Nik Sharma & Benjamin Witte: Creating Breakthrough Content Strategies

August 19 & 20: Built to Last Audio Conference from Buffer and Wistia

Speakers:

• Nik Sharma: investor, marketer and advisor to some of the fastest-growing brands in commerce
• Benjamin Witte: Founder and CEO of Recess

Links

• Add here

Episode notes and action points

Platform, audience, creative, experience

When planning and executing campaigns, there are four key areas you need to think about:

• Platform: Where you’re sharing the content
• Audience: Who you’re catering to
• Creative: Image, video, copy
• Experience: Where the call-to-action leads to

Understanding each phase of this process, how they differ, and the relationship they have with one another can turn a concept into a runaway success.

Nik also recommends that your content should always be native to the platform you’re telling the story in.

The new homepage

Consumers are turning to Instagram more frequently to discover and learn about new brands, and if you’re active on the platform — whether that’s through advertising or posting organic content – the top posts on your profile are your new homepage.

When someone visits your profile, they will see the latest 6-9 posts from your feed. Make sure you fill it with content that personifies (and sells) your brand.

Action point: Open up your Instagram profile and check that latest 9 nine posts. What do these posts say about your brand?

Moving from What to Why

How do you get your message to resonate with audiences? Many brands focus their attention on selling the what: what their product is or does (e.g. an energy drink or email marketing software). But it can be more powerful to sell the why: Which is the bigger reason your company exists, the cultural tension it addresses.

For example, with Recess:

• What = A sparkling canned beverage containing CBD
• Why = An antidote to modern times. Recess is about finding balance and the feeling of equilibrium that allows you to feel productive and creative.

Focusing on the why helps consumers to form an understanding of your story, so that later when they see your product — whether it’s on a shelf in a convenience store, in a Google search result or Instagram post — they get a feeling of connectedness and understand what your brand is about, not just what you’re selling.

Your why is most powerful when it speaks to an existing cultural tension of universal truth about the world. For example, Recess is made for creatives and offers a way to create space and balance. It’s an escape from the thousands of unread emails and notifications on your phone. To see this in action, check out how Recess shares its why on its homepage: takearecess.com.

Copywriting is undervalued

During the conversation, Benjamin explains that copywriting is arguably the secret to our Recess' success. In the world of marketing — especially social media — so much emphasis is placed on the platform (e.g. Facebook or Instagram) and the video/image/link being shared and often the accompanying copy is overlooked or added at the last-minute.

Nik explains that he believes copy is one of the most underutilized aspects of creative across platforms and it’s something that could unlock growth if more businesses experimented with it.

Action point: How different would your processes be if you you made copy the #1 priority across all of your content? And what would your results look like?