The biggest mistake that you do with your content and digital engagement marketing..

Imagine that you own a unisex salon- Haircuts, Spa and Make-ups are a daily part of your routine,  you hire an awesome salon manager, who is adept at her work and meticulously plan your store functioning. She keeps the salon running smoothly, the customers happy, and the competitors at bay. She’s amazing at her job, and you don’t know what you’d do without her.

But over time, you notice a trend. People are less into haircuts and facials. Your regulars keep talking about the trendy new styles of haircuts and facials, they’ve been getting elsewhere. So you make a decision. In place of hiring new hair stylist or facial experts, you turned to your salon manager whom you have recently hired to become your Styling expert.

This would be an insane decision. She is probably a great salon manager, but she’s not a stylist. Similar things happen with content marketing, brands make this same insane decision all the time. Repeatedly, they turn to their salon managers and ask them to be stylist.

“I saw an organization make an announcement, ‘Okay, we’re going to focus on content marketing,'” and ‘Hey Mr. XYZ, yesterday you were the senior brand manager. Starting Monday, you’re going to be the director of content.’ Such announcements make people excited, but they’re scared.”

For years, I’ve seen companies refusing to hire experienced editor and content expert to run their content marketing operation and instead ask one of their team members to handle it, who has little to no knowledge of the entire science behind it. This baffled me, because managing and editing a piece of content is a specialized skill refined through years of training and experience. It’s not something your brand manager can pick up overnight just because he took a couple of writing classes in college.

Even worse, forcing an internal transition like this takes your marketing folks away from what they’re really good at. Ultimately, your customers suffer if you take away an awesome salon manager so she can go and make some spectacular hair-dos.

If you examine the companies that do just out-of-the-box content marketing, you’ll see a common trend: They all have great editors or someone with serious media experience.

The point I am making is, find a content marketing and digital expert, share your pain points, challenges, ask him to create or curate content, encourage creating UGC (User Generated Content) and I guarantee that there will be business pouring in. A content expert impact shines through: in storytelling instincts, in creative use of platforms, in content that’s always focused on the needs of the audience, not the brand.

What’s more, these content editors and developers will attract right talent for your company, when potential candidates come to know that an expert is working for your brand, it gives your company credibility and generate faith.  

When you hire a hair stylist and not ask someone random to take his position, you’ll have someone with vision, similar goes with content marketing, when you hire someone who is experienced and knows his work well, he too will have a vision and know how and when to create video, infographics, and other multimedia that suits your brand.

A quick wrap-up:

If content is your focus, which has to be, then, search for an able content writer and handover your brand to that person, don’t expect results too soon, but, you are sure to get them, be patient and follow your instincts.