Humans love to tell and listen to stories. From childhood, storytelling has been a natural way for us to connect and converse – a fundamental part of our daily lives, and business stories are no different. When communicating in a business sales setting, we seek understanding, shared values and sense of purpose. Are they on a similar path? Do they understand my needs? Can they help me achieve my goals? Essentially, we're looking for a culture of like-minded individuals who will be engaging and rewarding to work with. We're looking for collaborators who will help us reach our goals faster and ..read more

Architects and specifiers are looking for the bare facts, with no spin. When product selection is tied so closely to professional reputation and risk, they take this assessment process seriously and have no patience for inflated claims or greenwashing. If you’re a manufacturer or importer of building products in Aotearoa New Zealand, your brochure and product web pages are key sales and marketing assets when building brand awareness, lead generation, reputation and trust. Up until recently, there has been limited guidance on what information to include, and the industry has kept information ..read more

AS PUBLISHED ON THE STUFF WEBSITE. We review one of my favourite content types for B2B and professional services brands – thought leadership articles. The most successful businesses solve deep client needs and articulate this clearly and frequently to the market. Clients seek trusted advisors, so to be known as an expert in your niche – and ideally become the default choice – you need to educate, entertain, engage and / or inspire. Thought leadership is nothing new, but how we do it in 2020 is quite different to how we practised authority building in 2009. It requires a strategic choice of t ..read more

AS PUBLISHED ON THE STUFF WEBSITE. To get the best ROI from your content, publish ideas and insights that are useful and useable for your ideal clients at different stages of their customer journey. You get the best return on your investment when you reach prospects with relevant and helpful information at the right stage of their customer journey. The right people need to know that you exist, and have the product, service and support they are looking for. By engaging them through blogs, articles, case studies or white papers, you can demonstrate your knowledge, expertise, and value to them ..read more

The customer journey – also called the sales funnel – is a framework for describing how a prospective customer converts from stranger to lead to convert. We use the framework to review how your content marketing efforts support this journey so that customers find you, engage with your content, email, call or sign up to your newsletter, and become a paying customer. In this article, I explore some of the best ways to attract new customers with your content, build trust and confidence, and some best practice case studies. 1. Exploration A prospective customer is in research mode and they searc ..read more

We're studying the capability of the language generator ChatGPT and how we can incorporate AI into our work to bring greater value. Besides the obvious downsides of its generic content, the main issue is that it doesn’t provide references. As of 8 February 2023 ChatGPT (or its parent entity, OpenAI) claims to own copyright in the written material it generates. But since there’s a risk the bot harvests material from copyrighted sources – and ChatGPT doesn’t give citations – where does that leave its customers? The answer, for now, seems to be ‘user beware’. Andrea: Who owns the copyright in a ..read more

Creating great content is fundamental to digital marketing success for B2B companies. And a content calendar is the best way to plan it, execute it, and track it. No matter its form or the tools used to create it, using a content calendar will help you: • become more strategic in your content planning and creation, • plan in advance to tie your content into key industry events, • plan your resourcing and budgeting better (text, photos, video), • streamline workflows to create higher-quality copy, photos, and video, • schedule content across different media platforms for maximum impact, • ke ..read more

Learn how to create a more powerful capability statement to express your true worth and stop being bypassed for companies who explain their value better. Capability Statement, Services Guide, Company Profile or Brochure – these are all terms used to describe the same document: an 8- to 16-page PDF or printed asset that answers who you are, what you do, why you do it, how you do it and your track record. They are shared with new and potential customers, with some pages used in RFP and tender submissions. Shared as a download on your website, attached to a cold outreach email, printed and dis ..read more

AS PUBLISHED ON THE STUFF WEBSITE The truth is that continually creating new content – whether it’s for your blog, or another marketing channel – takes up a lot of valuable time. Yes, regularly publishing content positions you in the market and brings in prospects, and therefore income – but if it’s eating into working hours, then it can feel counterproductive, and something’s got to give. Work it The smart solution is simply to make your content go further. Stretch it. Each piece of original content – a 700-word post, for instance, or a vlog or podcast – can be repurposed for other channel ..read more

Content marketing is the strategic and creative use of words, images, audio and video to engage, inform and inspire a defined audience. Potential clients try to assess the value you offer – including your philosophy, differentiators and expertise – based on the information you publish and present. Folio director Andrea Stevens presents contemporary frameworks for building your website content, authority and visibility. She looks at foundation assets – such as your profiles, bios and case studies – and how these fit into the ‘customer journey’ and breadcrumb trail that leads clients to your bra ..read more