Jeremy Enns was unsure if anyone was actually reading his newsletters and if it was making any impact. After subscribing to 100 newsletters and producing 500 podcast episodes, he realized that if he wanted to build trust with his audience, he needed to commit to creating consistent content. With multiple years of creating content, Jeremy was able to build trust and saw success in his content ecosystem. Through his hard work, he has proven that consistency and commitment to creating good content are key to building trust with an audience.

Here’s what Jeremy Enns and I cover:

* Good nurture content allows us a window into the hearts and minds of the creator.

* What to expect from a long content strategy–and what not to expect.

* The role of consistency and when you really, truly can own your expertise. 

Jeremy Enns is the creator of Podcast Marketing Academy, where he teaches brands and creators to hit their next growth milestones with detailed step by step marketing playbooks. He also writes the Scrappy Podcasting newsletter, sharing short actionable ideas around how underdog shows can punch above their weight.

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Highlights in this episode:

* [00:02:58] The Holy Grail for newsletter writers–and all content creators

* [00:06:16] Podcasting builds up that relational aspect that you cannot get from a social media post. 

* [00:08:57] A podcast (or any long-form content) feels like a more generous offering than an ad-driven lead magnet.

* [00:15:35] Jeremy’s launch vs nurture content life cycle

* [00:19:59] Consistency matters a lot more than frequency.

* [00:20:56] When you have a proven track record, people see that.

* [00:24:46] How to cover the breadth and full body of work you can offer: the inflection point.

* [00:27:26] How to lower the pressure that we all feel like we need to have it figured out now.

* [00:30:13] Being in this for the long haul. How you put it all together really becomes who you are, and that’s a pretty dang cool legacy.

Quotables:

Podcasting allows us a real and authentic window into the minds, hearts and souls of our favorite hosts. – Jeremy Enns

Throwing content spaghetti on the wall–and hoping it sticks–is not a strategic content plan. Discover the secret to getting maximum ROI from your content with strategic content planning–a must for visionary CEOs and established, sophisticated online businesses.

Strategic Content Planning is the opposite of “spray and pray” content marketing, and involves having a clear plan and specific goals in place to achieve business and marketing objectives. Creating content that builds upon foundational brandscaping is essential, and content should be distributed in an intentional way on the right platforms to ensure the right people see it. Content should also take people on a journey and overcome buyer hesitancy by giving them a new perspective or a quick win. 

In this episode, you will learn the following: 

* Discover the alternative to “throwing content spaghetti on the wall” and learn how to strategically plan your content. 

* Uncover the secrets to creating content marketing that works, and learn how to ensure you get the most ROI from your content.

* Find out how to build trust with your audience over time, and discover how to overcome buyer hesitancy.

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Highlights in this episode:

[00:01:11] Content strategy is often misunderstood as a plan for writing content. 

[00:03:38] The key is having a clear plan and specific goals you want to achieve.

[00:04:50] Getting to the “execution with ease” stage of digital marketing means embracing strategy. Strategic content is like the secret sauce that brings together all your content marketing efforts.

[00:06:07] Before you start churning out content, it’s important to do some foundational brandscaping. 

[00:09:31] Pro tip for creating content marketing that actually works. 

[00:10:41] How are you going to distribute your information? What content formats will you focus on? 

[00:13:42] The third leg of the triangle is choosing content topics that are impactful.

[00:15:05] There’s two tests I like to put content through to make sure that they’re doing this.

[00:18:10] I have a free template available for you over in my show notes. It’s intentionally simple.

[00:19:21] The four questions every content strategy should answer

Get ready to embrace your uniqueness, because in this episode, a content marketing expert spills the ironic beans that entrepreneurs must show up authentically and use their unique voice to build a sustainable business that transcends the fleeting success of “viral” content.

“You have to make sure that you’re using content as a filter. Good content will turn off more people than it turns on. It’s a filter. It is a freaking obstacle course for the people who don’t get you. But your people will get it, and the rest will move on so you can serve your people better.”

Here’s what I cover:

* Why content marketing? There are a LOT of other tactics other there, right?

* What are the steps to organizing a long-term content marketing strategy that sets you up for sustainable success? 

* Master the art of using content as a filter to attract the right customers while repelling the not-so-great ones.

Listen to this episode on:

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Highlights in this episode:

[00:00:32] The viral content type of content rarely leads to business success. Content marketing isn’t a short game; it’s a slow burn.

[00:01:28] Beyonce now has more Grammys than anyone else. But she still hasn’t ever won best record of the year. 

[00:03:45] There are three steps to organizing a long-term content marketing strategy.

[00:05:01] Content marketing helps you stand out from your competition. It allows you to establish your unique voice and share your story with a wider audience. 

[00:07:45] Being on social media is going to be part of a visibility strategy.

[00:10:18] The reality of a course business is you have to keep growing your audience to continue serving more people. Your marketing plan has to make allowances for losing audience members.

[00:13:47] Content marketing takes time.

Moving Beyond Virality + Short-Term Success: You Have To Show Up

Viral content seems to be the holy grail if you follow the Instagram or TikTok crowd. It gives you a whole lotta good feels, right! People like you! But this type of content rarely leads to business success–some of my most-viral content not only didn’t result in a single lead, it actually detracted from my marketing message. Your marketing efforts have to consider the long-term impact of your content if you want to set yourself up for long-term success.

Be the expert in your specialized niche and become a thought leader with Natalie’s tried-and-true business models.

“When you specialize your niche and narrow down, we need to be repelling a whole lot of people. When you start attracting your ideal client, everything becomes easier, and it makes you extremely referable because you are the person that does that.”

Natalie Eckdahl helps consultants, marketers, and financial professionals build an enduring business through her long-standing podcast, Biz Chicks, and her group coaching program and courses.

In this episode, you will learn the following: 

* What is the difference between specializing and niching in business? 

* How can entrepreneurs trust their intuition when determining their business model? 

* How can entrepreneurs build a business in the agency model for freedom and profit?

Listen to this episode on:

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Highlights in this episode:

[00:02:20] Today we’ll talk about the difference between specializing and Niching.

[00:03:31] What’s the difference between specializing in niche and just choosing what you want to be known for?

[00:05:49] When you specialize or niche or combine the two, you start to become an expert in what you’re talking about. That is when you attract people to you through your thought leadership.

[00:11:54] When it comes to knowing where your people are, it’s so key. The more you narrow your business, the more you get clarity on all of these things.

[00:17:39] Knowing where visibility boosts come from.

[00:19:06] Natalie markets through her podcast and sales calls  have become easier. [00:23:47] Natalie’s goal is to help women pay themselves 8-10K/month.

Quotables:

We specialize by the work that we do, and we niche by the who. – Natalie EckdahlClick To Tweet

The more you narrow your business, the more you get clarity. – Natalie Eckdahl

When an overwhelmed online business owner attempts to balance content creation and marketing with living their life, they find an unlikely solution in utilizing social media scheduling tools, batching tasks, and repurposing content to build a personality-driven marketing machine.

Here’s what I cover:

* How to authentically automate your content marketing to build up your know, like and trust factor with an engaged audience.

* How to save time and money on social media tools and techniques like scheduling, content curation, and batching similar tasks.

* How to manage real-time interactions on social media to preserve the quality of your interactions.

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Highlights in this episode:

[00:00:06] We’re going to talk about time saving social media techniques for busy entrepreneurs.

[00:02:01] Will scheduling and content tools cost a little bit of money? They will. But this money that you spend on these particular tools has so much ROI.

[00:04:33] Batching cuts down on my context switching, therefore, it saves me productivity and efficiency. 

[00:06:22] One of the biggest time-saving things you can do is recycle published content. Understanding the Content ROI and the content insights about your business come into play.

[00:08:19] Mastering social media as a business owner does not mean you’re a hostage to it.

[00:10:44] Staying consistent on social media is easier when you remember you’re in business to make a difference. Your people want your voice.

Time-Saving Social Media Techniques for Busy Entrepreneurs

This is a continuation of our End the Social Media Busy Work series. Did you catch the first article?

Use social media scheduling and content curation tools

Social media scheduling and content curation tools are essential if you don’t want your business to run your life. For any business or organization looking to use social media as part of its content system, these tools save immense amounts of time. 

Schedulers automate posting to every social media channel, allowing you to create and post graphics, videos, articles, and other posts all at once instead of manually doing it. Some, like Buffer, can automate Instagram carousels and tweet threads, even beyond normal post styles–another big tim...

An ambitious online entrepreneur sets out to end their social media busy work for good but quickly discovers that the only way to do so is to master a strategic approach to content creation, balancing their own lifestyle with their desired ROI.

“With the right approach, social media does not have to feel like busy work. Instead, it can feel like a powerful tool for connecting with people and marketing your offers in a way that feels good to you.”

After spending time researching sustainable, measurable content creation for content marketing, I’ve learned that in order to end the social media busy work, I need to employ a strategic content plan, create a social media content calendar, and set up a content database. With this strategy, I was able to maximize my efforts and avoid feeling like all the busy work was for nothing. I now have a balanced approach to content and have been able to create relationships with my target audience, leading to real ROI from my content.

This is the first of a two-part series on ending social media busy work–for good.

Listen to this episode on:

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You’ll learn:

* How to create a sustainable social plan and get back to actually living your life. 

* How to plan strategic content and create an evergreen topic list to build your authority. 

* How to master one platform and create a backup plan for another in case of de-platforming.

End The Social Media Busy Work

Social media often feels like busy work because it never seems to end–and it can be hard to know what you should be doing. So many experts out there are talking about showing up and plastering social content on every platform–so it feels like yet another tickbox you need to check in the neverending to-do list. Want to end the social media busy work for good? You need to do three things and balance them well–and you’ll get there.

It’s important to plan strategic content to reach your goals without “throwing spaghetti on the wall.” Secondly, you must show up as yourself on social media and avoid creating fake personas that don’t represent who you are. Lastly, when it comes to honing your strategy, measuring what works and what doesn’t will help you to finally leave the busy work behind and focus on the strategies that yield results.

With the right approach, social media doesn’t need to feel like busy work–instead, it can be a powerful tool for connecting with people and marketing your offers in a way that feels good.

It’s a noisy world–and you’ve got to cut through that noise to get noticed. What’s the point in creating content that nobody reads or watches? How long will you keep up your content creation journey if you don’t see results? Using curiosity and tension in your content is one of the best ways to ensure your viewer will keep viewing. If you want them to move from your audience to your community ultimately, you’ll want to learn the why + how behind open loops.

With a goal to help established course creators create sustainable, measurable content and reduce their workload, an ambitious content creator embarks on an ironic journey of using Hollywood-style tricks to ethically hack their audience’s natural inclination towards curiosity and keep them coming back for more.

You will learn how to strategically craft compelling stories that keep your audience engaged by uncovering the secrets of open loops.

In this episode, you will learn the following: 1. How can content creators use open loops to create suspense, tension, and provoke audiences’ curiosity?2. How can email subject lines be used to grab attention and increase the likelihood of someone opening them?3. What are the psychological effects of open loops and how can they help move people along the buyer’s journey?

Listen to this episode on:

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Highlights in this episode:

[00:01:33] An open loop is a storytelling device used to create suspense and tension and provoke an audience’s curiosity.

[00:02:25] Many of the best subject lines are Curiosity driven.

[00:05:18] Open loops keep your audience returning to your content.

[00:08:25] How to create an open loop in your own business.

[00:09:18] The easiest open loop to employ is a simple teaser.

[00:13:28] Numbers and loops

[00:17:25] Imagine loops

How to Use Open Loops & Curiosity in Your Content

Think of a hula hoop. You start. It flings around. If you keep the momentum (interest) going, the hoop keeps going. If you start losing your rhythm, the hoop slowly loses ground and then, all of a sudden, quickly falls.

In website analytics terms, we call that bounce.

Hubspot calls this a flywheel–a flywheel being a thing that starts out hard to move, but as you get it going, it takes less and less effort. The momentum keeps it going. So, how can you do this in content?

After clients asked about tangible results from short-form content marketing, Julia McCoy set out on a year-long study, only to discover the ironic truth of the short-format and long-format content debate. Her goal: to find the most effective and sustainable way to authentically automate her marketing. She’s sharing the results with a year of data to back them up.

You will learn whether shorter or longer content is better for your business’s success. We’ll also cover:

* Is short-form content shorting your business results? 

* What is the difference between short-form and long-form content? 

* How can we test different kinds of marketing to determine what works best for our business?

Listen to this episode on:

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Highlights in this episode:

[00:00:59] What to do when marketing tactics don’t feel good.

[00:02:14] Julia McCoy is the founder of Content Hacker.

[00:03:13] Talking about Julia’s study

[00:06:20] Short-form content did very little besides views

[00:13:03] Sustainability through long-form content

[00:14:50] How many clients Julia gained through short-form content

[00:19:42] Is short-form content able to build trust?

[00:22:27] Feedback Julia’s received on the study

What are the Key Differences Between Short and Long Format Content? Here’s How to Find Out!

Julia McCoy is a content marketer with a seven-figure writing agency and over 40,000 content projects and a leading strategist for creating exceptional content and building a brand presence that lasts. . She used a year-long study to measure the effectiveness of short-format content compared to long-format content in her business by studying her own content and that of other businesses, and after the year-long study, she’s here to discuss the critical differences between short and long-form content.

“There’s a misnomer out there. A misrepresentation created by a lot of the influencers where it looks so easy. It looks so easy to get viral, to get views, to get likes, to get followers. But what does that really get you as a business owner that’s the missing message.”

Julia found that although short-form content got lots of views, it rarely led to increased sales or revenue. On the other hand, long-form content generated over 60 ideal customers and over $200,000 in sales.

In this podcast episode, an experienced course creator shares their journey and wisdom of bridging the trust gap with a robust, prolific, and targeted content plan to authentically automate their marketing and by using content to train their audience.

You will learn:

* Is it possible to build an audience on social media without being on it?

* Why content should train your audience to think and get meaningful results.

* Why the content goal has to be the first step.

Listen to this episode on:

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Highlights in this episode:

[00:00:59] Advertising costs you time and money

[00:05:16] We live in a soundbite world.

[00:09:44] It isn’t enough just to create the content. You have to engage and push it along the way.

[00:11:13] Relevant stories requires knowing your audience well.

Social Media Goals: You Have to Engage

Today we’re going to answer the age-old (in internet years, that means, like seven months) question: do you have to be on social media? And if you are, how do you set your social media goals to make sure you’re getting the most out of your time?

We’re going to cover the following:

* The history of advertising for small businesses

* How + why your content needs to train your audience

* Your marketing goal and how that informs your content plan–and specifically why your content needs a goal

The History of Small Business Advertising

This is going to be a bit of a controversial claim, but the reality is–

Attention is either earned or paid. What does that mean? It means you’re going to put a lot of time or money in–that’s how marketing has always been and always will be. How that time and money get dispersed will shuffle and flow in different ways, but it’s always going to be a combination of those two things.

In most online businesses, social media is going to take a big space in both the time and money investment. Will there be exceptions? Yes. Are you one of them? Most likely–no.

When I started my first business, it was on the cusp of the online era. Many small businesses didn’t create websites at all and wouldn’t for several years. Facebook was only a thing for Boston-area colleges. I had to publish my business announcement in a newspaper and pay for a five-week print ad.

This week on the podcast, we are continuing our coverage of common mistakes established businesses make in and around content planning–and this week we’re talking about consistent content and the huge downfall of not committing to a nurture content plan. Real talk: consistency is a choice. Most will agree the average entrepreneur knows they “should” be doing a lot of things, but established online business owners need to stop “shoulding” all over their content.

Trust is a two-way street, and ghosting your audience will lead to a dead end in that relationship.

Here’s what we cover:1. How to authentically automate your marketing and build up your trust factor with a nurtured, engaged audience.2. What are the consequences of ghosting your audience, and how can you build trust and avoid it? 3. What are the three kinds of consistency you need to nail for successful content marketing?

Highlights in this episode:

[00:00:51] It’s time to stop shoulding all over your content.

[00:01:33] Ghosting your audience does not build trust.

[00:02:43] Marketing is not a one-time event.

[00:06:44] You can moan and groan about content creation or you can do it.

[00:09:42] An example client nurturing content plan

[00:11:16] Crappy content is time-wasting for you, the creator. And it wastes time for your audience, too.

[00:13:10] There’s really no excuse to fall down on content between launches.

Listen to this episode on:

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Stop “Shoulding” All Over Content

Moaning and groaning about content planning won’t make it go away–it’ll just delay the excellent results you could be receiving by getting strategic.

That means owning:

* Ghosting during the off-season does not build trust

* Being consistent is a choice. If you’re not consistent, it’s because you’ve chosen not to be.

Ghosting your audience does not build trust

It wasn’t all that long ago that Black Friday and Cyber Monday passed, and afterwards I made a proud declaration:

I didn’t receive a single email from someone I hadn’t heard from in six or twelve or more months, just because they were having a sale. (I did receive a full blast of sales emails from one particular list I’d definitely unsubscribed from, but that’s another trust-losing story for another day.)

Cheekily, I said this on Facebook,