Just Say No - The War on Misaligned Content (Part I)

Smaller professional services firms, solo practitioners and, dare I say it, some mid-sized firms, struggle with creating content for their website, their email marketing and their social media accounts on an ongoing basis. No one has the time, doesn’t know what to write about or how to write about it, or just doesn’t want to give up billable hours to draft a blog or, god forbid, present during a video.

As a result, it is often left to the business owner or marketer to find ANY content to publish under the presumption that something is better than nothing. The content in this case might be generated by a team member whose sole qualification to author a blog is that they have time on their hands, or a ready-to-go article from a third-party content library. (By the way, I’m not knocking third-party content; I will address this in a later newsletter).

And who can blame business owners or marketers for not wanting their website to grow stale or to attempt to save the organization’s email marketing from rigor mortis because nothing is available to send!

Although that logic is sound on one level, it can also represent a risk and a potential threat to the business on a deeper level.

Without thoughtfully crafted alignment between the business’ published content and its mission, vision and growth goals, current and prospective customers may consume the content wondering what the business represents. Consumers may have their own belief about the company brand until hastily published content creates a jarring, dissonant effect that causes them to, at the least, scratch their heads in bewilderment or, in a more troublesome development, become actually annoyed.

Saying no to misaligned content also means defending the integrity of the business’ brand, mission and vision and deciding that something is not always better than nothing.

In this first part of a three-part series on the need for content alignment, I look at some of the risks of publishing off-brand content.

1. Inconsistent or overlapping messaging

This problem presents when the business isn’t fully accounting for its existing content offerings. Any new piece of content published by the business should be done with recognition of other available content. Does the new content overlap with what has already been covered in earlier content? Or does it—yikes!—contradict a conclusion or recommendation from other content?

On one CPA firm website, a relatively new piece about financial planning strategy recommended the 50-30-20 approach to budgeting. Shortly afterward, I reviewed an earlier blog that proposed a DIFFERENT approach to budgeting than the 50-30-20 method.

RECOMMENDATION: Create a spreadsheet of the business’ content assets and identify topics covered and the recommendations made in each piece of content. That should be part of the foundation for future content planning to avoid overlapping or inconsistent messaging.

2. Hopping on the trend bandwagon

This is a particularly juicy topic nowadays with the advent of private equity and artificial intelligence in the accounting industry. But any for- or nonprofit entity faces the same challenge of how to address hot topics in a way that is less about bandwagon-jumping and more about providing actual purposeful content aligned with the business’ brand.

Sometimes, the best way to avoid getting pulled onto the bandwagon is to avoid the topic altogether. A few years ago, blockchain and cryptocurrency were the bright, shiny objects. The firm I worked with at the time did publish a short piece about it, but it was on-brand. Should a prospective client have reached out to us after reading the piece, we would have been prepared to help. Other than that, we stayed away.

The Securities & Exchange Commission’s sensitivity to perceived misinformation-sharing on the part of financial advisory firms provides a good example of the hazards of business decision-making that embraces trends without performing sufficient due diligence. Earlier this year, the SEC fined two firms for misleading claims about their use of AI technology with customers.

In this case, embracing a current trend did not just create jarring, off-brand messages but led to substantial fines.

RECOMMENDATION: Regardless of whatever emerging trend or topic may be all the rage in industry circles, every business should stay true to its mission, vision and areas of service expertise in determining what content or messaging to share with its customers and the broader public.

3. Forgetting your audience

Any decision to publish content should begin with identifying the intended audience of that content, the value provided to that audience and, if necessary, the desired action anticipated of the audience participants.

For example, if a company publishes a short video about five steps for effective?retirement planning, the company would presumably identify the audience of the video as individuals in their mid- to late 50s or early 60s. The value provided would be key insights that many non-financial planners might not know. And the desired call to action would be for the viewers to reach out to the financial planner for assistance.

Straightforward, right?

Except in the case of misaligned content, where something is perceived as better than nothing, a piece of new content may not consider the identity or needs of the audience. Such content would surely fail to meet the brand expectations of customers and fall flat. If you’re a business owner tracking the traffic on your website (which you should be doing!), don’t be surprised when misaligned content fails to engage your readers or viewers. ?

RECOMMENDATION: The approach I describe in the retirement planning video example should serve as the basis for content publishing decisions: 1. Who is your audience? 2. What value are you providing to that audience? 3. What action do you anticipate from your audience?

Thanks for reading. This is Part I of a three-part series on misaligned content. Next week, I’ll be back with more examples of what your business should not do, and my recommendations for what to do instead. ??

Are you a solo practitioner, or a small or mid-sized professional services firm struggling with your content to drive marketing strategies that lead to growth? My weekly Marketing Strategies 4 Growth newsletter shares insights gained from nearly 20 years of marketing experience at two mid-sized accounting and advisory firms. I specialize in content writing and strategic marketing planning to tackle problems that practice leaders face to get things unstuck and back on course.

Joe Kovacs, APR ([email protected])

www.kovacscommunications.com