Original Content is Critical to Growing a Practice

How does a business valuation appraiser become top of mind? For an expert to be top of mind in the mind of their target audience, this audience wants to see examples of the writer’s passion, personality, and perspective—the last item meaning, “show me how you would approach and solve this problem.” To do this, the writer needs original content. Content that is educational, a bit entertaining, and likely to provoke some thought or emotion. Content that will keep your audience engaged and growing. This article discusses the successful strategies used by the author of the article.

Last month I hit a milestone: I published my 300^th newsletter!

I spend quite a few hours writing my newsletter. You may think that is a lot of time. But the payoff is that I reach an audience of hundreds with my original content with one e-mail. How long would it take you to personally call or meet and have a conversation with that many of your prospects, clients, and referral sources?

So please, let me tell you why and how to do this.

Why You Need to Create Your Own Original Content

For experts like us, we need to create and publish original content that serves these goals:

1. Staying visible
2. Building credibility
3. Giving prospects, clients, and referral sources opportunities to know, like, and trust us

Now put yourself in your audience’s shoes. For an expert to be top of mind in their mind, they want to see examples of your passion, personality, and perspective—the last item meaning, “show me how you would approach and solve this problem.”

To do this, you need original content. Content that is educational, a bit entertaining, and likely to provoke some thought or emotion. Content that will keep your audience engaged and growing.

And that audience is not fellow BVFLSers—it’s the audience you want to serve in your practice area or industry niche.

What Do I Write? How Long Does it Take?

When most practitioners think about creating content, they think of blog posts or newsletters. They are the most popular options, so let’s go down that path.

The big hurdle is that you’re likely worried about what to write and how long it will take.

First, get a jumpstart by “repurposing” a speech, interview, whitepaper, or webinar that you’ve previously prepared. How many of these original content sources do you have in your archives?

And when you run out of those sources, jot down the 10 most frequently asked questions you get from clients. And then their 10 most should be frequently asked questions. Now write out the answers to those questions. Shazam, that’s 20 pieces of original content!

Your original content can also be in the form of checklists, e-books, infographics, podcasts, slide decks, and videos that would be relevant to your audience.

The fact is that the span of content options is quite wide, allowing you to produce what you want, when you want, where you want, how you want. You’re a media company!

How Often Do I Have to Publish?

Your audience will let you know what the right publishing frequency is—likely weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly. And try to have one to three posts or newsletters “in the can” so your content doesn’t disappear when you’re busy or traveling.

Where Does That Content Go?

The content you prepare can go into a blog post, which can be accessed through your web site, or a newsletter, which can be sent via e-mail as I do with my newsletter.

Podcasts can go on iTunes, videos on YouTube, slide decks on SlideShare.

And everything you produce should be referenced/linked to in a social media platform like LinkedIn, which is the go-to channel for most of your audience.

Last, but Not Least

Time/location shifting are also distinct advantages of content marketing. You can create and share it anytime/anywhere, not just when your contacts are available to talk.

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Everyone has a different idea of what a successful practice is. The practice you want is personal because it is based on what “successful” means to you. I help practitioners focus on the strategies, tactics, tools, and tech to build/grow/scale their versions of successful practices. If you want some help with that, e-mail me at rod@rodburkert.com.