Let’s talk about using content to foster a deep omnipresence within your audience.
Depth of Awareness Beats Audience Size
There’s a misconception about marketing that it’s all about getting the most eyeballs on your brand. That marketing is purely a numbers game – the more people you tell, the more business you get. A sort of “roll-up, roll up, come one come all” approach.
And though that kind of mass marketing has a place – largely when promoting widely needed (or indeed widely wanted) items to the general public – this “one to many” approach alone might achieve widespread brand awareness, but that awareness can sometimes be quite superficial.
However, when you are promoting a service-based B2B or a professional personal brand, people need to feel they can trust you before they buy. Businesses like ours usually only offer something that is only applicable to a small sliver of the business community, or may focus on helping a particular niche or industry.
When appealing to these narrower, trust-led audiences, surface, scattergun awareness doesn’t always cut it. You need to create a deep, rich connection with your audience. It’s not just about getting eyeballs pointing in your direction – it’s about winning over hearts and minds.
All About Content Cross-Pollination
This is where content cross-pollination comes in – at least that’s my term for it. I think it can be a truly valuable way to expand and deepen this relationship with your audience. Let me explain.
Say you have an audience on LinkedIn, you have an avid email subscriber following, an Instagram presence, and you have a podcast too.
In this example, it’s likely that most of the content you post through those channels aims to directly get people to visit your website, or head over to a relevant landing page related to a conversion of some kind. I’m certainly not saying there is anything wrong with that per se, but let’s get into it.
Instead of funneling people towards a conversion or a website visit with your content on those platforms, why not get the individuals following you on those platforms to follow you on one (or more) of your other platforms too?
For example, how could you use content to get your Instagram followers to hop over to your podcast? How can you get your podcast listeners to also follow you on LinkedIn? How could you get your newly aggregated LinkedIn followers to check out your blog? How can you get your blog-readers to join your email list?
You can approach this as a linear cycle, going back to our example, of Insta, to podcast, to LinkedIn, to blog, to email, to Insta, to podcast, to LinkedIn, to blog, to email and maybe playing around with the order in which you do that.
Or you could approach it as a network of different, yet enmeshed platforms, with each a hub for promoting the other 4 destinations. For example, how can I tweak my podcast presence in such a way that people will want to jet off to my blog or my LinkedIn profile or my email sign up link? How can I create email content that lets people know I have a presence in those 4 other places ready for them to explore?
This isn’t limited to these platforms either – feel free to replace them with whatever platforms or formats you use to get your content out into the world!
The Benefits of Content Cross-Pollination
Having interested parties interact with you over numerous different platforms creates a rich web of interaction with you. If your content (or indeed your smiley face or voice) appears in their YouTube feed, their LinkedIn feed, their inbox, their TikTok feed, and more then that’s going to be great for your brand awareness.
As they browse their favourite content portals, you’re there. You become somewhat omnipresent.
So to use a well-worn magic-adjacent internet idiom, you cross-pollinate your content to charge your brand’s promotional power, and you release more direct conversion-based calls-to-action to cast the spell of conversion, now you have a dedicated audience.
A Few Words of Warning
But as with any magic, it can also bite you in the bum if you misuse it. Heed these words of warning.
Firstly, over the top omnipresence can easily overwhelm an audience. When you appear everywhere your audience looks online, you risk fading into the noise – or worse, irritating your following. Either way, plan for them to have some respite from you, somewhere!
The second is that content within your blog, your podcast, your social feeds, your videos needs to be high-quality; discussing in-demand, relevant topics and sharing useful, practical information. It needs to be attractive and make them want to stick around in your online bubble. Plus, each platform’s content needs to have unique insights, so your platforms aren’t just parroting each other.
Need help with creating that un-put-downable content? Well if you’re a techy B2B then I can help! Click through to my website or hit the QR code in my end screen to connect with me!
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