Picking on the words: campaign

Sometimes, when I comment (okay, rant) on a specific word choice, some of my friends (who shall remain nameless in hopes that they will remain my friends) will say I’m focusing on semantics or that I’m just picking on the words.

Exactly.

People, words are important. We should take care when picking the words we use, especially in this digital-first world where it’s likely people will ‘meet’ you online long before they do so in-person (if that ever happens).

Ironically, even as images and video become increasingly prevalent, the words you choose become even more important — because they represent you.

As Ann Handley says in her book, Everyone Writes, “Words matter. Your words (what you say) and style (how you say it) are your most cherished (and, yet, undervalued) assets.”Agreed (you should pick up her book, by the way).

Which brings me to the word for this time — campaign. Those of us who are self-proclaimed ‘purists’ of content marketing believe that content marketing is not a campaign, because a campaign has a beginning and an end.

Content marketing is ongoing, so to talk about a ‘content marketing campaign’ is akin to referring to ‘military intelligence’ or ‘jumbo shrimp’ — it just doesn’t make any sense.

Campaigns still exist, of course. There are political campaigns and advertising campaigns, both of which have a beginning and an end. And, remarkably, these kinds of campaigns aren’t going anywhere, even as consumers look for and find new ways to avoid both on an almost-daily basis.

Content marketing, on the other hand, isn’t about interrupting. It’s simply about helping. Or, what author and speaker Jay Baer calls Youtility in his book by the same name. Jay says, “The difference between helping and selling is just two letters. But those two letters are critically important to the success of business today.”

Content marketing doesn’t have an end because it’s merely an extension of your business (which hopefully doesn’t have an end, either). So the next time you find yourself talking about a ‘content marketing campaign,’ please,choose one or the other because they are very different things.

Want to nominate a word for next time? Please feel free to do so in the comments!

Advice for younger writers (Or what I wish I knew when my shoes looked as new as yours)

The world is a different place than when I got out of school.

That’s a phrase I swore I’d never speak, much less write down. But, as I’ve gotten older, I’ve realized that:

A.     My parents are not, in fact, stupid

B.     Things change

C.     Keeping up with change is everything

So it is with the intention of helping you, younger writers, that I tell you things have, in fact, changed. I will share with you some public service announcements (PSAs) along the way in hopes that it helps you in your collective journeys. Here we go!

When I first graduated from college, there was no Internet (at least outside of the military) and certainly no Social Media. In fact, newspapers (my first two employers) were doing quite well, thank you very much.

If companies wanted to promote their products or services, they advertised. People couldn’t avoid ads back then (no TiVo, no Netflix) so that’s where I wanted to be. I could make great advertising and help companies promote whatever it was that they sold. My argument to myself: hey, who didn’t have things to sell? This is going to be great.

PSA: If you have to convince yourself of something, question it immediately.

While still in school, I sold advertising in the school newspaper. But it wasn’t selling, really. I attended a very large midwestern university with more than 50,000 students as a captive market (did I mention we were the school newspaper?) so we had to beat the advertisers back with a stick.

Selling? I didn’t know the half of it.

After graduation I thought this newspaper thing was going so well, I should do it full time. I accepted a job selling ad space for a local chain of weekly newspapers. I didn’t realize, until it was too late, that I was, in fact, selling space, not ads.

PSA: Make sure you understand what a job entails before you accept it (especially before you give up the one you already have).

In school, I had grown to love the creative side of crafting a message. This was also at a time when Macintosh started to mean less about fruit and more about computers. So, using a talent for writing I inherited from my mom, I started to realize I could lay down the occasional effective headline.

PSA: Try to notice the things you’re doing when people say things like, “You’re really good at that.” or “You make that look easy.” This is what you’re meant to do.

Alas, the weekly newspaper people didn’t hire me to create ads – they had a department for that, they informed me – I was supposed to be selling space. I was told to hit the streets. Yuck.

Needless to say, that first gig didn’t last long. The lesson from this part of the story is to learn to recognize when you don’t like something and get away from it as soon as you practically can. The key word here is practically.

PSA: Don’t quit your job today because you don’t like your evil boss. Everyone has to deal with evil bosses at some point. What I’m saying here is don’t waste too much of your life doing what you hate. This means you’ll have to work harder than most people, but it’s worth it.

So, I sold my soul to the corporate man and took a job in a Fortune 50 company to get out of the door-to-door sales business. I learned quite a bit in this next gig about communication to employees, rather than customers, and gained a lot of respect for my corporate communication brethren. But I needed to keep moving.

PSA: Different people like to do different things. Respect that. When I say I didn’t like sales, it’s because I sucked at it, not because it’s not a worthwhile vocation. Don’t stomp on others’ dreams as you’re looking for your own.

I finally landed a job in a marketing department, albeit a small one, and joined a four-person marketing staff of a large equipment and engine distributor. Perhaps this would be where I would make a difference (I told myself, both thumbs in the air!)

During my time with this firm – 10 years in all – the Internet came to be, cell phones happened and I became friendly with the corporate expense account. All good things, but I learned even more about business and life.

PSA: Appreciate what employers can give you beyond pay and benefits. Take advantage of any and all training opportunities and, if you don’t understand what a balance sheet is or how budgets are made — ask! At this company, I developed friendships I still have today and learned about the business world in ways I could never learn in school.

Rather suddenly, the company I worked for was purchased and my job was eliminated. This is not fun but, if it happens to you, realize two things:

A.     It’s not your fault

B.     This is exactly why you have a rainy day fund (Don't have one? Start one today.)

It was time for me to try the advertising agency world and I was more than ready. I was fortunate to hear about an agency that needed an account guy for one of its major accounts, which just happened to be my former employer. Remember the part about being sure what the job entails before you accept it? I should have known that no part of ‘account guy’ means writer.

PSA: Sometimes you’ll have to do work you don’t love in order to pay the bills. We all have. Don’t get mad at your employer or take this frustration out on your co-workers, they’re all trying to pay their bills, too.

It turns out that travel, another key element of my non-writing job, wasn’t something I loved either. And, with three small kids at home, they didn’t love it when daddy wasn’t home (and ‘daddy’ was my most important job).

But this time I had learned. I kept working and travelling while looking for something closer to home and finally found what I think is the perfect fit.

At an insurance company. Who knew?

PSA: Don’t pre-judge a potential employer based solely on their industry. A so-called boring category means it’s easier for your work to stand out!

Of course there are other words of advice I could offer, like start investing for retirement as soon as possible and make sure you get all of that company match, but you’ll get that elsewhere.

This diatribe is designed for writers, so I’ll leave you with these few final thoughts:

• Always read your work out loud before you publish it, you’ll be able to hear how it sounds to that little voice in your reader’s head

• Never publish a first draft; even if it’s a rush

• Always make sure you completely understand who your audience is before you start writing to them

• Never send a hastily written message (email, Tweet, etc.) you’ll almost always regret it; ‘save as a draft’ is a message purgatory created to save us writers from ourselves — use it

• Always be gracious to those you interview, they are providing you with an opportunity you wouldn’t have without their insights

• Never change direct quotes to fit your need

• Always try to be consistent; if your brand has standards, don’t just follow them, become the example of how they are followed

• Never present someone else’s work as your own

• Always be able to defend your position; you may not always win, but always have a well-thought-out point of view 

• Never stop writing

Three different levels of writing that radiate out toward your audience

Grammar is critical, but there’s so much more to consider

Some will debate if writing is grammar or something more. I’m in the camp that thinks of grammar as necessary (and often forgotten) but it’s certainly not all there is to writing.

As Ann Handley has said, “Writing is not grammar, writing is thinking.” Carmen Hill agreed, and recently added: “Yes, and grammar helps precisely express your thinking.” With that I couldn’t agree more.

Of course, most of us don’t have the luxury of writing just for the sake of writing. Many of us — even Ann Handley — have jobs. And people who have jobs write to support a brand, whether it’s a company brand or a personal brand.

So, while good writing is good thinking and grammar helps express that thinking, there is, of course, even more.

I recently developed a three-tiered approach to writing that my serve as a good way to help ensure you’ve got all the bases covered. Because each area affects the others, I see it as a series of concentric circles where the writer starts at the center and works his or her way outward toward the audience. I hope this idea will help you in your writing. So, here we go!

Start with core skills, work your way out

I believe the core skills needed for good writing are at the center of what a writer does. This includes pure writing measures for things like grammar, syntax, spelling, sentence structure…you know, the basics. If you’re not confident in your knowledge of these topics, study them. Learn them. Know them. They are your friend.

This also means including the right information (and nothing more). This requires asking the right questions…lots of them. If you haven’t done this basic level of work, your audience is likely to become distracted and unable to receive your message.

Layer on the brand’s voice

The next layer out from core skills is brand voice. This is where the basics that all good writers are capable of get more specific and differentiated. Is your brand a conversational brand (like Target) or are you more formal (like the IRS)?

The difference is important, because the way these two brands would say the same thing is necessarily different. That difference has to make its way into your writing, and this should happen right after the basic levels are assured.

And, of course, don’t forget message alignment

Finally, as you continue to move out toward your audience, the last filter you apply should be to insure your message is aligned with your messaging strategy. If there’s a creative brief, are you aligned with it? Have you done everything you can to assure that your specific audience will respond to your message in the way you intend?

What we need here is an example

Okay, here’s the message you have to deliver: your brand is changing the way it will accept orders and you can now accept credit cards (I know, it must the last brand on the planet. Sorry, I was a little short on examples today. Forgive me.)

Core skills: along with good grammar and spelling, include the basic information your audience will need:

·      Which credit cards will you now accept?

·      Is this additive or are you doing this for the first time?

·      When does this begin?

·      Do I have to use a credit card?

Brand voice: tell the story your way

If this message were coming from Target: “Hey, we can now accept that credit card. Hurry up and get over here!”

If this were coming from the IRS: “Effective April 15, 2016, we will be able to accept Visa, MasterCard and Discover Card.”

Message alignment: spend some time in your audience’s shoes

You can quickly see this message would be different for millennials than it would be for Baby Boomers. But what about male millennials (One swipe and you’re gone!) vs female millennials (Never worry about having to carry real money again!)

Of course, no approach like this is perfect for every situation. But I hope this will give you some ideas as you’re writing and perhaps it will help you hone your message as you’re creating it

Good luck!