Category: Personal

If you’ve watched an ad break on tv lately, you may be struck by how many of our household brands have re-positioned their advertising to ‘speak to’ the challenges we face during the COVID pandemic.

Something as simple as an ad for oven chips now becomes a message about the importance of enjoying simple family pleasures, at home.

In these constantly shifting sands, it’s ok to remind your customers that you are still out there with value to add to their lives and solutions to their problems.  

When reviewing our communications strategy through periods of change, some of us will follow our own instinct and some will seek help from specialist communication experts.  To get you started on the right foot, here are some key principles to follow when considering an approach that’s best for your business:

Show Empathy and avoid the hard sell

If you take nothing else from this blog, remember this;  Each and every one of your stakeholders (whether consumers on the high street, surfers on the web or B 2 B clients) are humans.  They are living this pandemic and tackling all the personal trials and sacrifices left in its wake. It is vital to strike a delicate balance between reminding our customers that we are there, thinking about them and ready to help with their needs while avoiding the hard sell like never before.  It’s unethical, unhelpful and, frankly, just wrong.

Be realistic but not pessimistic

Now is not the time to pretend everything is normal.  It just won’t wash. Acknowledge the challenges you face as a business but focus on how you are working through them while keeping the needs of your customers and staff at the forefront of all your decisions.  Be aware that everyone’s priorities will have changed in some way over the past year and demonstrate how you are in tune with that.  Ask your audience for ideas on how you can serve them better or make their lives easier.  Or, if you have the resources to create it, provide quality, informative and topical guides online that will leave a lasting feeling of brand engagement.

Tailor your channel and frequency to the message

When it comes to communicating through change, it’s vital to remember not one size fits all.  If you have a shop front, for example, and needed to temporarily close your doors or amend your opening hours,  your key priority is providing accurate information on the status quo through your preferred social media channels and update tools such as Google My Business accordingly.

If you are in the B 2 B space and your practical operation has continued largely as normal with the exception of home working, you might want to consider more of an opinion piece on your corporate blog where you can share high level insight on how you have shown industry leadership in pivoting through the crisis.

We are all dealing with some combination of adjustment to home-working, employee sick leave, loss of sales or health and safety concerns so now is the time to support, tread carefully but not be ashamed to keep your head above water.

Connect with your wider Community

During times of crisis, it’s advisable to avoid swamping your communication channels with new product launches or heavy handed promotions or re-brands.  Instead, why not carve out some space on your website/ blog/ social media platforms to support the local communities that your stakeholders care about?

For example, could you introduce a ‘local hero spotlight’ feature in your news section or seek nominations for a local charity to sponsor? This is especially beneficial to businesses whose brand voice is synonymous with caring, support, partnership and relationship building – which, let’s face it, is a space most of us want to occupy. Use any opportunity to remind your customers that they are not alone in times of crisis.

Only speak when you have something useful to say.

I’ve saved the best for last.  This can not be overstated.  Even in the ‘good times’ it’s very easy to over communicate as a brand.  And all it leads to is customer apathy at best and, at worst, resentment of the flood of e-marketing filling up their phones and inbox.  The best advice I can offer here is that it’s important to communicate with customers but only if it’s about something that’s important to them.  Have you got something genuinely helpful to offer them?  Is it a crisis-friendly pricing schedule? Do you have some top tips to offer them through a tough patch? Can you cross refer them to another trusted advisor/ service that is relevant to their needs?

If you don’t lose sight of these principles and stay true to your brand values, there is no doubt that you will leave a lasting legacy in the minds of your customers. This, after all, is much more valuable than converting every sale or pretending to have all the answers during a time of universal crisis.

If you need any further support of guidance with your content marketing or business communications, I’d be delighted to have a chat about how I can help you achieve your goals. 

Whether you are familiar with the term content marketing or not, business owners across the land are reaping huge benefits from learning the basics of this craft.

As our lives become busier and competition for our cash fiercer, we’ve developed a hound-like ability to sniff out and reject ‘traditional’ online advertising.  And so the use of Content Marketing has grown in popularity year after year.  Put simply, it is the act of providing potential customers with genuinely valuable content on a common theme or challenge to attract their attention and build trust in your product or service.

Many businesses seek specialist help to create and deliver a bespoke content marketing strategy for your business but,  by following 5 key principles,  it’s very achievable to upskill yourself and colleagues on the basics.

What are the 5 things you should never forget about Content Marketing?

1. Your audience are the start, middle and end of your content marketing strategy.

But let’s be clear.  This is about defining the audience you actually want to reach rather than the audience you think you want.  And the best way to achieve this is by using your creative skills to bring your audience ‘persona’ or ‘avatar’ to life.  Leave no detail to chance.  What age are they?  Where do they live?  What media do they consume, hobbies do they have, company do they keep and what daily pain points do they face?  Once you have built up as much detail as you can about this persona, you may be surprised how you can deviate away from previous misconceptions about your target audience.

• Tone of Voice

Now you know who you’re speaking to, you need to make sure you decide on the best tone of voice to connect your brand values with this audience.  If you think of the brands that you have a strong relationship with, what is it about their voice that cuts through the noise and makes you take notice?  Is it the sense of humour of a drinks brand or the reassuring maternal voice of a childhood medicines provider?  Just as we talk to our nearest and dearest with a different tone than a future employer, for example, it’s vital to remain consistent throughout your content marketing channels.  Which brings me neatly on to principle No. 3….

• Consider your Media (or other) Channels wisely

We live in a time of over-crowding on the information superhighway and it’s easy to be tempted to try and tick every box on our content marketing journey.  But please don’t waste time and energy trying to spread yourself too thin in some sort of ‘catch all’ approach.  The reality is that your core audience will be hanging out in a few key places.  Which brings us back to point 1. – knowing WHO they are – to decide on your priority channels – be that web content, social media or traditional print/ broadcast media. This may sound obvious but it’s remarkable how often it’s forgotten.  Is your target audience likely to be visually stimulated with a limited attention span or are you looking to land your CEO thought leadership article at a B2B audience to build reputation with industry peers?  I’ll let you join the dots to Instagram, Twitter, Linkedin or a Blog post.

• Make your content as valuable as your resources will allow.

So, now you know who you are talking to and through what channel, it’s time to get serious with the substance!  I try to remember three main prompts when compiling content for my clients:  Is it relevant, valuable and shareable?  If not, ditch it or seek help to make it so! If you have a bit of budget,  you could also consider conducting a short survey to give a ‘top line’ or news hook to your content and show that you know your customers inside out.  Keep abreast of news topics in your field using simple tools such as Google news alerts or BuzzSumo but never forget the litmus test above!

• Have the confidence to go for it, measure how it lands, and build on this for next time.

Don’t worry if your first foray into content marketing does not change the world overnight.  Even the most adept content marketeers didn’t get there overnight.  The more you do it, the more you will develop an instinct for it and generate a resource of analytics that can help you understand your audience more.  For example, let’s say you’re in the DIY business. If your blog post offering top 5 tips to maximise space in your garden shed generated more likes, shares and click-throughs to your website than a Facebook Live demonstration on the latest high spec power drill technology on sale,  it may be time to focus on a blog content plan for the next 6 months and pop the camera down for a rest.

If you need any further support of guidance with your content marketing or business communications, I’d be delighted to have a chat about how I can help you achieve your goals. 

It’s business.  Leave your emotions at the door!

Jordan Belfort

So said The Wolf of Wall Street.  And, while there’s no doubt he tasted a certain success, I think most of us know how that story ends!  So, when it comes to business communications, I’m an strong advocate for making your emotions work for you.

For a very long time, many have believed that your business profile should  be free from the ‘complications’ of emotion, allowing you to focus instead on solid and deliverable solutions to practical needs.

In my experience as a Freelance Writer working with a wide range of businesses, however, those who make the deepest connection with their customers (existing or potential) achieve this by remembering one key fact.  

We are all human and we all feel emotions, be those fear, loss, panic, ambition, or joy. 

So, not just showing emotion but truly humanising your business writing and communication will ensure more meaningful engagement with your target audience and stakeholders in the long run.

Four key principles of humanising business writing

If you are considering writing a blog post or newsletter for example, to drive traffic to your website, there are some key principles that I would recommend you follow:

Keep your customers in mind and try to talk to THEIR emotions – use empathy and understanding to connect as quickly as possible with the specific ‘pain point’ that you can best help them solve.

Selling family portrait photography?  Then tug hard on those parental trigger points. Remind them that their children are growing up fast and those precious and heart-warming family moments and stages must be caught now or lost forever, in a tidal wave of regret and fading memories.

Selling financial services? Even products which may, on the surface, appear less driven by emotion than practical need, can connect using emotion.  Feeling overwhelmed by the burden of tax compliance?  Can a trusted and reliable professional take this heavy load off your overwhelming to-do list?

Include your colleagues in your communications

Here’s a secret you may have heard before – people connect with people far more than products or services.  So, introduce your team and colleagues as real people with lives, opinions and personal experiences to your business writing.  This can include anything from employee recommendations to an ‘employee in focus’ for example. Personally, I love reading the staff reviews of books in Waterstones.  What a brilliantly personal touch.

Use Video and Imagery to tell your story

Humans are, by nature, a very visually stimulated bunch.  There is plenty of impressive research out there to prove the transformative power that a brief engaging video clip or still image can have on our business posts, tweets or e-marketing.  And don’t worry,  it doesn’t have to be taken by a professional.  A 60 second montage created on any one of the many free creative tools out there such as Vimeo or Canva is just perfect.  

Invite your audience into the side of your business they might not always see.

Consider for example, an ice cream seller.  We all know what a tub of your favourite ice cream looks like, tastes like and makes you feel when you see it sitting in your freezer on a hot day, beckoning you forth to devour it straight from the tub.  But,  if you knew a little bit more about the decades long relationship the makers have with the same British farm whose dairy cattle supply them with cream,  wouldn’t you feel a little bit more invested in the brand?  Or,  if you heard from the factory employee who has, for the last 30 years, put his heart and soul in to making the beautiful bedroom furniture you are browsing for your child’s bedroom, wouldn’t you be a little bit more inclined to trust the end product?

Stay targeted and don’t go off topic

One of the surest fire ways to lose your audience, through almost any media or communications channel is to veer repeatedly off topic and indulge in unnecessary ramblings.  

Trust me, this is the death of effective business communications.  Now more than ever, we are all time starved, over-burdened humans often just trying to get through each day with minimal stress and maximum achievement.  If you want to capture a reader’s attention, you have to work hard and fast to make your point.

Generally speaking, if it’s an article, blog post, press release, newsletter or thought leadership piece,  you have the headline, first and – if you’re lucky – second sentence to convince readers that ‘s worth going any further.

Keep focussed on one topic, service, product or feature/ benefit at a time.  Offer your audience clear take-aways, a call to action and never loose sight of the core objective – whether that is to provide valuable, sharable content, drive click-through rates or convert a sale.

And finally, keep the look of your communications simple and non-intimidating, avoiding too much clutter and remember plenty of white space to let the words and images stand out.

If you need any further support of guidance with your business communications, I’d be delighted to have a chat about how I can help you achieve your goals. 

As we send our little cherubs back off to school after the longest summer holiday in history, the well-earned peace and head space presents us with the perfect opportunity to go back to the classroom too and revise the basics of effective business writing.

Whether you are getting to grips with doing it yourself or looking for some expert business writing help, here are my top tips to keep you on track for the new term!

• An irresistible headline and opening paragraph.

Capture their attention with a short, sharp headline and first line.  Your customers, clients or stakeholders are very busy people with a million things competing for their attention every day.  The single most important line you will write in any communication is the first one. So be creative, use powerful words but few of them and promise the reader a reward for their time invested in your space.

• Avoid jargon like the plague.

Yes, you want to sound like an expert in your field and you want to impress with the depth of your subject specific language but, trust me,  unless you’re preparing a presentation to the Board, jargon is the death of business communications.  Imagine your target audience was sitting next to you in a coffee shop and you had 5 minutes to get your point across. Don’t make any assumptions about your readers’ knowledge of the subject area. “That was far too simple and jargon-free” said no-one, ever.

• Keep your audience front of mind with every sentence, image, video or link.  It’s vital that you do your customer research before investing the time and effort into a content marketing strategy, blog, social media feed or newsletter.  Who exactly are you appealing to?,  what ‘pain points’ are you claiming to solve and what communication channels are you likely to reach them with.

• Include professionally researched facts, sources and a solid call to action at the end.  There is an extremely limited audience for self-indulgent ramblings.  You need to offer quality content in a timely manner and reference external sources where appropriate. Assume your readers have even less spare time than you and work hard to give them added value and take appropriate action, whether that’s a click through to book, buy, try or refer a friend.

• Keep your tone of voice consistent.  Think in advance about how you want to come across.  If you’re writing an internal staff newsletter, remember that you want to sound inclusive and motivational.  If it’s customer facing content marketing, driven by a specific product or service don’t forget to stay on message and keep it relevant, remind the reader that they are not alone in seeking help for their need and you are their knight in shining armour who can make their life better.

• SEO, or Search Engine Optimisation.  Seen as a dark art by some or a constantly shifting landscape by others but ultimately it all boils down to a simple concept.  There’s no point in writing award-winning business prose if no one is going to find it online or hang around long enough to know who you are.  Seek professional help if needed or access some of the multitude of free resources online but get up to speed on your keywords, backlinks and alt text.  It’s sink or swim out there folks!

• Check, double check and check again.  The importance of conducting proper quality control before sharing or publishing your work can not be overstated.  This is your chance, as an individual or a business, to demonstrate that you offer the ‘gold standard’ in professionalism and attention to detail.  If you let typos and grammatical errors or sloppy formatting slip through, you have to think about what impression that will leave.  Even the most seasoned of writers can be guilty of the odd spelling blunder after a tough day at the office. I was going to include one in this, just to test you out but it was too painful for me to swallow.  So, if you spot one, please do let me no!

Allison Meldrum is a Freelance Writer and Communications Consultant with experience in Health, Well-being and Fitness sectors

Writing and running. Two words that sum up how I survived lockdown: for varying reasons and with greater or lesser challenge each time but always to the undeniable benefit of my mental and physical health.

And I know I’m in good company here, with Nuffield Health reporting that three quarters of Brits took up a new form of exercise during the COVID-19 crisis. Indeed, has there ever been a better time to release that best-selling novel that lives within us all?

It was multi award winning Japanese writer Haruki Murikami who beautifully intertwined these apparently unrelated pursuits as ‘exerting yourself to the fullest within your individual limits’ in his book What I talk about when I talk about running.  He describes how being active every day makes it easier to hear that inner voice.  You know, the same one that pops into your head with a devasting response to convert your doubters or win over potential new clients, if only it had spoken up at the time!

It’s that same inner voice that instinctively knows just how much you can offer your clients or customers but translating those words into communications that deliver results is where many of us need a bit of extra help.  Top ten tips such as these from Stuart Bruce are a great way to channel that inner voice in the right direction during the most uncertain of times. 

On a lighter note, my favourite childhood writer, A.A. Milne adopted a gentle and meditatively calming approach to reminding millions about the importance of looking after your mind and body in equal measure, especially when times are testing and it’s all too easy to doubt yourself.  As Piglet told Pooh;

“The things that make me different are the things that make me me.”

A.A Milne

I don’t even remember first hearing these words but, just like the finest writers of all time, the genius of the message is in its simplicity.  Milne didn’t deal in ‘fancy’ language or heavy-handed lessons.  But somehow, his expertly crafted words and engaging storytelling carried his readers – of all ages – along in an effortless and unforgettable journey.   

Content Writing for your Business

In my role as a freelance writer, I use words to bring your story, brand or vision alive in a way that stays with readers for the long-run  (pun fully intended).   Just as ‘running bores’ are more likely to turn you off the hobby than on, effective copy writing is not about preaching, teaching, selling or unwelcome sermons.  It’s about creating content which helps you to market or ‘exert yourself to your fullest potential’, across key communications platforms according to your unique objectives.  And, perhaps most importantly, it’s about writing that your audience will take pleasure in reading.  Whether that is through a blog post, newsletter or editorial feature.  

Consider, for example, my attitude to physical activity.

If you were to rewind a couple of decades to my younger self, anyone aiming to ‘sell me’ the benefits of running – not just for a taxi – but 2 – 3 times a week would be facing what is described in marketing terms as the impossible brief.

This is the girl who would do anything to avoid the school sports field and saw ‘runners’ as a strange species who pound the pavements at all hours with painful grimaces and sweat dripping from every pore.  Where’s the fun in that?

Fast forward just a few years and that same girl will tell you that there is no more rewarding freedom than pulling on her trainers and escaping from the responsibilities of motherhood and life-at-large during a solid 10km run around my beautiful corner of Scotland.   I don’t run to be ‘a runner’ or to achieve a PB or to lose weight (although I wouldn’t reject any of these).  I run for the simple joy of being in the open air and feeling my lungs and heart getting a little bit stronger with each step.

And when I’m faced with an exciting new client brief– however seemingly complex or challenging it first appears – my approach is equally simple.  Just as we learn the most important life lessons from some of the simplest tales we hear as children.

It begins with gaining a deep understanding of your target audience – what makes them tick?  What are their ‘pain points’ and how can you reach out to them and convince them to let you make their life that little bit easier?

Nowadays we are spoilt for choice with regards to communication channels.  We can blog, vlog, tweet, tag and a multitude of other fantastically immediate options.  Call me old-fashioned but – as we Tik Tok and Insta our way through life’s twists and turns, I believe that the fundamentals of powerful story-telling cuts across all channels. 

So, whether your needs are more Haruki Murikami or Winnie the Pooh, I would love to hear from you soon. 

Allison Meldrum is a Freelance Writer and Communications Consultant with experience in Health, Well-being and Fitness sectors