Do you have a favorite retailer that you buy from over and over–even if their competitors offer a better price or features? I bet you do.
In my case, my favorite place to buy perennial flowers for my flower beds is the online nursery, Bluestone Perennials.
I like them because…
- They specialize in perennials (I don’t mess with annuals).
- They have a huge variety of perennials to pick from–more than you’ll ever find in any local nursery or greenhouse.
- They have search filters on their website that allow you to find the perfect plant you’re looking for (need a short, white, deer resistant, flower that’s heat-tolerant and does well in partial shade and clay soil? You can find it with a few clicks).
- They ship all their plants in plantable pots made from natural fibers that the roots grow right through (no plastic pots to throw away).
- They only ship your plants in the spring and fall planting windows, when they’re most likely to succeed.
Now, buying from Bluestone isn’t perfect. If I’m being honest, here’s a few negatives:
- Their flowers are expensive. The prices for the flowers themselves are a little higher than you’d have to pay locally. And that’s before taxes and shipping. Shipping is the real killer. If you’re only ordering two or three plants, the shipping can be the biggest part of the price.
- If you want a flower to put in the ground right away, you’re not going to make that happen by buying online. It may take a week for you to get your plants.
- And if you want to put a plant in the ground in summer, you’re out of luck. You can order it during the summer, but they’re not going to ship it to you till September.
And those are some significant cons to going with Bluestone.
Nevertheless, I keep buying from them, year after year. Why?
Because of the Know Like Trust Factor (KLT) that we’ve been talking about this past week. Over the years I’ve been ordering from them, I’ve come to Know them, Like them, and Trust them. Which all adds up to me being brand loyal to them as my go-to source for flowers.
So much so, in fact, that switching to another company to get my flowers at this point would just feel wrong.
And when it comes to content marketing for educational consultants, that’s exactly what you’re shooting for!
You want the people who follow you to Know you, Like you, and Trust you. Once you’ve achieved that, you become a part of their lives and they’ll go to you (become brand loyal) for your expertise before anyone else.
Over the past few posts, I’ve given you some specific steps to take to achieve this goal of becoming the go-to expert in your niche through your free content efforts.
Here’s a quick recap of what we’ve talked about in those posts. Consider this your content marketing checklist for establishing yourself as a trusted name in your field:
Know
- Show up frequently in your audience’s world. This could be via email, social post, podcast, video, or any other channel. Want a closer connection to your people? Show up more often. That simple.
- Show up more consistently, as well. Showing up on specific days of the week at a specific time is much more powerful than showing up the same amount of times, but randomly. When you show up consistently, people start to look for and anticipate your communications.
Like
- Share openly about your life–both personal and professional–with your audience. Don’t share everything, of course, but by sharing things about your family, your work habits, your hobbies, things you love and hate, your children and pets, etc., people get to see a more full picture of who you are and what makes you tick. This approach will attract people who are like-minded into your circle and repel those who don’t like what you stand for (this is a good thing).
Trust
- Trust is built on two factors: credibility and relatability (or empathy). Credibility is important, so certainly share enough of your accomplishments in your field to show that you know your stuff (or better yet, whenever possible, let others demonstrate your credibility through testimonials).
- But most educational consultants lean heavily (often too heavily) on credibility and don’t do enough to demonstrate relatability–demonstrating that you understand your audience’s problems and that you offer solutions to those problems. A little talk of credibility goes a long way, but it’s almost impossible to talk too much about your audience’s challenges.
It’s really that simple. If you want to build a larger audience for your work…
(1) Show up more often and (2) more consistently, (3) don’t be afraid to share personal details, and demonstrate both (4) credibility and (5) relatability (but lean more heavily toward relatability) whenever communicating with your audience.
Follow this content marketing checklist, and you’ll soon attract a large audience of fiercely loyal followers.
To Your Success,
Willy
P.S.–I fully realize that the content marketing plan laid out in the checklist above, while simple, isn’t necessarily easy to put into practice. Most consultants struggle with finding enough time to put out a steady, consistent stream of content.
If that sounds familiar to you, then maybe we should talk about how we could be part of the solution with our Custom Content Solutions.
We provide content writing services for a number of clients–everything from ghostwriting their lead magnets or blog posts to writing their websites or social media posts.
If you’d like to put out more content and use it to strategically build your audience, just hit the link to schedule a call. We’ll discuss your needs and what parts of your content strategy we could take off your plate.
Schedule a call to discuss our custom content solutions for your business.
