5 Ways for Humanizing Content

Silverpop Tip Sheet:
Getting Personal: 5 Tips for Humanizing Content sn't it nice when you walk into your favorite restaurant and the staff knows your typical order down to the smallest of details? Or when the salesperson you recently met with remembers your name, favorite color and dress size? Or when you enter your local florist and the owner offers personalized recommendations based on your spouse's preferences?ILet's face it: Getting one-on-one personal attention beats dealing with a faceless corporate entity any day. But many companies, after decades of sending generic marketing and advertising messages to the masses, have been slow to personalize and humanize their online content. That's a big mistake. With the rise of social media and accompanying corporate pages on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, customers and prospects now move quickly and effortlessly between your company's social presence and photos of their best friend's recent vacation. So, their expectations for how businesses communicate with them have changed accordingly. Moving forward, the most successful marketers will be those who stand out by infusing their content with a more human feel. Here are five tips and tactics guaranteed to strengthen your messages and delight your subscribers:
are an important part of the communication and promotions mix, but would you ever limit your communications with neighbors to "Want to buy some Girl Scout cookies?"With that in mind, make sure your email arsenal also includes messages designed simply to inform, entertain, surprise and provide value rather than sell. For example, a packaged goods company might offer favorite recipes from the staff, a technology company could author a how-to white paper that doesn't hype its own product, and a cruise operator can recommend travel, packing and on-shore dining tips. Bottom line: Listen to the questions that your customers and prospects have, and then use your emails to help provide answers and insight.
Combining a friendly, conversational tone with a personalized message is a savvy way to cut through the clutter.Lose the robotic corporate speak. In today's social age, there's much less tolerance for communications that sound like they've been written and approved 1by a legal team or PR department. Check to see if your emails have a relentlessly sales-y tone, and read copy out loud to ensure it sounds conversational rather than overly stiff or formal. Remember, it's no longer about shouting your message, so spend less time talking at your customers and prospects and more time paying attention to their behaviors and listening to them via social networks, community forums and surveys. And then talk to them the way you would, well, talk to another human being. Delight your customers with educational content that enhances their experience.Place more emphasis on content that educates and solves problems. Within social circles, people Make your voice distinctive, engaging and yours. know there's more to building relationships than In many cases, a purchase decision is based on 2telling others how great you are and offering incentives to brand preference and customer experience rather get them to like you. Yet inboxes are cluttered with messages t3han th e difference between two products. And considering promising "20% Off and Free Shipping." Those messages that your subscribers are likely receiving emails from
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several competitors that sell products or services like Your customers' yours for about the same price, a little personality can be words will often the determining factor for whether they remember and speak louder than your promotional anticipate your message or hit "delete." copy, so incorporate Humanizing means being memorable and engaging. Your them into your corporate personality and voice should be the logical emails.extension of your company, brand image and presence in the marketplace. Humor is often an effective way to add a humanizing voice to your messages, but that's only one tactic. What works for one company may not be a good fit for yours, so think of your personality as an extension of your company's unique core values and build around that.
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