It all comes down to connection

There's a meme that's been circulating the internet for years that says something along the lines of “How weird is friendship? You pick another human and say ‘I think I like this one’ and you basically just do stuff with them.” But the thing is, it's actually not weird. Human connection has been around since the beginning of humans. It's not even just a desire, it's a basic human need like food or air. To sustain life, we need some sort of connection.

If you look back through history, the historical moments that stand out, and the ones that we tell stories about, are those moments built on examples of extraordinary human connection. Any movie that you watch, yes it might be full of action shots or superheroes #teamthor but essentially it comes down to a story about human connection itself.

Throughout the ages it's always been such an important part of our culture and such a major part of an everyday person's life, but in the era that we live in right now, never has there been a time where real human connection has played such a small part of our everyday lives.

Technology has the ability to bring us so much closer together. Just today, I've talked to a client on the other side of the world, on the other side of the country, and it feels like we're in the same room. However it is also this technology that has driven us further and further apart.

We no longer call. We text.

We don’t talk in person as much. We Facebook.

We don't even get together for a friends obligatory slide night after their holiday because we've already seen it all on Instagram before they even get home.

We've got more “friends” than ever before, but we're not seeing them, not connecting with them. Even when we're together with friends at a coffee shop, what's generally sitting on the table between us? A phone. Technology. Like a big glass buffer between a couple of humans physically sitting together, but not really together at all.

It’s because of this, people are craving, yearning for human connection. It's for this reason that it is such an important piece of the puzzle to think about when you're putting together your marketing content and your marketing strategy overall. How can you truly connect with your intended audience? How can you not just talk at them, not just put stuff up on your social media, not just throw up a blog that says ‘a bunch of stuff’ but doesn't really mean anything to them? How can you actually connect and stir up emotion with your future customer or client?

The first step to doing this is actually just finding out who they are, what they think about, what they want to know, what they don't want to know, what they like, what they don't like, what's driving their buying decisions… This is actually a process that we take our clients through when putting together a marketing strategy for their business. It’s such a worth while exercise and always has some serious light bulb moments for our clients and we’re actually so passionate about it that we want to give you the tools to do exactly the same for yourself.

On our website we've actually got a customer journey mapping tool that you can download for free. In the process you'll go through a few poignant steps to help you pull out the info you need. We'll go through the customer profiling, where you really delve into who your ideal clients are, what their family makeup might look like, their income, their typical age bracket, what they do for a job, what are their interests, where do they hang out, online or in the real world and why do they need the service or product you are offering? Ie. what are their pain points and that's one of the most interesting questions to really delve into. It’s here where you really think about your potential client and what's actually happening in their lives at the point where they have some sort of inkling or realisation that they need ‘you’.

Going through this exercise is such an important part of your marketing journey and getting your strategy/content right so it’s truly connects with your audience rather than just talking at them. From there, you can create really strong marketing content

So our tips for creating content that connects?

1. Map out your customer journey and profile your ideal clients so you understand what is important to them.

2. Emotion. Use it. Make them smile, laugh or feel grateful. #MakeThemFeel.

3. Be authentic. There's enough ‘fakeness’ on the Internet. People want to connect with real people, so let your human side to your business shine on through.

4. Use video. It's a great way to bring the humanity out in your marketing and a spoken word has so much more power than a written one.

5. Keep it on brand. Define the personality of your brand and keep everything in line with that so people can get to know your business and feel comfortable with who you are and trust the content you are putting out.