According to experts, communication has little to do with what you say. Indeed, your audience will pay very little attention to your words. Overall, your words will never convey more than 7% of your message, which means that your audience focuses on other elements. For marketers and business professionals who are trying to promote their profile online, it means that most of the time you’ve spent calibrating your thoughts and looking for the best possible synonyms has been wasted. Admittedly, it’s not to say that you’re free of creating content without worrying about the way it might affect your audience.
Here are some examples of how the way you say something can change its meaning:
- “I love you.” This can be a romantic declaration, a platonic expression of affection, or a sarcastic put-down. It all depends on the tone of voice and body language used.
- “You’re wrong.” This can be a simple statement of fact, a hurtful accusation, or a constructive criticism. It all depends on the context and the way it is said.
- “I’m sorry.” This can be an apology, a way of expressing regret, or a way of saying “I don’t care.” It all depends on the tone of voice and the body language used.
It is important to be aware of the way you say things, as it can have a big impact on how your message is received. If you want to be sure that your message is received the way you intend it to be, take the time to choose your words carefully and to say them in a way that is respectful and considerate of the other person.
But most people won’t listen to the words you say. Instead, they will respond to the way you choose to deliver your message. You’ve probably come across tactful communication tips that emphasize the best solution to get your message through without hurting other people’s feelings. The principle applies to all types of communication. In the business environment, the frame you use to share information plays a crucial role in how your audience is going to interpret the message. In other words, staging the scene for your message is the first step of a successful communication strategy, whether you are writing a blog article about your latest product or hoping to raise your profile on a networking platform.
In a world of content, you need to bring structure
How to Use the 3-Act Structure To Improve Your Content Marketing
In an age where there can be no profitable market position without a digital presence, you can’t afford to carry on without a website. Your website not only provides an informative background about your services and products for your audience, but it is also an essential tool to build trust. Having the right products doesn’t matter if your content is outdated. Indeed, unless you’ve been living under a non-digital stone in the past few years, you’ve probably heard of Search Engine Optimization — SEO for short. The main function of SEO is to ensure that search engines can access your website and index its content, which will make your business findable when users type relevant search terms. However, it would be foolish to assume that SEO activities only refers to your choice of keywords. Indeed, you need to work closely with a specialist to ensure that your content is structured meaningfully to enable crawling and understanding. As a result, your HTML structure and the page layout matter just as much as what you choose to write about. With the adequate SEO facilities in place, your content remains inaccessible, which makes it pointless.
Ready to create content, but what content do I need?
Many small businesses feel overwhelmed at the prospect of content creation. When it feels like you’ve written a ton of blog articles that nobody has read, you can’t help but wonder if it’s really worth all the hassle. Why create content if nobody cares enough to read it? There’s a crucial distinction you need to make here between the kind of information you want to share with your audience and the type of content you are using to do so. Ultimately, just because blog articles don’t work, it doesn’t mean that your content is worthless. On the contrary, it might be an indication that you need to spend more time developing an effective content marketing plan to figure out when is the best time to engage and what kind of content you should use. If you don’t know how to approach your content plan, you should check out this free ultimate content marketing calendar for guidance. The bottom line is that you need to design a sharing plan that lets you reach your audience, both in terms of timing and content formats. After all, if blog posts are not successful, you can try to bring infographics, podcasts and case studies to better share your expertise.
You can write all you want; you can’t fake expertise
Writers Can’t Fake This
If you want to attract potential buyers to your site and keep them there, your content is not going to be enough. It’s your expertise people want to read. Unfortunately, if you are to sound like an expert, the best way to get there is to earn your expert status honestly. Ultimately, there is a ton of data available online. If your audience wants to know more about your specific industry, they can probably learn enough to write an essay just by spending the afternoon browsing Wikipedia. So can you too. If you want to get your message across, you need to speak from your personal experience, using examples from past cases. Being as real and authentic as you can is the fastest way to inject to your content shape and trustworthiness.
You make it hard for your audience to get your message
Did you know that 45% of online users give up registering online is the process is too complicated? What does it have to do with your message? When you publish your message on a website or via an application, you need to make sure that your visitors can interact smoothly with the platform. User experience refers to the way your visitors navigate and use the site or the app. If they are left confused, unable to decide where to click to go further or if they struggle to complete their actions, they are likely to give up and leave without ever getting to read your message. Poor UX experiences are frustrating and create unnecessary tensions. Not only do they stop people from interaction with your content, but they also promote the idea that you might not be a suitable interlocutor in the first place – because you make navigation impossible difficult for them.
Hi world – the nightmare of the online communication universe
PR Nightmares: What You Can Learn from the Biggest Blunders
Even though we send professional emails every day, we are not educated in the art of email communication. More often than not, the worry in writing an email is to ensure that it displays all the relevant facts. As a result, it’s not uncommon for professionals to send accidentally unpleasant emails. Ultimately, just because you type it with a specific tone in mind doesn’t mean the recipient will read it as you meant it. The absence of visual context and voice can make it difficult for people to know how to interpret online communication. It can be helpful to consider the different ways in which a person could interpret your message and adjust accordingly.
The funky professional selfie content is never a good look
Selfies are not just a trend; they’ve become a whole new culture. You can turn on your favorite social media app without stumbling across dozens of selfies of friends, relatives, and people you don’t even know. Nailing your selfies has become just a phenomenon that you can find helpful resources all over the Internet to help you to take good selfies. As a consequence, more and more professionals have embraced the selfie culture. Networks such as LinkedIn and Twitter are filled with BTS self-portraits. Initially, the idea is to inject some personality to your message. But meaningless everyday selfies have become an excuse for self-gratification. This is me, looking dapper while enjoying a cup of coffee. This is me, your local expert in his overpriced car. Your selfies could be counterproductive.
Choosing your battles
It is difficult when you’ve created new content and developed the appropriate format and structure for it to face complaints. More and more people get offended on a daily basis. Sometimes, something you didn’t even think was an issue causes a massive backlash. You can’t always win. But sharing the why behind your content matters just as much as the way you distribute it.
Your audience doesn’t listen to you. People value the approach you use to deliver your content often more than the message itself. If you don’t want to get lost in the process, your content strategy should include a delivery methodology.