A Nation of Quitters

Where have you gone, Evelyn Wood?

We need you.

Steve Peck, writing for Heinz Marketing, reports the average reader devotes no more than two minutes to branded long-form content.

No matter the content's quality, after two minutes, the average reader quits.

Peck reaches this conclusion after a study of 180,000 readers and 1,700 white papers, e-books, reports and guides.

Because Americans' average skim-reading speed runs from 400 to 700 words per minute, most content exceeding 1,400 words is wasted.

"Blink and you’ve lost them," Peck says.

While in the White House, self-taught speed-reader John F. Kennedy sent a dozen members of his the staff to the Evelyn Wood Reading Dynamics Institute, so they could keep pace with the cerebral president.

Mrs. Wood promised students she could teach them to read at the rate of 1,500 words per minute, and produced some who could read four times that many.

Face Facts

In a controlled experiment, the UK's Behavioural Insights Team studied the effect stock shots of faces had on the responses of 1 million visitors to the website of a charitable organization.

The researchers found the use of stock photos of people's faces significantly reduced conversions.

They concluded that, because marketers over-expose web users to these kind of photos, users simply tune them out—and ignore any content that accompanies them.

"The use of a stock photo discouraged individuals, who saw it as a marketing gimmick," the researchers said.

Fancy Pants

The term fancy pants first appeared in 1843 in an ad in The Bangor Daily Whig & Courier. 

In a time when most pants were coarse, the soft twill trousers advertised for sale by auction house Williams & Prince were, indeed, fancy.

Style manuals discourage writers from putting on fancy pants. Never use a fancy word, when a plain one will do.

But, as pscyho-linguist Steven Pinker says in The Sense of Style, the rule is overstated: 

"It's certainly true that a lot of turgid prose is stuffed with polysyllabic Latinisms and flabby adjectives. And showing off with fancy words you barely understand can make you look pompous and occasionally ridiculous. 

"But a skilled writer can enliven and sometimes electrify her prose with the judicious insertion of a surprising word. According to studies of writing quality, a varied vocabulary and the use of unusual words are two of the features that distinguish sprightly prose from mush."

In a 1739 letter, Voltaire offered similar advice to the 24-year old writer Helvétius:

"Beware, lest in attempting the grand, you overshoot the mark and fall into the grandiose: only employ true similes: and be sure always to use exactly the right word."

Battling Bullies

As a small business, you have no greater leverage than content.

My blog Copy Points, which reached a milestone today—100,000 pageviews—proves the point.

David-size businesses can effectively combat Goliaths in the Bizarro World of social media, and build a proprietary audience of followers, fans and advocates.

But how?

In a study last year, software provider Curata identified 428 bloggers it dubbed members of the “10K Club,” because they attract 10,000 or more pageviews a month. 

Two-thirds of 10K Club members represent small and mid-size businesses, with revenue below $100 million.

Curata concluded that six factors made these David-size bloggers successful:

1. They know all the effort, one day, will pay off.
2. They create content that targets a specific audience.
3. They avoid product-pitches.
4. They post at least once a week.
5. They promote their blogs on other channels.
6. They study their pageviews, to learn what kinds work best.

With 100,000 pageviews under my belt, at last I have something I can boast about to my granddaughter. 

Once she's old enough to know what a blog is.

3 Easy Hacks to Make You a Great Writer

Imagine earning $1 for each encounter you have with some grifter hawking simple hacks for turning your mediocre copy into gold.

You'd soon be another Warren Buffet.

But life's just not that easy… until now.

You've reached Mecca on your journey to $1 million every month.

That's because I'm pulling back the curtain to reveal the three most awesome writing hacks ever offered:

1. Read. 

2. Read. 

3. Read.

These three magic bullets come endorsed by a NOBEL PRIZE WINNER.

On April 16, 1947, novelist William Faulkner led a Q & A session in the English department's creative writing course at Ole Miss.

During the session, a student asked him, "What is the best training for writing?"

Faulkner advised, “Read, read, read! Read everything—trash, classics, good and bad; see how they do it. When a carpenter learns his trade, he does so by observing. Read! You’ll absorb it. Write. If it is good, you’ll find out. If it’s not, throw it out the window.”

So that's it. Read, read, read. 

Killer!

Wait, there's more in my pipeline!

In my next post, I'll share the greatest hack in the history of modern media.

For now, here's a teaser.

Millennials: In Blogs We Trust

A new study by research firm Millennial Branding reveals that Millennials rely on blogs more than any other form of media as a source of trustworthy product information.

Thirty-three percent of Millennials say they count on blogs to guide their purchase decisions, while fewer than three percent allow traditional forms of media (TV, magazines and books) to influence them, according to the study.

Although a majority (58 percent) expect brands to publish online content, a mere one percent of Millennials say that ads of any sort increase their trust in a brand.

Before making a purchase, Millennials instead seek the opinions of friends (37 percent), parents (36 percent) and online experts (17%).

Civility. There's an App for That.

Worried friends and followers on Facebook and Twitter might think you're ill bred?

Your social media reputation is safe with a subscription to ThinkUp, according to Farhad Manjoo, columnist for The New York Times.

ThinkUp keeps tabs on your graceless behavior on those networks and points out, among other things, how often you refer to yourself, use profanities and ignore others.

The tracking service is designed "to make you act like less of a jerk online," says ThinkUp co-founder Gina Trapani.

When Branding, Don't Follow the Herd

You're a global, market-leading, socially responsible company with a broad product portfolio and a deep commitment to diversity and sustainability.

Guess what?

Your customers don't care, according to new research by McKinsey.

The consultancy studied the marketing materials of 90 B2B companies, then asked 700 buyers to rank by importance the themes expressed in those materials.

It turns out buyers don't evaluate prospective suppliers in terms of global reach, market leadership, or their commitment to social responsibility, diversity and the environment—among the most prevalent themes in today's marketing materials.

Instead, buyers care most about suppliers' responsiveness, honesty and expertise—themes rarely expressed in the materials.

The researchers caution against "following the herd" when developing marketing themes.

Searchers Getting Wordy

Bloggers can take heart from a trend in the way customers are searching on line.

Searchers are increasingly using complete sentences and long phrases as search terms, according to software maker Hubspot.

They're realizing that simple search terms can no longer pinpoint useful Web content, given its enormity.

So, for example, instead of entering "sales training," a searcher might enter "two-day onsite sales training for a small insurance brokerage in Kentucky."

"As a result of these more complex searches, Google has actually changed its algorithm to better fit conversational questions from searchers," Hubspot says.

Google's change in its algorithm will help drive more traffic to blogs, "which are designed by nature to be educational, answer questions, and provide background info," Hubspot says.

Vintage Verbs: Attinge

Part 1 of a 5-part series on forgotten verbs

English comprises more than half a million words. 

Many are undeservedly forgotten.

Attinge means to touch or influence.

You might say, "Chad's post about great customer service attinged thousands of users."

We preserve the verb's Latin root whenever we use the word tangent.

B2B Marketers Spending More on Content

B2B marketers plan to spend a full third of their budgets on content marketing in 2013, according to research firm eMarketer.

The firm defines content marketing as attracting customers with “content that is not, at its core, promotional material, but which is interesting or valuable for its own sake” and that's “geared to help businesspeople do their jobs better.”

With the larger investment comes greater eagerness for “sticky” content, says eMarketer.

Personalization is a sure way to assure content is sticky. “The more personalized the content is, the more helpful and necessary the content—and therefore the brand—becomes to the customer,” eMarketer says.

Consistency is another. “Content marketers must also keep the content flowing,” the firm says. “A customer community is like a pump that one must prime.”

Blogging is Easy. Just Open a Vein.

Two in three B2B marketers say producing sufficient content is their biggest challenge, according to a new study by the Content Marketing Institute.

But blogging's easy, if you think like a journalist.

Lack of content never fazed famed journalist Kurt Loder, who once said, "News is anything that's interesting, that relates to what's happening in the world, what's happening in areas of the culture that would be of interest to your audience."

News in your industry is anything that's trending around your products and services. 

That means industry-focused content is all around you—in mainstream newspapers, television shows, trade magazines, scholarly journals and nichey newsletters—just waiting for your unique spin.

If anything's a challenge, it's the latter effort. 

Spin demands a little sweat.

As another famed journalist, Red Smith, once said, "Writing is easy. You just sit down at the typewriter and open a vein."

The Elevator Post

Readers report they enjoy Copy Points because the posts are concise.

That's no accident.

I think of each post as the e-version of an "elevator speech."

And the elevator is in downtown Washington, DC, where no building may be taller than 14 stories (so as not to contravene Jefferson's vision for Our Nation's Capital).

It's mind-boggling that, in the age of Tweets and TED Talks, so many bloggers are windbags.

They've forgotten one of Strunk and White's chief lessons:

Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. This requires not that the writer make all sentences short or avoid all detail and treat subjects only in outline, but that every word tell.

Got that?

Make. Every. Word. Tell.

Trust Busters

Without your Website visitors' trust, you're toast.

Writing for Copyblogger, Barry Feldman lists these nine ways to void visitors' trust:

You're doing all the talking. You offer visitors no opportunity to comment. "When your brand does all the talking on your Website, you’ve got a recipe for distrust," Feldman says.

You’re anti-social. You ignore social media.

You're writing for robots. "Keyword stuffing is a certain mistrust trigger," Feldman says. Write to motivate people, not to drive SEO.

You’re not helpful. Givers earn trust; the needy don't. "In the online world, the most fervent servants have the most loyal friends."

You're never home. Your Website omits contact information.
You’re never wrong. This is the cardinal sin of large companies and TV pundits. Don't commit it, too.

You're a mess. If your Website design stinks, "you’ll never even get the chance to develop trust," Feldman says.

You’re using bad words. Feldman doesn't mean profanities, but "spelling mistakes, poor grammar, blatant bastardizations of the language, clumsy sales pitches, clichés, and jargon-laden nonsense."

You're slimy. You're guilty of using the ultimate trust-busters: bait and switch tactics, fine print, aggressive cookies, fabricated testimonials, privacy policy violations, spam and missing unsubscribe protocols.

"You can’t beg, buy or borrow trust. If you want it, you have to build it one article, podcast, tweet, and headline at a time," Feldman says.

Learn more about building trust from my free white paper, Path of Persuasion.

Why I Blog

Rereading George Orwell's 1946 essay Why I Write led me to wonder why I—or anyone—would blog.

"Putting aside the need to earn a living, I think there are four great motives for writing," Orwell says.

Writers want to boost their egos. Writers "desire to seem clever," Orwell says. They share this desire with "the whole top crust of humanity," including scientists, artists, politicians, lawyers, soldiers and businessmen.

Writers want to share their enthusiasm. Writers want to share their perceptions of the world and the pleasure they gain from "words and their right arrangement."

Writers want to record history. Writers hope "to see things as they are, to find out true facts and store them up for the use of posterity."

Writers want to change things. Writers "desire to push the world in a certain direction, to alter other peoples' idea of the kind of society that they should strive after."

In each writer's case, Orwell says, these motives will fluctuate from time to time; but you'll always find at least one of them driving the efforts.

"So long as I remain alive and well I shall continue to feel strongly about prose style, to love the surface of the earth, and to take a pleasure in solid objects and scraps of useless information," Orwell says. "It is no use trying to suppress that side of myself."

Learn to Love Tofu

I've just concluded my first month as a Vegan and resigned myself to loving Tofu.

As a marketer, Tofu should be part of your daily diet, too.

Tofu is an acronym that stands for “top of the funnel.”

The top of the funnel, of course, is your lead-cistern.

According to inbound-marketing agency FiveFifty, 97% of first-time Website visitors are top-of-the-funnel people.

They're "just looking" and far from ready to buy. 

So, if your content appeals only to bottom-of-the-funnel people, you look a little desperate.

"Remember the last time you were shopping at a retail store, and the sales representative kept asking if they could start a dressing room for you?" FiveFifty asks. "If you’re just browsing, their attempts to close a sale can feel overly pushy."

To make delicious Tofu, you need to prepare "buyer personas" that include the demographics, pain-points and priorities of your leads.

"The world’s best Tofu is based on answering real-life questions people have when they first come to your company's Website," FiveFifty says.

Carpetbaggers

During a phone call this week, blogger Michelle Bruno complained to me about the unsavory folks who copy the content of her blog, Fork in the Road, and publish it under their own names.

"I see my stuff all over the place," she said.

Michelle spoke with resignation. 

But I'll take a New York minute to call out these plagiarists.

Or, as I prefer, carpetbaggers.

You'll remember from US history classes that carpetbaggers were opportunists who descended on the vanquished South just after the Civil War. They exploited Southerners by stealing their land and businesses.

The term is synonymous with "crook," "charlatan," "plunderer" and "thief."

Time to Quit Facebook?

Copyblogger's Sonia Simone thinks content marketers should quit Facebook.

Because you can't control what social platforms like Facebook do, she says, it's risky to build your business on another company's "virtual land."

"The minute you actually depend on Facebook for your business, they will change their terms of service in a way that causes you pain," Simone writes.

Publishing on social platforms like Facebook benefits the platforms' owners, nothing more.

They goad you to post content so you'll win a bunch of "Likes."

But that's only a ruse.

In reality, according to Simone, your publishing efforts "are helping them build an audience they can show their spammy display ads to."

Worse yet, Facebook isn't about selling.

"People go to Facebook to share duckface selfies, pictures of grandkids, and memes from George Takei," Simone says.

And while it's still possible to engage people with your Facebook posts, "'engagement' does not equal 'customers.'"

You Facebook posts will get Likes that never lead to sales.

"That’s not marketing," Simone says. "It’s an annoying hobby."

Perfect B2B Posts

Inc. offers these tips for publishing perfect B2B posts:

On LinkedIn, you should:

• Use 16-25 words
• End posts with exclamation marks
• Avoid ending posts with question marks
• Post between 9 am and 1 pm
• Post at the top and bottom of the hour 
• Post on Sundays

On Twitter, you should:

• Use 11-15 words
• Use numbers and numerals
• Use hashtags
• Avoid ending posts with exclamation marks (unlike LinkedIn!)
• Avoid ending posts with question marks
• Tweet between 10 am and noon
• Tweet at the top and bottom of the hour
• Tweet on Wednesdays

A Plea for Civility

Just when you were ready to throw culture to the dogs, Copybloggers' Sonia Simone issues The Civility Manifesto.

"If you write and publish regularly on the Web, you’re an influencer—whether you have 100 readers or a million," she writes. "And I’d like to call on all of us to work together and return some civility to the Web."

Without a greater measure of civility on influencers' part, Simone predicts that "anonymous creeps and soulless bullies" will soon rule the Web.

She asks influencers to rally behind five principles:

1. Recognize diversity as our strength (respect different people and views)
2. Stop using the language of trolls (avoid abusive words and phrases)
3. Stop giving attention to anonymous trolls (ignore them, block them, report them)
4. Look for connection (empathize with people you disagree with) 
5. Be real (stay honest, but "respect your own dignity and that of your fellow human beings")