Create Content That Keeps ‘Em Coming Back for More

Your email list is probably more powerful than you realize. As a general rule, email marketing has an ROI of $38 or more for every dollar spent. That’s an incredible 3800% return on investment! Imagine what you could do if you got your email list in shape.

 

One of the best ways to grow your email list is by getting leads to subscribe to your content. Ah, shoot. There’s the problem. No one seems interested enough to subscribe.

 

There are several possible reasons why you aren’t seeing more subscribers. While I won’t go into all of them here, let’s take a look at one of them.

Your buyers want to subscribe to content they can get excited about — your email should be the thing they open first in the morning, like the grandma whose birthday cards always contain a couple of $20 bills, not the five bucks you’ll get from the other grandparents.

 

If your customers love reading your content, they’ll love subscribing to it, because they won’t want to miss out on anything. So how do you create content your audience can’t wait to read? I’ll walk you through it in this article.

 

First, I’m going to assume you’re already writing content that your audience finds helpful. It should go without saying that your content needs to be customer-centric. In other words, it’s all about them, and not you. Your articles, emails, and lead generation pieces address your buyers’ concerns, motivations, and pain points. (Yeah, I know. It should go without saying, and yet I said it. Now you know how my wife feels.)

 

Okay, let’s dig in.

Tell stories

Human beings are wired for story. It’s how we organize and understand the world, and even our own selves. One of the things I like to ask people when I first meet them is, “Tell me your story.”

 

Stories are critical in B2B marketing, too. In fact, you just read a little story in the introduction. Can you find it?

 

Stories don’t have to be long — they can be just a sentence or two. But whether you tell a story of 20 words or 2,000 words, the point is to engage your reader’s imagination. Stories bring delight. They tap the emotions. They create a common connection. They inspire action and reactions. Stories are memorable, and they become a part of us. In other words, using stories in your marketing content is powerful.

 

A few guidelines on storytelling in marketing:

 

• Every story has conflict.
• Communicate the risks of failure.
• When telling stories that involve your company, make them about your customers and not you.
• Only tell relevant stories.

Create suspense

How do you keep a blog reader in suspense?

 

Don’t know? I’ll give you the secret.

 

But not yet.

 

(See what I did there?)

 

Suspense in marketing content keeps your readers or viewers interested. It creates an emotional desire to find out what’s next, which leaves them wanting more. Basically, you’re using the ol’ cliffhanger technique that TV shows have mastered.

 

You can use suspense to keep people reading a blog article, watching a video, or following an entire series of content.Here’s a few ways to create suspense:

 

• Introduce uncertainty.
• Delay resolution. Raise questions or problems that need to be resolved, but don’t deliver the answer right away. For example, you might introduce a problem and make a promise that you’ll solve it — but first, explore why traditional solutions don’t work. Only then do you provide the best solution.
• Ask questions. A question demands an answer. People’s ears prick up and their brains start firing. They want to find the answer for themselves. Now your readers are engaging actively with your content. W00T!
• Raise the stakes. Nobody wants to watch a movie with tiny little bumps in the road for the hero. We want epic roadblocks! Luke Skywalker doesn’t just overcome his uncle’s wishes, he saves the galaxy from certain destruction at the last minute. Elizabeth Harmon doesn’t just win a chess game, she beats the world’s greatest player who’s already beaten her twice, while overcoming the demons of addiction. Epic roadblocks don’t have to threaten the entire world — they just threaten the hero’s world. Know your audience’s greatest pains, motivations, and fears, and you’ll be able to key in on the roadblocks they’re facing.

 

Can you find all the ways I’ve used suspense in this post?

 

Suspense can be a powerful tool to keep your audience engaged and interacting with your content — if you use it judiciously. Like any tool, you need the right one for the right job, and you need to use it the right way. Don’t be manipulative! Your audience will see through it and walk away.

Be a voice worth listening to

If your content is just like everyone else’s, you’ll have a hard time fighting against the been-there-done-that response. Your buyers are looking for something new, something they haven’t already seen or heard.

 

Don’t be afraid to buck the industry trend, if the trend needs some bucking — be contrarian, take a stand. Get provocative.

 

Most of the time, your message probably won’t be radically different from other voices in the industry. How do you give them something new if you aren’t taking a different stance? Tell it in a different way! Your brand has its own voice. You have a unique perspective, with unique experience and expertise. You provide a certain value that your competitors don’t provide. Bring that out in your content!

Be easy on the eyes

Maybe you can’t judge a book by its cover, but that doesn’t change the fact that people don’t buy ugly books. It doesn’t matter how good your content is, if your buyers are met with a wall of text, or a website that looks like a remnant from 2015. Bad design speaks volumes. If your content is hard to read or looks bad, you’ll see your visitors head for the door faster than a jackrabbit on a date.

Tap into the emotions

This is a soapbox I’ll stand on all day. B2B marketing content CANNOT be boring. Your B2B customers aren’t organizations — they’re humans. Bore your audience and they’ll tune out and find something else that piques their interests. Show some personality.

 

Your content should also connect emotionally. You don’t have to get melodramatic about it, or pull their heartstrings — just create interesting content that meets your buyers where they’re at emotionally. Are they stressed? Offer relief. Are they indifferent to a problem? Create urgency. Have they been struggling to succeed? Give them a glimpse of victory.

Keep ‘em captive

What happens when your audience has reached the end of your content? What if they got what they came for halfway through your blog article? The last thing you want is for them to click away from your content and never come back. So, give them a reason to stick around!

 

Calls to action (or CTAs as industry insiders like to call them) tell your audience how they can get more content they’ll love. A CTA is an invitation to keep discovering more content, and to take further steps towards becoming a customer.

 

Must-read article: The 3 Worst Call-to-Action Words You’re Probably Using

 

EVERY PIECE OF CONTENT should have some kind of call to action — an opportunity to learn more about the topic, to download relevant content, to subscribe, to request a demo, to talk to a sales person. It can be a button, a pop-up window, a banner on your website — you name it. Generally, it should be visual, appealing, clear, and compelling.

 

If your content doesn’t have a CTA, you’re betting that they won’t go back to their Google search and find your competitors’ content. I wouldn’t take that bet!

Want more? Get more!

Want more email subscribers? Dying to see what 3800% ROI looks like with a bigger email list? Start by taking a look at the content you’ve been creating. Is it worthy of Grandma card status? If not, find one of these tips that you can start working on this week. (No need to tackle them all at once!)

 

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