Good Communications in Bad Times
melinda wissmann
Content Marketing—Now More than Ever
If you are striving to find the right tone and content for your marketing communications in these challenging times, the answer may lie in content marketing practices that have always worked—connecting with people by sharing genuinely useful insights.
If your nonprofit’s mission truly matters, then it matters that you continue to tell your story and connect with stakeholders, even in these strange, sad times. The questions is how?
At this point we’ve all received messages of concern from businesses we’ve patronized or organizations we’ve supported. They range from the tasteful and touching to the instantly forgettable, to the nakedly self-serving.
Our advice at KWD is to think seriously about the opportunities presented by content marketing, the practice of connecting with audiences not by selling something or seeking something, but by sharing something of value.
That valued commodity typically comes in the form of useful insights or expert advice—something entirely appropriate and often welcome in bad times as well as good. For a school, timely content marketing messages might feature wisdom from educators on how to guide your children through stressful times and advice on answering difficult questions. Or it could be tips for learning effectively online and managing screen time in reasonable ways. Or it could just be a list of links to useful third-party resources.
For a university, content marketing appropriate to this moment might involve a virtual round-table with a group of thought leaders on the implications of emerging from this crisis—or a blog post from a specialist in supply chains explaining where all the toilet paper went.
The idea is to look across your organization to identify thoughtful people who have something worthwhile to share, and then decide the best way to share it, whether through email campaigns, webinars, or YouTube videos.
This is also a chance to look back into to your archives for existing content with fresh relevance—author talks you’ve hosted or student performances you videotaped. (A few minutes of shared joy is a valuable commodity too.) You might also consider taking content originally created for an internal audience and offering it more broadly, to your admissions inquiry list, for example.
Right now, people everywhere are seeking connection. So, if you sponsor an online alumni book group or continuing ed courses or any other virtual experience of community, promote it with fresh vigor. Folks who never had time to read may finally find they have it. Others who shunned virtual engagement in favor of “the real thing” may be more open-minded. With luck, you will not only capture people’s attention during the crisis and offer them a meaningful form of social interaction, but also establish channels of connection that stay active when normalcy returns.
Similarly, you may discover new forms of content marketing that you choose to sustain after the pandemic. After all, the idea of engaging people by sharing information that they find real value in is a powerful one, and not just in these exceptional times.