What content should you create? Answer your customer’s questions and misconceptions

"I'm not quite sure what content I should focus on creating."

This is a common statement we hear from consultants who are getting started with their content strategy. They are not sure what to create, and what topics to write about.

In this article, I am going to give a simple framework and tactical approach for how to come up with content ideas.

There is a gap between you and your customers, content can close it

When you begin thinking about content, imagine a spectrum of your customer’s awareness about you and your area of focus.

On your left is your customer. They have little awareness of you or the services you focus on. That is what has led them to hire you for consulting services.

On the right is you. You have a high level of awareness about the services that you focus on. You live and breathe your area of focus everyday.

When any new prospect enters your world, there is an education period. They will have questions, they will need proof to build trust. This is the gap.

Each meeting you have with the prospect closes the gap.
Each case study or success story you share with the prospect closes the gap.
And each piece of educational content you share with the customer closes that gap.

Now on how to close the gap...

What questions do your customers ask you?

The next time you are in a meeting or sales call with a prospect, take note of any questions your prospects ask you. These are amazing sources of content because they will signal what areas of awareness your customer is lacking on.

If you note these questions across a wide variety of customers, you will almost certainly come across trends of common questions that you find yourself answering over and over again.

Instead of answering these verbally on every call, consider turning these into content pieces that you can send before or after your sales call to solidify your expertise and show that you are ahead of their thinking.

When you have a content piece prepared to answer a customer’s question, it works wonders to help solidify trust and show you know their business.

For example, on call after call, we found that our customers were asking us "Should I post my content on LinkedIn or my website?". After hearing that question 5-6 times, we decided to create an article specifically focused on answering that question.

One week after writing it, another prospect asked the same question and we had the article ready to go.

What misconceptions or objections do your customers have?

Another powerful way to use content is to overcome objections and misconceptions in your customer’s minds. When you find yourself running into the same objections or misconceptions over and over again, this can be a great chance to create educational content to help someone over that hump.

To identify these opportunities, look for common misconceptions your customers bring to calls.

What do they believe at the start of every call that you have to convince them of otherwise?
What are they skeptical about?
What are their biggest fears and concerns about moving forward?

These topics make for amazing content pieces because you can use them immediately in your sales process.

For example, at Content Allies we offer a podcasting service to our customers. When we bring this up to almost any new prospect they immediately say "But how am I going to build an audience?"

Our approach to podcasting is actually to use this as a tool for systematic networking. We use podcasting as a means to first help you grow your network and rub shoulders with other influencers. That is the primary benefit, while the audience is a secondary benefit.

In almost all cases, our prospective customers have not thought about podcasting in this light. This is a large misconception they have about what a podcast is and the purpose of it.

That is why we created the article Grow your consulting firm through podcast networking. This is an article that we can send over after each sales call to help change their mindset and perspective on podcasting. This approach alone has helped us move several customers across the fence to launching podcasts with us.

This approach will lead to a never-ending supply of ideas

When you follow this approach you will never run out of content ideas. Each conversation with a customer becomes a source of topics and inspiration for new content.

The key is to simply start paying attention and collecting ideas.

Action steps:

• Set up a document or dedicate a note pad to writing down ideas from customer conversations.

• Start paying attention during conversations with prospective and existing customers.

  • What questions are they asking you?

  • What misconceptions do they have?