136: Content That Clicks: Avoiding Common Content Mistakes with Heather Richie

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Welcome to the Course Creators MBA podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Destiny Kopp, and I help business owners increase the revenue with digital products and evergreen sales funnels. In this podcast, we go deep into product and marketing strategies for digital product creators. We cover everything from digital product creation, how to market and sell your digital products, and just as important, how to find your ideal customer. Let's jump right into our show.

And my special guest today is Heather Richie. Heather is a certified content marketing strategist. She's a coach for content creators and and the blogger behind Writer's Life for you. As a content marketing strategist, it's her goal to make content creation and understanding your audience easier so that you can make more money with the content you create. And Heather, I am so excited to jump into this topic with you because we definitely want to make more money with our content for sure. Right? I mean, that's why we're here, you know, that's why we create the content. But before we get into all the questions that I have for you and the title or, you know, basically what we're going to be talking about today, which is creating a content plan that aligns with your goals. So before we get into all of that, can you tell the good audience just a little bit about you, how you help people, and how you got into all of this?

So thank you for having me, Destiny. First of all, this is a topic near and dear to my heart. So I actually funny story that not everybody knows I was a police officer for about 20 years and I basically had to go out on disability and wanted to do something working from home. And so I ended up stumbling upon freelance writing back in 2017, started a blog in 2018, and I still do write SEO optimized content for other bloggers. So that's kind of how I got started. And then content creation just kind of became my jam since I do it all day every day for myself and other people. So that's how I kind of got into being a certified content marketing strategist. And then I feel like there are so many. Like, in theory, it sounds easy to create content your audience loves, but I feel like there's so many things that can trip you up in pitfalls, which is why I like talking about this topic to kind of help people, you know, get to know their audience so that they can create content that people love and sells their offers.

And I. So I didn't know that about you. A police officer for.

Right.

I am thorough. I just want to go ahead and say I'm thoroughly impressed. I don't think I could have ever have done anything like that. So kudos to you.

It was my only adult job, so doing that and then switching to working online is completely different. Like, I used a lot of the same personality traits, and, like, I do problem solving. I mean, there's a lot of things that I can apply. But, yeah, it's a totally different job from being a police officer to writing content.

Well, and one thing that you said, you said it sounds easy to create content that your audience loves, but we know that that's not the case. I know. You know, I've been doing this for a long time, and I've been in marketing for over 25 years. It's not as easy as I think it is. Sometimes when I go in there to create something and put out in the marketplace, I'm like, why didn't anybody like that? But so can you kind of go into some of the common mistakes that business owners like me, like, the people are listening make when creating a content plan and maybe how they can avoid those mistakes?

Yes. So, for instance, I mean, we've all made these mistakes because, face it, when you're starting to create content, you're likely learning a lot of other things. So I don't ever want people to ever feel bad for making any of these mistakes, because I've probably made, like, a gazillion of the ones I'm about to list. So one of the first ones is not getting to know your audience well enough. And I feel sometimes we think we know what our audience wants, but sometimes we're creating the content that we want, and we're not really researching or digging into, you know, what keeps them up at night, what problems do they have? So it's really important to do some audience research, whether that's going into Facebook groups where your ideal people hang out, or, you know, looking, just doing research online, looking on YouTube, I find that comments and YouTube videos are some of my favorite places, places to get, like, questions and different things that people that, you know, people in your audience are having questions about or have problems about. So that's one mistake. And then also not having a content strategy. And I know I was guilty of this for probably the first three years. I always like to say that the content strategy is your vision, while the content plan is like the roadmap to get you there. So. So without a strategy, your content won't be that helpful to your audience. So you kind of need to sit down and figure out, okay, what are their Needs. What type of content do they like to consume? You know, what problems do they have? What types of like, do they like videos? Do they like short form content? You know, it's really digging into those things and then setting up how you're going to deliver that. Setting up a content schedule and making sure that you set content goals as well. Because you know, your content goals need to match with your business goals too. And then one other one I'll throw in because I could be on this topic all day and that would be ignoring SEO best practices. Now I know when I first started I was like, I do not have time to learn SEO. And now I wish that was the first thing I had focused on. So if you're not finding keywords you can actually rank for and you're just picking a random keyword, you may show up on like page 10 of Google and that's not going to do anything for you. So really learning at least on page SEO and different strategies that you can use to apply your content is also really important if you want to rank higher.

So let's dig into this. You know, you said your content goals need to align with your business goals. So let's talk about a little bit how we can align that. So how can we align our content plan with our overall business goals and objectives? Let's just say our business goal, right, is to sell or to bring on, you know, five new clients in, you know, in the next month. What, how do we lay out a content plan for that and align it with that?

So actually, if you don't mind, I have another example or two.

Yeah, yeah, go in.

So first of all, if you have business goals, like, like you said, if you want to bring five new clients on, or if you want to rank higher on Google and make money from your content, or if you want to spread brand awareness and have people get to know your brand, then you want to make sure your content goals align with that. So for instance, if I want to increase my brand awareness, then you would want to create content that really showcases your brand's personality and values. And then if you want to get more website traffic, then you're going to want to create more written content that leads people back to your site, like blog posts, or you could put resources in your social media bio, link that lead back to your website. Now, anything like that. It's really looking at what your goal is and specifically prioritizing doing that type of content to meet those goals. And there's, you can have more than one goal, but just make sure. That you are producing content that matches each one of those goals, if that makes sense.

It does, it does. So for sure. And I'm kind of thinking about people who are listening this podcast, which are a lot of people who have either online courses or digital products or memberships. And I think overall, right. I mean, their end goal is to get more sales, get more clients. So how would you suggest they kind of back into that? What would be some good content goals or, you know, business goals that they could focus on to get to that end.

So if you want to sell more of your courses or get more clients, you really want to focus on like what your audience needs are so that you can show up in front of them with solutions that are going to lead back. So you want to position yourself as an expert. And I know a lot of people fall into that imposter syndrome trap. We feel that way at times. Like, who's going to believe me? I'm not an expert, but you likely aren't giving yourself enough credit. So when you get out there, you're going to position yourself as the go to person in your niche, which is why it's important to niche down. I know that's not a very popular topic, but. Excuse me, niching down makes your content creation easier and it makes it easier to talk to your ideal audience. So you're putting that content out there, you're coming at them with helpful tips, and then along the way way you're going to be positioning your product, your course or your service as the solution to some of the things that they're dealing with.

So let's say that we, we know that we need to position ourselves as an expert, you know, to attract ideal customers. What are some ways that, how do we go about kind of brainstorming and generating content ideas that would help us do that? Where would we go to find that?

So I, I'm all about finding new ways to come up with content ideas because I remember back in the day, this was something I really struggled with. So first, you of course want to know what your audience, what their needs and their wants are. So if, for instance, I'm selling my membership or my course and it is on and we'll say like content creation, like I have one, then what type of content, what questions do people have about content creation? You know, what are, what are the issues they have? Well, for instance, they have issues like understanding their audience and getting their audience to engage with their content. So you would want to put tips out there like that you can think of go into those Facebook groups that I mentioned earlier, where your ideal people hang out and then see what questions are asking in there and then create content that answers those questions. And then you can do good old fashioned competitor research, which I love because when you're brand new at this, you likely don't have a lot of an audience to like ask, you know, or send surveys to. So I like to look for topics that my competitors are talking about. Now I'm not saying like steal their ideas, but I'm just saying, you know, you can see what content they're talking about that maybe you're not and you might want to write a blog post or put social media content out there like that. You might find stuff that's not working well for them that you, you want to avoid. So that would be another way. And then I love, I call it like the Google ABC search. I think there's something a little bit better than that. But I like to go to good old Google and not only like type in your keyword to start, like you do good old fashioned Google searches and you'll see questions that like the section that says people also ask, those are good ideas for content to create content on because people are actually searching for those questions on the Internet. And then if, say my keyword is freelance writing, then I could type in starting with the beginning of the Alphabet A. So you might find, and I did this the other day, I've got to remember what came out. But like freelance writing for actors and you, you can keep going. Like go to B, freelance writing for beginners and to see and you can see what content ideas will come up and the keywords. Because Google, Google auto fills what people are already searching for. So those are easy things too. Like, oh, you know, people are already searching for those things so you can write content on them.

I love that. And I know you brought it up just a few minutes ago about going to YouTube and looking in the comments. Yeah, I have not done that and I, you know, I don't know why. Right. That seems so like brilliant. And why, why didn't I think of that before? Go, go and look at that.

I stumbled on it honestly by accident. And then a lot of what I like to use too is like for your sales pages and things like that, if you can speak your ideal avatar or person's language. Like I'll like to pull what people are actually saying and use their wording. Like I had somebody one day send me and I'll just say like a testimonial that said before my Course, they felt like they were just winging it. And that's what I feel like a lot of content creators think they're like just winging their content. They have no plan, they're doing stuff willy nilly. So that's another thing you can get from those YouTube comments too. It's actually pretty, it's actually pretty fun.

I love that. I love that. And getting, getting some of those, you know, words that they're actually using that you could take back to your content or your sales page or your social media captions or whatever. So let's say that we have a piece of content. We've done our research, we've taught. We know it's something that our ideal customer is asking about. It's going to help them. How do we make sure that it is optimized for different channels? Like we're going to put it on our website, right? We're going to maybe even email it out to our list or, you know, post it on social media. Do we have to do anything different for all of those different channels or what is your recommendation there?

Yes, both. Fortunately and unfortunately, each platform has its own, like, different, how do I say, requirements. Or for instance, if you're emailing your list, it's going to be different than putting keywords in a blog post. So you can take that blog post and maybe pull sections out. You know, SEO, optimize your blog post so that, you know, people can find you on the Internet. And then when you send it out to your list, kind of pull sections or rephrase things that would, in a way that would be helpful to your email subscribers. And then I like to, and I've been bad at this in the past. I've definitely gotten much better. But you know, when you're trying to do all your social media, it can be really hard to not just copy and paste everything to every channel. But what I put on Instagram is going to be completely different than what I put on Twitter. Like the caption limit is different, character limits different. The image sizes are different. So you just want to make sure that a, you're only choosing like the channels that your people hang out on. So you want to go look at, you know, you can probably just Google. I'm trying to remember what I Googled like back in the day for this, but Facebook caption requirements or something and it'll tell you the caption limits and it'll tell you image sizes. You could say Facebook post image size. If you search that in Google and it'll come up with the different image sizes and that way you're optimizing it for each channel and you're more likely to get engagement and that channel is more likely to show it to other people.

And I think that's something that, you know, I even, I personally struggle with is what do I put out on social media that's not just something that people will just look at and say, oh, that's nice, but something that they will actually engage with. Is there any, do you have any tips on that?

So again, it just really comes down to knowing your audience. And I actually use social media templates from the vyral marketing stars because they have like a whole content strategy where, you know, they have like the 80% value and the 20% selling, basically. And so there's different types of content, like quotes and stuff that people will comment on. You want to pick things that your audience is going to relate to. I'm trying to think of an example here. Like for instance, I like picking up email templates because copywriting, even though I'm a writer, copywriting is just not my forte. So when I can get 27 email templates for $25, I'm gonna snag that. That's just an example. But you know, you could post something like that. Like a picture of somebody getting money out of their wallet and throwing it. Like, just take my money. When you see that sale on like funny things like that that relate to them and then serious things or tips, things that are really going to help them, that they're gonna be like, oh, wow, like, it's like she's reading my mind.

I love that. And I'm, I'm right there with you. I ever see templates, I'm like, yes, please, I want this. Take my money. I'm, I'm all for the templates there. So, Heather, before we wrap it up here, do you have any last minute tips for the audience when they're working on their content plan and they really want to make sure that the content that they're creating actually helps them generate their, you know, generate revenue or achieve their business goals.

So what I really try to do, content planning, failed me for a long time. And part of that was that I didn't have my business organized well enough and systemized so that I could look ahead, if that makes sense Now, I could plan my content almost for the whole year. But you have to be set up the systems in your business and the processes, like a content creation process, so that you can look ahead. And if I know that I'M going to launch my course four times a year. Then you could pick the months that you're going to launch your course. And then I like to use my Trello board because we none of us are mind readers. Like, I don't know what course I'm going to create, most likely in September. So try to make it, I say make it flexible and that works with your brain. Because like with my Trello board, for instance, I can move things around. So if I end up, oh, there's this affiliate promotion that I clearly didn't know was going to happen, I want to switch this topic around or I'm going to launch my course in a different place. That's what will really help you, is finding a system that works with your brain and the way you think and then making it flexible so that you can adapt it and really systemizing your biz. Like, I really get behind that. And I was one of those people that said, I don't have time to stop and organize my business. Well, a friend of mine said, you don't have time not to, because me taking those several days out to do that has made me be able to write like my Black Friday email six weeks in advance. Like, it's insane. The difference just getting organized will do, which not everybody thinks about that when you teach about content planning and I like that.

Tip. So you use Trello. Are there any other systems or you know that you have found work for folks?

So. And it honestly depends on who you are. Like, I know notion is really popular. I just. Notion just doesn't work for me. So you may have to try systems like I've tried Asana. Evernote. I really like ClickUp. ClickUp is my second favorite. Like, in fact, I was using Trello and ClickUp together, but it was just too much. Like, I really love Click ClickUp for task management too. But Trello can do all of that for you and send you reminders and notifications. So it's really just finding the system that works for you. Asana. I worked for a woman that made templates in Asana that were amazing. So you can take any system that works for you and then make that your content planning system, basically. And, you know, create a content schedule. I have people ask me all the time, how often should I publish content? And I'm like, only as much as you can remain consistent. Because we all hear consistency is key. Consistency is key. If you can't post on Instagram seven days a week, don't set that as a goal. Try doing three or four and then you can bump up over time, but only do what you can do and then choose a system that works for you.

And Heather, those are some great tips. Before we hang up here, can you let the audience know where they can find you? And also, I believe you have a free gift for them.

I do. So I think there's going to be a link under the podcast episode that will show you my website and the different social media channels I'm on. My blog is Writer's life for you. And I work. I write about working from home. Freelance writing and then content creation is a big topic on my blog. And the freebie I have is 20 questions to ask yourself when you're creating a content strategy and plan. And basically, these are. Some are focused on audience, some are focused on logistics, but these are the things that really tie to your content strategy and that they're going to help you set that up and then that is going to be able to help you create that content plan. And when you have a strategy and plan together, it's like, so those questions will really help you with the process.

And I want to know what those questions are myself. They're good ones.

I was like, ooh.

Heather, thank you so much for joining me. I absolutely love chatting with you about content marketing.

Well, thank you so much for having me. This has been really fun myself. Love it.

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