approach
What is “Content Marketing?”
“Content marketing is the art of understanding exactly what your customers need to know and delivering it to them in a relevant and compelling way.”
Get Content Get Customers – Turn Prospects into Buyers with Content Marketing
Joe Pulizzi and Newt Barrett
Today’s buyer comes to you much later in the sales cycle than previously – and arrives highly self-educated. Refocusing your marketing efforts from the more traditional, “interruption” methods towards generating valuable content that draws prospects to your website is essential to thrive in the new marketplace.
Corinne’s Approach
Corinne is passionate about how interactive the web has become. In 2000, she partnered with a tech-savvy friend to publish an ezine called intrazine for a year, which was designed to create community in the workplace. This project was a result of Corinne's regard for the integral role community plays in all aspects of life, and her belief that the web was the ideal next home of a new kind of community.
To view a sample issue (December/November 2000) of intrazine, click here.
Since then, Corinne has only become more convinced of the power of story to persuade, influence and connect people. It is her view that all marketing communications materials are a form of story: the case study is a success story, the sales letter or brochure tells the prospective customer that the business appreciates their story, the white paper tells a story of a better way. Every time a prospect or customer enters the door of the business, in any fashion, there are stories to be exchanged and a rich bridge between to be built.
Interactivity on the web means the ability to truly engage with the customer and one of the most powerful ways to do that is through story. The internet has raised customers' expectations - to be included, heard, acknowledged and partnered with, versus hard-sold. The economy has changed, and will continue to change, buying factors and habits. Companies must keep up, or, even better, lead the way.
"Xerox - recognizing that its repair personnel learned to fix machines by trading stories rather than by reading manuals - has collected its stories into a database called Eureka that Fortune magazine estimates is worth $100 million to the company."
A Whole New Mind, Daniel H. Pink
"This is the role that stories play - putting knowledge into a framework that is more lifelike, more true to our day-to-day existence. … Being the audience for a story isn't so passive … Inside, we're getting ready to act."
Made to Stick, Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die, Chip Heath & Dan Heath
"People need a story to organize their thoughts and make sense of things. In fact, anyone you attempt to influence already has a story. … If you tell them a story that makes better sense to them, you can reframe the way they organize their thoughts, the meanings they draw, and thus the actions they take."
The Story Factor, Annette Simmons
What's your story? What's your prospect's story? What's your customer's story? How are these currently being discovered, told, and mined to maximize trust and loyalty, both within your organization and in external communications?
Corinne's approach is to listen for your story and investigate the prospects' story, find where they converge and bring it to life, to inspire action.
