links aren’t clickable.

Unless you reshare the post as a story and use the “link” feature to embed a link.

Content 19 and 20: Bredemarket Threads and JEBredCal X

Oh, and there are two other places where I reshared the link to the blog post:

  • As a thread.
  • As a xeet or whatever tweets are called these days. (This is not an official Bredemarket X account, but my “professional” X account where I share Bredemarket stuff and other stuff.)

So that encompassed the first set of content reshares. But before I go on…

Content 21: LinkedIn reshare of podcast

All of the stuff listed above was stuff that I meticulously planned by listing subtasks to the original Asana task “Your Customers Don’t Care About Your Product’s Technology.”

But I forgot that I deviated from Asana and also shared a link to the podcast in the Bredemarket Technology Firm Services LinkedIn showcase page.

Some people are horrified that I deviated from Asana and didn’t record this important share. (And they’ll really be horrified later in this post when I create another piece of content and don’t log it in Asana.)

Others are horrified that I put all the other stuff in Asana in the first place.

As for me, well, I got the content out. Cool.

But the blog post wasn’t enough. I needed to convey the same message in a different way, for those who think words and stuff aren’t cool.

Content 22, 23, 24, and 25: The short

In the same way that I created an audio podcast that made the same points as the blog post (while linking to the blog post), I wanted to create a video vertical short that did the same thing.

So I headed out to the Southern California Edison Euclid Substation.

From Southern California Edition PDF.

I then stood in front of some very technological stuff, and filmed 27 seconds of me talking about the prospect’s problems…and your problem…and how Bredemarket can solve your problem.

By the time I was finished, the video short was available on:

Originaly posted at https://bredemarket.com/2023/10/08/a-short-on-non-caring-prospects/

So now both WordPress and Instagram had two pieces of content that kinda sorta said the same thing. But this is good. Maybe some people like the video version, while others like the text version. I’ll catch them one way or ther other.

But before I actually shot the video at the SCE Euclid Substation…

Content 26: Instagram Live/Reel

…I was scouting out locations. (If you know the Talking Heads song “Found a Job” you’ll recognize the phrase.)

When I arrived at the SCE Euclid Substation, I walked around the south and west sides of the substation, looking for the best place to shoot my video.

And I was broadcasting on Instagram Live as I was doing this, offering my adoring fans a rare “behind the scenes” look at Bredmarket activities. And, incidentally, proving that Bredemarket behind the scenes is pretty boring.

But the Instagram Live session was recorded, and was posted as a reel a couple of days before my video short was posted.

I don’t know if it made a huge difference in the subsequent reception of the short, but one of my relatives liked the “behind the scenes” look so that’s good.

So those 26 pieces of content addressed Bredemarket’s views on customer focus and benefits.

But my life is not confined to Bredemarket. Time for one huge repurpose.

Content 27: jebredcal blog post

At the same time that I’m asking Bredemarket prospects to contract with me, I’m asking technology companies (including identity companies) to hire me as a Senior Product Marketing Manager.

And the same message can, with some adaptation, be delivered to hiring companies.

So I wrote a separate blog post on my jebredcal personal blog, “Do Your Prospects Ignore Your Company’s Message?” that addressed the latter target audience.

From https://jebredcal.wordpress.com/2023/10/09/do-your-prospects-ignore-your-companys-message/

If you compare the jebredcal blog post with the original Bredemarket blog post, you can see some clear similarities…with some noticeable differences. For example, I don’t ask employers to use Bredemarket’s calendly, email, or web messaging channels. I use my personal email and my LinkedIn profile messaging capability instead.

Now that the blog post was written, I was ready to share it on LinkedIn where the employers are. (No Facebook. No TikTok.)

Correction: I was ALMOST ready to share a link to the post on LinkedIn. I had to complete one thing first.

Content 28: Personal short

I decided that on the day before I shared the post on LinkedIn, I’d create a personal video short that introduced the content.

But this one, rather than taking place in front of a cool electrical facility, would be a behind-the-scenes view of Bredemarket’s world headquarters. Since the city of Ontario restricts you from viewing this yourself (restriction 3), this is the only way that you will ever see Bredemarket’s world headquarters.

Exciting?

No, completely boring.

But I did it anyway, and posted the video on LinkedIn yesterday. (And if you look to the left, you can see Bredemarket’s business license as required by restriction 1.)

Content 29: The LinkedIn share of the jebredcal post

After a day’s wait, the jebredcal blog post was shared on LinkedIn. I haven’t been swamped with job offers yet, but content marketing doesn’t work like that.

Content 30: You’re reading it right now

Once I realized that I was going to write one blog post for Bredmarket prospects and one post for potential employers, I decided to write a third post that talked out how you create different content for different target audiences. As I noted above, the two pieces of content have significant similarities, but also significant differences.

But as I thought about it, I thought it would be more important to illustrate how you could take a single idea and repurpose it as 30 different pieces of content.

Well, 30 so far. I still have to figure out how and where to reshare THIS blog post…

Content 31: LinkedIn post about a job rejection

Stop the presses!

And here’s another EXCITING behind-the-scenes look at how Bredemarket works!

L’Ennui. By Gaston La Touche – http://www.godelfineart.com/artist_works?id=338#!La Touche_L’Ennui, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=23337907

By Tuesday afternoon (October 10, 2023), I had substantially completed writing this blog post on “How I Expanded 1 Idea Into 30 Pieces of Content.” But since there was no huge rush to publish the post—after all, I had just published 29 other pieces of content over the past few days—I figured I’d take advantage of the opportunity to “sleep on it” and look at the post one more time before publication.

Then something happened early Wednesday morning.

Every day, potential employers tell thousands of job candidates that they are “moving in a different direction.” By Original: Jack Ver at Dutch Wikipedia Vector: Ponor – Own work based on: Plaatsvector.png by Jack Ver at Dutch Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=95477901

I received a “you have not been selected for this position” email from a potential employer. I had only applied for the position two days earlier, on Monday, right in the midst of all of this content creation.

Proving that I can create content out of ANYTHING, I authored a LinkedIn post that began as follows:

If you are one of the lucky talent acquisition professionals who is still employed, there is ONE CRITICAL THING that you MUST impress upon your employers.

Please tell your employers NOT to list positions as “remote/hybrid.”

That’s kind of like listing a food as “vegan/beef.” Is it vegan, or is it beef? It’s a mystery until you take a bite, and there’s a 50% chance you will be disappointed or horrified with what you find.

From LinkedIn.

You may ask what a LinkedIn post about “remote/hybrid” job listings has to do with incorrectly-focused product marketing messaging.

It’s all in the call to action. Those who read to the end of the post encountered these words.

Anyway, if you’ve read this far and are seeking an experienced identity/biometrics/technology Senior Product Marketing Manager for a #remote position (or a position within 25 miles of Ontario, California), please message me. The linked post below includes my contact information, as well as my philosophy on product marketing messaging.

From LinkedIn.

And then I linked to my personal jobseeking blog post “Do Your Prospects Ignore Your Company’s Message?”

  • For those keeping score, that blog post was content number 27.
  • Even though I already posted a link to that post on LinkedIn already. See content number 29.
  • And no, I didn’t list this content in Asana either (see content number 21).

I guess this 31st item is a special treat. Like ice cream.

By Baskin-Robbins – Own work based on: Baskin-Robbins logo 2022.png, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=116914428

Quick Thoughts on Product Positioning

I’ve already talked about product launches in my recent On “Go-to-Market” post, but having worked in product marketing for some time, I know that there are a lot of tasks that your firm has to perform even when you’re not launching a new product.

One of those tasks is product positioning. And it’s important.

Product positioning isn’t quite as complex as global positioning (a factor of authentication, by the way). By Paulsava – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=47209685

Six questions for product positioning

There are some complex ways to define product positioning, probably even at the level of Shipley 96-step complexity. But when I can, I gravitate for the simple.

Here’s how I define product positioning:

(UPDATE OCTOBER 23, 2023: “SIX QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU IS SO 2022. DOWNLOAD THE NEWER “SEVEN QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU” HERE.)

  • Why your product (or service) exists.
  • How your product benefits your customers.
  • What your product is (but note that I asked the first two questions before this one).
  • Other facets of your product (goal, benefits, target audience—if this is new to you, catch up by reading my e-book on the six questions your content creator should ask you).

Why the questions matter

If your product suddenly disappeared from the world, would your target audience (or, in marketing-speak, personas) care?

Would your target audience be just as happy with the competitive offerings, or would the target audience lose out if your product’s distinctive benefits were suddenly no longer available?

Choose one (food) to go forever. Reproduced at https://josephmallozzi.com/2020/10/01/october-1-2020-lets-chat/

There are a number of popular memes that ask you to remove one popular food from a list of foods. What would happen if, instead of asking about pizza and tacos, you asked your target audience about your product and eight others? Would your product survive the cut, or would your prospects happily dump it?

Position your product so that it always remains top of mind for your prospects.

  • Answer the questions above.
  • Create content that is focused on the customer (not focused on your firm).
  • Create content that explains benefits (not features) to your prospects.

Tweaking a Call to Action, For Me and For You

I just took a look over the last few calls to action that Bredemarket has published.

Whatever you need, talk to me. And be prepared for me to ask you six (or more) questions.

And if you’re reading this post in Janury 2025, thank you. If you want to talk to me about content creation, some of these links may still work!

Perhaps Bredemarket, the technology content marketing expert, can help you select the words to tell your story. If you’re interested in talking, let me know.

If I can help your firm:

From various Bredemarket blog posts.

All of my most recent calls to action were variations on “Contact me.”

And all the CTAs werre kinda so-so and yawn-inducing.

By Basile Morin – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=87999584

Other CTA ideas

Since I was open to other ideas, I viewed @yourfavcontentcreator_’s recent Instagram reel with four suggestions. Two of them didn’t make sense for Bredemarket’s business, but the first and fourth resonated with me.

I’ve reproduced those two below.

👉 “Get started on your journey to [desired outcome] today.”
👉 “Ready to see real results? Explore our [product/service] now.”

From https://www.instagram.com/reel/CwVKzmrOHj0/?igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA%3D%3D

If her ideas resonate with you, be sure to follow her Instagram account @yourfavcontentcreator_.

A false start, and a new hope

At first I thought I’d simply incorporate “journey” into my CTA…

Don’t stop believin’ in your content!

…but then I decided that “results” would be better.

At the same time, the CTA has to be Brede-distinctive, captivate prospects better than “contact me,” and ideally appeal to all of Bredemarket’s target audiences (identity/biometrics, technology, local).

So, identity/biometric and technology firms, will the paragraph below the logo make you MORE likely to engage with Bredemarket for marketing and writing services? If not, I’ll continue to tweak it in an agile fashion.

Bredemarket logo
From bredemarket.com.

Authorize Bredemarket, Ontario California’s content marketing expert, to help your firm produce words that return results.

On “Go-to-Market”

After I slept on my “trust funnel” post, I decided that it was too long and took the entire “go-to-market” section out. But I saved it and am sharing it with you here.

This little piggy went to market

By Rklawton – Own work, CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=735848

(Yes, I know that the little piggy didn’t go to market to do their own shopping. But bear with me here.)

If you are creating content as part of the formal launch of a product or service, you are creating SOME type of go-to-market (GTM) plan.

  • Perhaps it’s a well-defined plan.
  • Perhaps it’s a simple document.
  • Maybe it’s a haphazard dictate to “go to market in three days.”

About the “three days” thing

(C, I told you I was going to write this.)

Oh, and by the way, you can’t go to market in three days, even if someone says you can. You can’t. Or if you do, there will be significant gaps or inaccuracies.

In her LinkedIn Learning course, Deirdre Breakenridge prefers to define a four-month go-to-market plan, with specific deliverables for every one of the months in the plan. Of course, she admits that this is ideal, and sometimes you can’t take a full four months to bring a product or service to market. Whether you take four months or six months or even two months, GTM execution for any robust product or service needs a significant amount of time to get all the pieces together.

One of the reasons that it takes months to execute a GTM plan is because a GTM plan requires inputs from several departments, including

  • product,
  • marketing,
  • product marketing (if it is separate from the first two departments),
  • engineering,
  • customer success/customer service,
  • finance,
  • sales, and
  • legal.

You won’t get all of THEM to produce inputs, or even agree what the inputs should be, in three days. It takes time.

But there ARE teeny tiny GTM efforts

One exception to the four-month guidance: if your “product” or “service” is VERY small (like a single blog post), you can obviously go-to-market much more quickly.

For example, here’s my Asana-based “GTM plan” for a single blog post, “I Changed My Mind on Age Estimation.“

From the private Bredemarket Asana Content Calendar, back in the days when Twitter (TW) was still Twitter.

Sometimes. At other times I skip Asana altogether and just take pictures and post stuff, like what I did with my “Coldest Beer in Town” and “Classy by Definition” posts from earlier today. Variety is good.

Back to normal GTM

But when your product or service is more complex, then you need to plan your GTM campaign and make sure that it answers all questions about your product or service.

There are all sorts of GTM guidelines out there, and I was part of a team who collaboratively created three different flavors of GTM guidelines over the course of several months, starting with the complex and ending with the ridiculously simple. And the team STILL couldn’t get the other teams to agree on the parameters of the guidelines.

I’m not going to dictate MY ideas on GTM guidelines, but I will say that whatever guidelines you create, make sure that by the time a GTM effort created under these guidelines is finished, both your prospects and your employees will gain the appropriate understanding of your product or service, and the GTM content will answer all of their questions.

(UPDATE OCTOBER 23, 2023: “SIX QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU IS SO 2022. DOWNLOAD THE NEWER “SEVEN QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU” HERE.)

If you don’t know what questions to ask, my six questions (why, how, what goal, benefits, target audience) can be adapted for GTM purposes.

What about your GTM content?

Are you executing a go-to-market plan and need to create some content?

  • Do you need customer-facing external content (blog posts, white papers, whatever)?
  • Do you need employee-facing internal content (FAQs, battlecards, whatever)?

Regardless of the content you need, Bredemarket can help you. Here’s a list of the types of content I’ve created over the years:

Articles • Battlecards (80+) • Blog Posts (400+) • Briefs/Data/Literature Sheets • Case Studies (12+) • Competitive Analyses • Email Newsletters (200+) • Event/Conference/Trade Show Demonstration Scripts • FAQs • Plans • Playbooks • Presentations • Proposal Templates • Proposals (100+) • Quality Improvement Documents • Requirements • Scientific Book Chapters • Smartphone Application Content • Social Media (Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Threads, TikTok, Twitter) • Strategic Analyses • Web Page Content • White Papers and E-Books

Whatever you need, talk to me. And be prepared for me to ask you six (or more) questions.

Bredemarket logo

You Need a Laptop AND a Smartphone For This To Work. Or You Don’t.

If you are reading this on your laptop (or your desktop), point your smartphone to the QR code on your laptop (or desktop) screen to read my first e-book, “Six Questions Your Content Creator Should Ask You.”

(UPDATE OCTOBER 22, 2023: “SIX QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU IS SO 2022. DOWNLOAD THE NEWER “SEVEN QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU” HERE.)

If you are reading this on your smartphone, just click on this link: https://bredemarket.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/bmteb6qs-2212a.pdf.

As I said before, QR codes are sometimes useful, and sometimes not.

If you want to know the “why” about the e-book-see what I did there?-visit my announcement of the e-book. You can view the e-book there also.

By the way, I just checked my WordPress stats. Since this e-book was published in December 2022, it’s been downloaded over 160 times. I hope it’s helping people.

There’s a Reason Why “Tech” is a Four-Letter Word

By Tomia, original image en:User:Polylerus – Own work (Vector drawing based on Image:Profanity.JPG), Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3332425

We often use the phrase “four-letter word” to refer to cuss words that shouldn’t be said in polite company. Occasionally, we have our own words that we personally consider to be four-letter words. (Such as “BIPA.”)

There are some times when we resign ourselves to the fact that “tech” can be a four-letter word also. But there’s actually a good reason for the problems we have with today’s technology.

Tech can be dim

Just this week I was doing something on my smartphone and my screen got really dim all of a sudden, with no explanation.

So I went to my phone’s settings, and my brightness setting was down at the lowest level.

For no reason.

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

– Arthur C. Clarke, quoted here.
From https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202613

So I increased my screen’s brightness, and everything was back to normal. Or so I thought.

A little while later, my screen got dim again, so I went to the brightness setting…and was told that my brightness was very high. (Could have fooled me.)

I can’t remember what I did next (because when you are trying to fix something you can NEVER remember what you did next), but later my screen brightness was fine.

For no reason.

Arthur C. Clark, by ITU Pictures – https://www.flickr.com/photos/itupictures/16636142906, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=64344486

Was Arthur C. Clarke right? And if so, WHY was he right?

Perhaps it’s selective memory, but I don’t recall having this many technology problems when I was younger.

The shift to multi-purpose devices

Part of the reason for the increasing complexity of technology is that we make fewer and fewer single-purpose devices, and are manufacturing more and more multi-purpose devices.

One example of the shift: if I want to write a letter today, I can write it on my smartphone. (Assuming the screen is bright enough.) This same smartphone can perform my banking activities, play games, keep track of Bredemarket’s earnings…oh, and make phone calls.

Smartphones are an example of technologial convergence:

Technological convergence is a term that describes bringing previously unrelated technologies together, often in a single device. Smartphones might be the best possible example of such a convergence. Prior to the widespread adoption of smartphones, consumers generally relied on a collection of single-purpose devices. Some of these devices included telephones, wrist watches, digital cameras and global positioning system (GPS) navigators. Today, even low-end smartphones combine the functionality of all these separate devices, easily replacing them in a single device.

From a consumer perspective, technological convergence is often synonymous with innovation.

From https://www.techtarget.com/searchdatacenter/definition/technological-convergence

And the smartphone example certainly demonstrates innovation from the previous-generation single-purpose devices.

When I was a kid, if I wanted to write a letter, I had two choices:

  1. I could set a piece of paper on the table and write the letter with a writing implement such as a pen or pencil.
  2. I could roll a piece of paper into a typewriter and type the letter.

These were, for the most part, single purpose devices. Sure I could make a paper airplane out of the piece of paper, but I couldn’t use the typewriter to play a game or make a phone call.

Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1216813

Turning our attention to the typewriter, it certainly was a manufacturing marvel, and intricate precision was required to design the hammers that would hit the typewritter ribbon and leave their impressions on the piece of paper. And typewriters could break, and repairmen (back then they were mostly men) could fix them.

A smartphone is much more innovative than a smartphone. But it’s infinitely harder to figure out what is wrong with a smartphone.

The smartphone hardware alone is incredibly complex, with components from a multitude of manufacturers. Add the complexities of the operating system and all the different types of software that are loaded on a smartphone, and a single problem could result from a myriad of causes.

No wonder it seems like magic, even for the best of us.

Explaining technology

But this complexity has provided a number of jobs:

  • The helpful person at your cellular service provider who has acquired just enough information to recognize and fix an errant application.
  • The many people in call centers (the legitimate call centers, not the “we found a problem with your Windows computer” call scammers) who perform the same tasks at a distance.
By Earl Andrew at English Wikipedia – Own work, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=17793658
  • All the people who write instructions on how to use and fix all of our multi-purpose devices, from smartphones to computers to remote controls.

Oh, and the people that somehow have to succinctly explain to prospects why these multi-purpose devices are so great.

Because no one’s going to run into problems with technology unless they acquire the technology. And your firm has to get them to acquire your technology.

Crafting a technology marketing piece

So your firm’s marketer or writer has to craft some type of content that will make a prospect aware of your technology, and/or induce the prospect to consider purchasing the technology, and/or ideally convert the prospect into a paying customer.

Before your marketer or writer crafts the content, they have to answer some basic questions.

By Evan-Amos – Own work, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=11293857

Using a very simple single-purpose example of a hammer, here are the questions with explanations:

  • Why does the prospect need this technology? And why do you provide this technology? This rationale for why you are in business, and why your product exists, will help you make the sale. Does your prospect want to buy a hammer from a company that got tired of manufacturing plastic drink stirrers, or do they want to buy a hammer from a forester who wants to empower people to build useful items?
  • How does your firm provide this technology? If I want to insert a nail into a piece of wood, do I need to attach your device to an automobile or an aircraft carrier? No, the hammer will fit in your hand. (Assuming you have hands.)
  • What is the technology? Notice that the “why” and “how” questions come before the “what” question, because “why” and “how” are more critical. But you still have to explain what the technology is (with the caveat I mention below). Perhaps some of your prospects have no idea what a hammer is. Don’t assume they already know.
  • What is the goal of the technology? Does a hammer help you floss your teeth? No, it puts nails into wood.
  • What are the benefits of the technology? When I previously said that you should explain what the technology is, most prospects aren’t looking for detailed schematics. They primarily care about what the technology will do for them. For example, that hammer can keep their wooden structure from falling down. They don’t care about the exact composition of the metal in the hammer head.
  • Finally, who is the target audience for the technology? I don’t want to read through an entire marketing blurb and order a basic hammer, only to discover later that the product won’t help me keep two diamonds together but is really intended for wood. So don’t send an email to jewelers about your hammer. They have their own tools.
By Mauro Cateb – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=90944472

(UPDATE OCTOBER 23, 2023: “SIX QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU IS SO 2022. DOWNLOAD THE NEWER “SEVEN QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU” HERE.)

Once you answer these questions (more about the six questions in the Bredemarket e-book available here), your marketer or writer can craft your content.

Or, if you need help, Bredemarket (the technology content marketing expert) can craft your content, whether it’s a blog post, case study, white paper, or something else.

I’ve helped other technology firms explain their “hammers” to their target audiences, explaining the benefits, and answering the essential “why” questions about the hammers.

Can I help your technology firm communicate your message? Contact me.

Bredemarket logo

How Bredemarket Works

Bredemarket logo

(Updated question count 10/23/2023)

I’m stealing an idea from Matthew Mace and adapting it to explain how Bredemarket works.

What am I stealing from Matthew Mace?

Matthew Mace is a freelance content writer who recently posted the following on LinkedIn:

Do you need a freelance content writer but don’t know what to expect?

I created a “work with me” pdf that explains what I do and how I can help you.

From https://www.linkedin.com/posts/matthewmace-contentmarketing_cycling-running-wellness-activity-7094675414727450624-8U_Y/

His post then explains what is included in his “work with me” PDF. If you’d like his PDF, send him a message via his LinkedIn profile.

But what if I want to know how to work with Bredemarket?

Glad you asked.

After reading Mace’s LinkedIn post, I realized that I have a bunch of different online sources that explain how to work with Bredemarket, but they’re scattered all over the place. This post groups them all the “how to work with Bredemarket” content together, following an outline similar (yet slightly different) to Mace’s.

And no, it’s not a stand-alone PDF, but as you read the content below you’ll discover two stand-alone PDFs that address critical portions of the process.

Question 1: Why would I work with Bredemarket?

As you’ll see below, “why” is a very important question, even more important than “how.” Here are some reasons to work with Bredemarket.

By Federal Bureau of Investigation – https://washingtonian.com/2016/11/24/the-fbi-opened-its-crime-lab-here-in-dc-back-in-1932, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=128508441
  • You require the words to communicate the benefits of your identity/biometrics product/service. I offer 29 years of experience in the identity/biometrics industry and am a biometric content marketing expert and an identity content marketing expert. I have created multiple types of content (see below) to share critical points about identity/biometrics offerings.
  • You require the words to communicate the benefits of your technology product/service. I have also created multiple types of content to share critical points about technology offerings.
  • You require the words to communicate the benefits of a product/service you provide to California’s Inland Empire. I’ve lived in the Inland Empire for…well, for more than 29 years. I know the area—its past, its present, and its future.
  • You require one of the following types of content. Blogs, case studies / testimonials, data sheets, e-books, proposals, social media posts / Xs (or whatever tweets are called today), white papers, or anything. I’ve done these for others and can do it for you.

Question 2: Why WOULDN’T I work with Bredemarket?

This question is just as important as the prior one. If you need the following, you WON’T want to work with Bredemarket.

  • You require high quality graphics. Sorry, that’s not me.
I did not draw this myself. Originally created by Jleedev using Inkscape and GIMP. Redrawn as SVG by Ben Liblit using Inkscape. – Own work, Public Domain, link.
  • You are based outside of the United States. Foreign laws and exchange rates make my brain hurt, so I only pursue business domestically. But depending upon where you are, I may be able to recommend a content marketer for you.

Question 3: What are Bredemarket’s most popular packages? How much do they cost?

Here are the three most common packages that Bredemarket offers.

By Staff Sgt. Michael L. Casteel – [1], Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2407244

Note that these are the standard packages. If your needs are different, I can adapt them, or charge you an hourly rate if the need is not well defined. (But as you will see below, I try to work with you at the outset to define the project.)

If you follow the link above for your desired package and download the first brochure on each page, you’ll get a description of the appropriate service. The pricing is at the bottom of each brochure.

Each brochure also explains how I kick off a project, but the procedure is fairly common for each package.

Question 4: What are Bredemarket’s working practices?

When I work with a client, I hold a kickoff to make sure that we have a common understanding at the beginning of the project.

The first seven questions that we address are critical. In fact, I wrote an e-book that addresses these seven questions alone.

  1. Why?
  2. How?
  3. What?
  4. Goal?
  5. Benefits?
  6. Target Audience?
  7. Emotions?
Go to https://bredemarket.com/2023/10/22/seven-questions-your-content-creator-should-ask-you-the-e-book-version/ to download this e-book.

But that’s not all that we address in the kickoff. There are some other lower-level questions that I ask you (such as the long and short form of your company name).

Once we have defined the project, I iteratively provide draft copy and you iteratively review it. The number and length of review cycles varies depending upon the content length and your needs. For example, I use up to two review cycles of up to three days each for short content.

Eventually I provide the final copy, you publish it and pay me, and both of us are happy.

Question 5: What about samples and testimonials?

Because I usually function as a ghostwriter, I cannot publicly provide samples or identity my clients. But I’ve written yet another e-book that anonymously describes some sample projects that I’ve performed for clients, including a testimonial from one of them.

Go to https://bredemarket.com/2023/04/16/four-mini-case-studies-for-one-inland-empire-business-my-own/ to download this e-book.

Question 6: What are the next steps to work with Bredemarket?

If you believe that I can help you create the content your firm needs, let’s talk.

Or if Matthew Mace’s content services better fit your needs, use him.

How Non-Commodity Content Creators Collaborate with Clients

On Friday, I shared a Kaye Putnam video on my Bredemarket LinkedIn page.

From https://www.linkedin.com/posts/bredemarket_be-irreplaceable-differentiate-your-brand-activity-7085682536026165249-tq01/

While I won’t go into all of the video details here (you should spend a few minutes and watch Putnam’s video yourself), one of the points that Putnam made was that the best content creators need to differentiate themselves from commodity content providers—in other words, to “be irreplaceable.”

If it’s not obvious how your product or service is wildly different, not just better, your ideal clients will resort to looking at you like a commodity.

Kaye Putnam, from the transcript to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNGos1kVIdM

One of the ways in which content creators can differentiate themselves from their competition is to have a unique process.

In addition to having the emotional appeal and positioning that we already talked about, you can employ tools like having a proprietary process. A unique way of achieving a desired result.

Kaye Putnam, from the transcript to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNGos1kVIdM

I’d like to look at one such process, the process in which a content creator collaborates with a client, but I’d like to take a look at how two very different content creators achieve the same outcome.

How Bredemarket collaborates with clients

One of the many differentiators between Bredemarket and its marketing and writing competitors is the way that Bredemarket kicks off projects.

Before I work with you, I ask a series of questions to better understand what you need.

(UPDATE OCTOBER 23, 2023: “SIX QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU IS SO 2022. DOWNLOAD THE NEWER “SEVEN QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU” HERE.)

Now these are not all of the questions that I ask. After all, my process is, um, “Bredemarket-developed.” (I avoid the word “proprietary” because of its negative connotations.) But the limited number of questions that I did share suggests how I try to understand you. Why you do what you do. How you do it. And so forth.

(If you are interested in this topic, I have written an entire e-book focused on the first six questions that I ask you. To download the e-book, visit my blog post “Six Questions Your Content Creator Should Ask You: the e-book version.”)

In true Putnam manner, I approach this entire process as a Sage, or someone who imparts wisdom which, when combined with your wisdom, results in an effective piece of content.

Yes, this is a Rembrandt painting, anticipating the next section of the blog post. By Rembrandt – The Yorck Project (2002) 10.000 Meisterwerke der Malerei (DVD-ROM), distributed by DIRECTMEDIA Publishing GmbH. ISBN: 3936122202., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=157824

But not everyone is a Sage, and other content creators approach collaboration differently.

How Paso Artis collaborates with clients

As I’ve frequently said, my primary emphasis is words. My graphic execution capabilities are somewhat limited.

I did not draw this myself. Originally created by Jleedev using Inkscape and GIMP. Redrawn as SVG by Ben Liblit using Inkscape. – Own work, Public Domain, link.

But there are many, many people who have better graphic execution capabilities than I do.

One such person is the artist behind Paso Artis.

From https://www.facebook.com/paso.artis

Now I don’t know Paso Artis’ personal archetypes, but I’d be willing to bet that her primary archetype isn’t Sage. The obvious guess for her primary archetype is “Creator.”

Get ready to celebrate the power of your creative brand archetype! Whether you resonate with being an Artist, musician, writer, dreamer, builder, or designer, your brand has the incredible ability to amaze and inspire others.

When customers encounter your creative brand, they can’t help but feel captivated. They look at your work and think, “I want to be able to do what they can.” Your brand ignites a spark of inspiration and ignites the imagination within those who connect with it.

One of your innate advantages as a creative brand is your boundless creativity and imagination. You possess the unique ability to see the world in a different light, to think outside the box, and to breathe life into your visions.

Kaye Putnam, from https://www.kayeputnam.com/brand-archetype-creator/

A few of you may recall that I initially thought that I was a “Creator,” until I realized that this archetype applies more to imagery rather than words. And not stick figures.

Despite our vast differences, Paso Artis and Bredemarket have one similarity.

  • We both work together with our clients to create a piece of content that satisfies the clients’ needs.
  • With Bredemarket, it’s a written piece of content.
  • With Paso Artis, it’s a custom painting.

But because Paso Artis is…well, an artist, she doesn’t use Sage-like words and tables and bullet points to describe her client collaboration process. The Paso Artis-developed (again, I don’t like the word “proprietary”) collaboration process is described much more…artistically.

As an artist, I do feel the responsibility and privilege of taking a vision and turning it into a painting that will hang on the wall for years and be seen every day and regarded with affection.

Don’t be scared of handing over your dream to me.

In order to achieve a happy outcome, you and I will work together.

From https://www.facebook.com/paso.artis/about_details

Note that Paso Artis uses some words that Bredemarket never uses, such as “affection” and “dream.” Now I might use “vision” and “scared” in the proper context, but most of my clients and prospects do not dream of having their customers regard their products and services, or their blog posts or white papers, with affection. Even the Bredemarket client who chose to “truly say thank you for putting these (proposal) templates together” didn’t get affectionate about them. I mean, I love Microsoft Word, but I don’t LOVE Microsoft Word.

So Bredemarket and Paso Artis use a different vocabulary. This happens to come back to another point that Putnam made, to speak the language of your clients.

If you only know Italian and your ideal clients are speaking French, you might get a few people that understand what you mean, but it’s not going to have the transformative effect that we’re looking for. You want to learn to be fluent. In the decision making language of your ideal clients.

Kaye Putnam, from the transcript to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNGos1kVIdM

Marketers, imagine if you will a possible persona for a Paso Artis prospect.

By David Teniers the Younger – 1. Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien, Bilddatenbank.2. khm.at, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=659517

“Jay” is a homeowner who loves art and desires a particular type of painting for his home, but does not have the artistic talent to paint it himself. Ideally, the completed painting will be one that brings Jay delight when he sees it in his home, and will also delight his guests. But can he trust anyone to realize his dream?

So Paso Artis (who has years of marketing experience in her day job work) knows that she has to address Jay’s pain points. She first does this by addressing them in her “About” text (“Don’t be scared of handing over your dream to me”), but then addresses them more deeply during her consultation with Jay.

I have never performed a competitive analysis of artists who respond to commission requests, but I’d guess that some are better at collaborating with clients than others.

And the ones that collaborate well earn a positive reputation, which translates to increased revenue over those who don’t collaborate well.

How should YOU collaborate?

But of course Bredemarket doesn’t matter, and Paso Artis doesn’t matter. You matter.

When you collaborate with a partner, either one in which the partner provides a product or service to you, or you provide a product or service to the partner, make sure that both of you are on the same page (or easel) before launching into the work project.

And if you have a dream for a painting, contact Paso Artis via her Facebook page.

And if you want your blog posts, white papers, case studies, and other content to be regarded with affection (or something like that), contact Bredemarket.

Five Truths About Your Target Audiences

This post explains what “pillar pages” are, the pros and cons of Bredemarket’s pillar pages, what I’ve learned from the “Target Audience” pillar page that I created, and how this can help your business deliver effective, converting messages to your prospects.

What are pillar pages?

I’ve been working on “pillar pages” for the Bredemarket website for over a year now.

By Rama – Own work, CC BY-SA 2.0 fr, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=638837

As I stated before in an April 2022 blog post, a “pillar page” is simply a central “cluster” page on your website that discusses an important topic, and which is linked to other pages that provide more detail on the topic.

Think of a wheel with a hub and spokes. The pillar page is the hub, and the related pages are the spokes.

By Zereshk, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=171752

How can Bredemarket’s pillar pages be better?

As of July 5, 2023, I have created five pillar pages, which I label as “topics of interest” on Bredemarket’s “Information” page.

Now these pillar pages aren’t as mature as I’d like them to be.

  • I haven’t really multi-layered my keywords that link to the pillar; currently things are fairly simplistic where benefit “spoke” blog posts link to the benefits “hub” pillar. I haven’t explicitly optimized the “hub and spokes” for people who search for, say, features.
  • Similarly, the organization of each pillar page is fairly simplistic. Each pillar starts with a brief discussion of the topic in question, and is then followed by excerpts from and links to blog posts that provide more detail on the topic. (And the blog posts themselves link back to the pillar, providing bidirectional…um, benefits.) It’s functional, but perhaps you’d be better served if the pillars grouped subtopics together, rather than listing all the blog posts in reverse chronological order.

But the pillars do their work in terms of navigation and search engine optimization. If you want to find out what Bredemarket says about a topic such as benefits, it’s fairly easy to find this.

What have I learned from the Bredemarket Target Audience pillar page?

This post delves into the fifth of my five pillar pages, the Target Audience page.

By Christian Gidlöf – Photo taken by Christian Gidlöf, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2065930

I’ve recently worked on beefing up this pillar page by linking to more Bredemarket blog posts that discuss target audiences. And in the process of making these additions, I’ve realized some things about target audiences that I wanted to summarize here. (Repurposing content refocuses the mind, I guess.)

In the process of improving my pillar page, I’ve gleaned five truths about target audiences:

  1. You need to define at least one target audience.
  2. It’s not illegal to have multiple target audiences.
  3. Different target audiences get different messages.
  4. You can create personas, or you can not create personas. Whatever floats your boat.
  5. Target audience definition focuses your content.

I’ll discuss each of these truths and suggest how they can improve your firm’s content.

One: You Need to Define At Least One Target Audience.

The first and most important thing is that you need a target audience before you start writing.

By David Shankbone – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2786722

If you have no target audience, who is receiving your message? How do you know what to say?

For example, the primary target audience for THIS blog post is anyone from any type of company who could use Bredemarket’s marketing and writing services. It’s not limited to just the identity folks, or just the Inland Empire folks. If it were, I’d write it differently.

Here’s another target audience example that I used in an October 2022 blog post:

  • If you’re a lollipop maker and you’re writing for kids who buy lollipops in convenience stores, you’ll write one way.
  • If you’re a lollipop maker and you’re writing to the convenience stores who could carry your lollipops, you’ll write another way.
From https://bredemarket.com/2022/10/30/six-questions-your-content-creator-should-ask-you/

Do you see how target audiences influence what you write?

Two: It’s Not Illegal to Have Multiple Target Audiences.

I recently criticized myself in jest because my self-promotional LinkedIn post identified two target audiences: companies who could use my services as a full-time employee, and companies who could use my services as a Bredemarket contract consultant.

This does have some drawbacks, since if I had chosen one or the other, I could have streamlined my post and made my message stronger.

But in this particular case, I chose to “muddy the waters.” Mary, grab the baby, targets rising.

Not Limp Bizkit. From https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhF7gnRZBpY

The content addressed two target audiences at the same time, although this post prioritized the companies looking for full-time employees.

As long as you know in advance what you’re going to do, you can define multiple target audiences. Just don’t define a dozen target audiences for a 288-character tweet.

Three: Different Target Audiences Get Different Messages.

Perhaps you are writing a single piece of content that must address multiple target audiences. A proposal is an example of this. For example, a proposal in response to a request for proposal (RFP) for an automated biometric identification system (ABIS) affects multiple target audiences.

By Love Makes A Way – https://www.flickr.com/photos/lovemakesaway/15802177909/, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=101171928

Here’s an example of multiple target audiences for a theoretical Ontario, California ABIS proposal, taken from a May 2021 Bredemarket post:

  • Field investigators.
  • Examiners.
  • People who capture biometrics.
  • Information Technologies.
  • Purchasing.
  • The privacy advocate.
  • The mayor.
  • Others.

That’s a lot of target audiences, but if you’re submitting a 300 page proposal that answers hundreds of individual questions, you have the ability to customize each of the hundreds of responses to address the affected target audience(s).

For example, if the RFP asks about the maximum resolution of captured latent fingerprint images, your response will address the needs of the “examiner” target audience. Your response to that question won’t need to say anything about your compliance with city purchasing regulations. (Unless you have a really weird city, which is possible I guess.)

At the same time, if the RFP asks if you comply with E-Verify, this is NOT the time to brag about supporting 4,000 pixels per inch image capture.

Four: You Can Create Personas, Or You Can Not Create Personas. Whatever Floats Your Boat.

If you haven’t read the Bredemarket blog that much, you should know that I’m not very hung up on processes—unless my client (or my employer) insists on them. Then they’re the most important thing in the world.

If you find yourself trapped in a room (preferably padded) with a bunch of certified marketing professionals, they’ll probably toss around the word “persona” a lot. A persona helps you visualize your target audience by writing to someone with a particular set of attributes. Here’s an example from the October 2022 post I cited earlier:

Jane Smith is a 54 year old single white owner of a convenience store in a rural area with an MBA and a love for Limp Bizkit…

From https://bredemarket.com/2022/10/30/six-questions-your-content-creator-should-ask-you/

If I’m going to write a particular piece of content, this persona helps me focus my writing. As I write, I can picture Jane in my mind, fetching the giant cups for the soda dispenser, planning her next trip to the big city, and wondering if her customers would mind if she started blasting this song.

Not the Seldom Scene.

Having this persona in my mind can be an excellent writing support.

  • What would Jane think about a list of target audience truths?
  • What would Jane think if a Limp Bizkit song appeared in the middle of the list? (She’d like that.)
  • Most importantly, would that post about target audiences induce Jane to explore the Bredemarket 400 Short Writing Service?

So you can create personas, either on the fly (take a LinkedIn profile of a real person and change a few facts so that the persona becomes Jim, a 35 year old product/content marketer who specializes in healthcare) or through an extensive and expensive persona research program.

By Idaho National Laboratory – Flickr: Microscopy lab, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=16101131

But what if you escape from the padded room, run away from the marketing professionals, and swear up and down that you will never ever create a persona?

Will your marketing efforts die?

No they won’t.

You can still target your writing without inventing demographic information about the person reading your content.

It depends upon the effort you want to invest in the task.

Five: Target Audience Definition Focuses Your Content.

I kind of already said this, but I wanted to explicitly repeat it and emphasize it.

Regardless of whether your target audience is defined by an expensive research effort, a tweak of a real person’s LinkedIn profile, or the simple statement “we want to target latent fingerprint examiners,” the simple act of defining your target audience focuses your content.

By Lookang many thanks to author of original simulation = Fu-Kwun Hwang author of Easy Java Simulation = Francisco Esquembre – Own work http://weelookang.blogspot.com/2015/05/ejss-thin-converging-diverging-lens-ray.html, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=40429189

Your text addresses the target audience, and doesn’t go off on tangents that bear no relation to your target audience.

This makes your message much more effective.

But is the message of this post resonating with companies needing content creators?

If you’re still reading, I guess it is.

Bredemarket can help you define your target audience for your content, and can help you define other things also that are necessary for effective content.

Would you like to talk to me about the content you want to create, and the message you want to deliver to your target audience?

Are you ready to take your firm to the next level with a compelling message that addresses your target audience(s) and increases awareness, consideration, conversion, and long-term revenue?

Let’s talk today!

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to cross-reference this blog post with my Target Audience pillar page.

How Bredemarket’s Six Questions Support Strategic Content Marketing

(UPDATE OCTOBER 23, 2023: “SIX QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU IS SO 2022. DOWNLOAD THE NEWER “SEVEN QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU” HERE.)

Just for fun, I’m going to challenge my assertion that there are six questions that your content creator must ask you before creating content.

I ought to know about these six questions. As a content marketing expert, I wrote the book on the topic.

To download this e-book, go to https://bredemarket.com/2022/12/18/six-questions-your-content-creator-should-ask-you-the-e-book-version/.

If you haven’t read the e-book, the six questions are:

  1. Why?
  2. How?
  3. What?
  4. Goal?
  5. Benefits?
  6. Target Audience?

The idea is that your content creator hosts a kickoff session, asks you the six questions, and only then starts to create the content in question—the blog post, case study, or whatever.

Are the six questions overkill?

But simplicity advocates may argue that those six questions are five questions too many.

Analysis paralysis may prevent you from moving forward at all, much less realizing your content creation goal. Perhaps you should be more efficient and just put pen to paper and, as the shoe people say, just do it.

By http://www.seeklogo.com/nike-classic-logo-99493.html, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=48024270

I found a content marketing expert who agreed with this assertion, and wrote a post entitled “In marketing, move quickly.”

That content marketing expert was…well, it was me.

I ran across a local company (which I will not name) that issued a press release in December 2021. In part, the press release mentioned the local company’s new dedication to the marketing function.

From https://bredemarket.com/2022/03/23/in-marketing-move-quickly/

The company had hired an international marketing firm “to develop comprehensive marketing strategies….We expect their work to incorporate a website redesign, brand refresh, new strategic messaging and content, as well as focused video and digital campaigns.”

So, when I wrote the “In marketing, move quickly” post three months later, what had this international marketing firm accomplished in the interim?

The website has a full slew of data sheets on the company’s products, and I found a 2017 brochure that effectively served as a white paper. But that’s it; no other white papers, and no case studies describing happy customers’ experiences.

The company’s YouTube channel has two videos from 2021.

The company’s Facebook page hasn’t posted anything since 2017.

Neither of the company’s LinkedIn pages (yes, the company has two LinkedIn pages) has any posts.

From https://bredemarket.com/2022/03/23/in-marketing-move-quickly/

Now I have no visibility into this particular company, but I’ve been around the block to guess that the international marketing firm was probably still in the analysis stage, optimizing synergies according to “out of the box” criteria, to ensure bleeding-edge revenue maximization.

No, the six questions aren’t overkill

After reviewing what I wrote before in that blog post, I realize that my e-book lacks a very important point.

Don’t spend three months answering the six questions.

I shouldn’t HAVE to say this, but perhaps it’s safer to explicitly say it.

Now practices can very from consultation to consultation, but it’s very likely that a content creator and their client can breeze through those six questions in half an hour or less.

Or maybe the client can answer the questions on their own before the meeting.

If your content marketing expert schedules six one-hour meetings (or worse still, workshops) to address the six questions, run away!

(Is the content marketing expert billing by the hour?)

And the six questions create a content strategy

There’s something else that I failed to explicitly say in my e-book.

Not only do the answers to the six questions benefit that one piece of content, but they benefit everything else that your company does.

For example, let’s say that a content marketing expert is working with a gourmet ice cream shoppe (not a shop, but a shoppe), and the proprietor (Jane Cold) answers the “how” question as follows:

At Jane’s Gourmet Ice Cream Shoppe, we keep the internal dining temperature below 50 degrees Fahrenheit to ensure that our guests enjoy ice cream as it was meant to be enjoyed. We inform our guests of our temperature policy beforehand to ensure they bring proper attire.

By Edward S. Curtis – This file was derived from: Inupiat Family from Noatak, Alaska, 1929, Edward S. Curtis.jpg, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=24953870

Now let’s say that the piece of content in question is a social media post describing a new farkleberry ice cream flavor. (Thanks, Live Eat Learn.)

By Eric Hunt – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=85068643

While the content marketing expert will use the answer to the “how” question to create the content, the ramifications go far beyond the social media post itself.

  • Perhaps the new flavor could be branded “Frigid Farkleberry” to suggest how the ice cream should best be enjoyed.
  • Maybe in addition to branding, the “how” answer may even influence pricing. Perhaps prices incorporate the number “32,” as in a single-scoop price of $4.32. (Yes that price is high, but after all this is an ice cream shoppe.)

And what of future social media posts?

Let me clue you in on a little secret: once your content marketing expert has asked the six questions for the first piece of content, the kickoff is much quicker for subsequent pieces of content.

Chances are the basic “why” and “how” won’t change, although some of the later questions such as the target audience could change for each individual piece of content.

So without explicitly trying to do so, the six questions have created a de facto content marketing strategy. After creating five pieces of content, you’ve essentially defined your company’s mission, purpose, and differentiators, and may have defined as many as five separate vertical markets along the way.

Not a bad investment of thirty minutes of time.

(But a terrible investment of three months of time.)

An exercise for you

Normally this is the point where I’d tell you to contact me if you want to use Bredemarket’s content marketing expertise. But this time I’m going to do something different.

  • Why don’t you think of a piece of content you want to create?
  • Once you’ve decided on that, why don’t you ask yourself the six questions?
  • Once you have the answers, why don’t you see what type of overall content marketing strategy you can shape, solely based on those six responses?