brandnewsroom

for creating aTips!

YourBrandExposed.comOriginal Content Series

Scott MacFarland November | 2014

brandnewsroom

Tips!

!As a young professional I worked in a broadcast television newsroom for many years. This was an eye-opening experience for me that I wouldn’t trade for anything. The skills I learned I still use today because they are timeless in strategy and execution.  !What a newsroom journalist does everyday is

what we marketers should do to create a brand newsroom machine.

!Here are 13 tips for marketers who may not have broadcast journalism experience, but they need to know how these fit perfectly into creating a content marketing and brand newsroom machine.

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Every piece of content you create matters and is part of the overall perception your audience has of the company. Be very careful what your brand image displays and says to the customer. Customers don’t want to be told or sold. They want to make the decision themselves. customers are much smarter and have more influence over the brand than we give them credit.

customers are much smarter and have more influence

over our brand than we give them credit.

Perception!

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!1.What type of content am I creating? 2. Why am I creating it? Determine a key message. 3. Is my audience going to be positively or negatively

impacted when they see my content? 4. What response do I want to get from the viewer once

they see my content 5. What criteria determine if content is not usable? 6. Who is responsible for quality control and final

approval?

Ask yourself these 12 questions before you start the content creation process.

Content!

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!7. Do you have an editorial calendar? 8. Will your content be a series of stories, one article or a special feature? 9. What are the sources of your content and are they validated? 10. What tone of voice is most effective when reaching your customers? Speak and write in the tone of voice you would speak to them as if they were in front of you. 11. Are you positioning your content as if it is the authority? 12. Is the content you create relevant and helpful to your audience?

Content!

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Content should answer customer answer questions and help to solve their problems.

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We know content is the genesis of a brand newsroom. However, if you don’t have a plan for how it is best distributed, the content most likely will not have the impact you want. Think about how you plan on using the content and on what distribution channels it makes the most sense to reach your intended audience. Keep in mind, there is most likely more than one.

Distribution!

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There’s another player in the digital marketing world,

and it has an immense following. It’s called distribution.

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!We all know that great content is valuable. But, what if that great content sits idle and nobody sees it? Is it valuable now? I think not. Enter distribution. Content is produced and distributed in a lot of ways. This includes all forms of traditional and digital content. Every medium known to mankind is a form of distribution. If we take a look at just the global Internet users, we know that all of them are consuming content that has been distributed. That’s 2.8-billion reasons why distribution deserves the crown. !!

Sorry content… you’re a close second.

Distribution!

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Source: InterWorldStats

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More ideas on Content DistributionSource: TheNextWeb

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!Every piece of content should be designed to elicit a response from your personas. Think about who these people are and clearly define their personal and professional attributes. You also want to identify their ”motivators” for buying your product or service. These are key. !

Audience

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Depending on who your audience is will help you determine what type of

content you create and how it is distributed to reach them most effectively.

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A simple way to look at your audience is to think about what generation they are. Here are the main living generations in America. The most influential used to be the Boomers because of their buying power. However, Millennials are making a strong run at the next high-power generation. If you are not paying attention to them, you should. !Silent: 1927-1945 Baby Boomers: 1946-1964 Generation X: 1965-1980 Generation Y / Millennial: 1981- 2000 Generation Z: Born after 2000 !!!!

Audience

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Get more information on GenerationsSource: MarketingTeacher

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Feedback

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How will you allow your viewer to communicate with you in order to get valuable feedback? Once you figure out an appropriate method of getting customer feedback, think about how you will use that information to create and distribute content more effectively.

!You can use you own company social media channels to listen and get feedback, or use others

to monitor conversations.

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Feedback

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Social Mention Addictomatic Twazzup IceRocket  TweetDeck KnowEm Ubersuggest HootSuite Buffer Social Report Cyfe !

Here are 11 social media applications that are easy to use and will provide you with more analytical data, monitoring and automation than you ever thought possible.

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Organization

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Planning and organizing your content calendar is a must. Without structure, your content strategy will be haphazard at best and you won’t be able to produce everything you need, when you need it. An organized and planned approach always helps the key contributors to be more efficient and effective.

Benefits of a content calendar• Allocate staff and resources!• Plan for upcoming deadlines!• Big picture review of content topics!• Prevents content redundancy!• Helps with time management!• Provides visibility of your content over time!

to ensure a balanced media approach is !happening!

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Organization

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!A Content Calendar gives you visibility of your planned content production and distribution over time. This enables you to look at the big picture (3-6-9-12 months), or a week by week view. It also allows you to take a look at 9 key areas that need timely attention to detail when multiple project assignments are being produced.!

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Organization

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!The benefit of a content calendar is to provide you with a guided, organized approach. This will help to create and produce content based on important factors that you determine are most helpful for your team. Below are the 9 that I use to organize content workflow.!

!Day/Week/Month: When do you want it out the door?!Topic: What content genre are you are producing?!Keywords: Based on your brand and product!Media Type: Blog, eBook, Video, Landing page…!Persona: Select one persona not an “everyone” approach!Stage: Awareness, Conversion, Purchase!Offer / Call-to-action: “Download this eBook”!Author: Determine the person who is the author!Completed: When it’s totally finished

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Production

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!Think about the content production process and make sure all your areas of responsibility are covered. This can be accomplished with a simple spreadsheet outlining the description of responsibilities, which is performing the task, what resources you need and when it’s due. This will help you manage all the production aspects of a brand newsroom. Here are 10 roles that are commonly seen in brand newsrooms.

• Writing • Social Media• Designing• Photography• Videography

• Video editing• Web/interactive programming• Content Management / Web / Analytics• Research• Media / Press

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Resources

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Sometimes you don’t have the resources to produce your projects in the time you need it done. How will you accommodate for that to ensure it’s finished on time? My suggestion is to always have a plan-B in your back pocket ready to go. That way when a crisis does happen and you need plan-B to be executed on a moment’s notice, there will be a plan ready.

Your plan-B should really be a checklist which includes specific duties and deliverables that need to be done ASAP. Don’t forget to include a team member’s name so they understand plan-B is their responsibility.

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A crisis won’t come when you are expecting it. It always arrives at the

worst possible time. Having a pre-established plan-B will make the crisis situation much easier to handle in the heat of the moment.

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Time Management

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In a newsroom environment, just like in a marketing department, there are multiple competing deadlines and projects that must be completed, in short order. Learning to manage your time, and have the ability to jump back and forth from big picture to tactical, here and now, is an absolute must.

!Creating a project timeline is

critical to see both the big picture and the tactical details.

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Time Management

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!Juggling projects, resources and challenges is a fantastic skill to learn. You must ask yourself when you are in the middle of juggling many content priorities, “what is my deadline?” If you have project timeline in place you can refer to them as needed to help keep you and your projects on track. !!!Week 1-2: Start research and writing of design documentWeek 3-4: UX implementation / Navigational structure - Client ApprovalWeek 5-6: Design / Look & Feel / Submit mock-ups - Client ApprovalWeek 7-8: Web testing / QC - Final Client ApprovalWeek 9: Project Due

Sample Timeline

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Accuracy

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!When content is created, it’s not thrown together like throwing caution into the wind. It’s planned and purposely produced with a goal in mind. Regardless of the due date on the project, accuracy is always at the top of the list of important items to think about. When you are accurate, your credibility skyrockets. When you are not, your credibility is headed for the toilet, and that’s a stinky place to be. !!! The details matter, so pay

attention every step along the way, even when you think you can do the job with

your eyes closed.

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Speed

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Energy in a newsroom is fueled by speed. Every piece of content must be produced with this in mind. Sometimes the most valuable content produced is completed in the shortest amount of time. !In marketing, speed is also very important, especially now that social media commonplace and requires immediacy. Marketers today must think fast and sometimes act on instinct.!

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Speed and accuracy combined require a deep knowledge and

understanding of your job function, brand, customer

and technology.

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Teamwork

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Newsroom journalists know that without proper teamwork, problems arise, deadlines aren’t met, editorial, production and creative suffers and the story is in jeopardy of not making it on air. !Teamwork is a vital ingredient for marketing departments as well. Many aspects of marketing require subject matter experts in editorial, design, programming, production, strategy, social, digital and traditional elements to name a few. With today’s marketing being heavily integrated with technology, marketers must also know who to turn to when the tools you need aren’t working. All of these play integral roles in the marketing mix. !!

!A good team, produces a good product,

it’s as simple as that.

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Creativity

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This is such an ambiguous skill that can sometimes be hard to measure. We all know creativity is imperative in order to produce top-level work. Make sure you have a go-to person or team that can do all things creative. This skill is incredibly valuable when integrating multiple digital and traditional channels to grab your prospective customer’s attention all while increasing exposure and credibility. Without creativity, your messaging, imagery and brand will fall far short of expectations. Check out these three below. They may help you add a boost of creativity to your work.

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Here are a few apps I really like!Canva Visme Typendium

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The mantra of your brand newsroom should be defined with these 13 terms listed below. They will be the foundation of how your brand newsroom thinks, what makes it tick and keeps it energized and fueled with the expertise it needs to create incredible marketing.

Perception!Content!Distribution!Audience!Feedback!Organization!Production!!!!

Resources!Time Management!Accuracy!Speed!Teamwork!Creativity!!!!!!

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Original Content Series

Scott MacFarland November | 2014