Tiffanie (00:02)
And advertising week, for example, they recently reported that storytelling is said to be 20 times more memorable than quote traditional corporate messaging and that consumers are going to trust SME 63 % more than corporate brands.
Ben Ard (00:42)
welcome back to another episode of Content Amplified. Today I'm joined by Tiffany. Tiffany, welcome to the show.
Tiffanie (00:47)
Hi, thank you for having me.
Ben Ard (00:49)
Yeah, Tiffany, I'm excited. Selfishly. We were talking before we hit the record button. This is an episode that I want every brand to hear about because I think it's the right way of doing content. But before we dive into that, Tiffany, let's get to know you, your work background and history.
Tiffanie (01:04)
All right, I'll make it short and sweet. I have been in the general marketing and communications field for definitely over two decades. I won't get specific on numbers as I will age myself, but started off primarily in the architecture and construction engineering, or as we call it, AEC industry. Worked there for around 17 years, shifted gears to go more so into the business management consulting industry.
And now I'm out on my own back in the AEC world doing my own thing and I own my own business.
Ben Ard (01:37)
I love it. That's amazing. What's the business name again?
Tiffanie (01:39)
It is MARCOM Consultants, so M-A-R-C-O-M Consultants.
Ben Ard (01:44)
Perfect. Love it. Tiffany, I'm excited. This is going to be a fun subject. This is something that I think a lot of people are paying attention to and may need to convince other people inside their business that this is the right way of doing things. think a lot of marketers may already be convinced here, but what we're going to talk about is really the fact that trust driven content comes from people and customer stories, real information, real content.
And not just from influencers or brand voice, things like that. And it's interesting. It's scary. It's hard, but I think this is the right way of doing things. So Tiffany, to kick things off, when you look at content coming from companies versus content coming from real people, where do you see the biggest gap today?
Tiffanie (02:23)
you
So that's a great question.
I'll start off with saying, you know, the old adage of they say, well, you're on your phone. I'm a big Instagram. Obviously, I, as a marketer, I'm on all of the platforms and I'm actively engaged, but personally, my platform of choice is Instagram. And I don't know if it's my age. I don't know, again, being in the industry, if I'm just a little bit more sensitive to it, but I am definitely over the age of the traditional influencer.
I feel as if much of that content by individuals, especially on Instagram, TikTok has gone in that direction and it just feels really salesy, right? So I think when it first happened, influencers coming out, it felt real. And now I'm listening to what you're telling me or kind of, you know, saying, hey, try this product because I trust you and it felt more real. And now I think that's shifting a little bit because they really monetized it.
And so I will say the same thing is happening with big brands. So obviously we can't talk about big brand content marketing and not talk about LinkedIn. It's probably the number one platform they use in addition to others. So when you go on LinkedIn and you're seeing any big brand, it's rinse and repeat. It's very corporate speak. It's formal. It's professional. It's almost lending itself to AI written. You may not see the emojis, but you still know.
AI had a hand in it. And so that's also very distancing to the person who's trying to engage with that content. So I think there's warnings on both sides of that coin there. I think there's a good middle ground there to be found.
Ben Ard (04:08)
Yeah, I love that.
Yeah, I love that. So how do practitioners or subject matter matter experts build trust differently than brands like what what's the playbook? How do they do it differently and why does it work?
Tiffanie (04:22)
Yeah. Well, I will tell you, the various industries, as we described earlier, that I've been a part of, primarily, yes, they are not product driven or really in the professional services or services realm.
Every company I've worked at, they have indicated to me, yes, we want to promote our quote SMEs, subject matter experts. We know we hear that, but they're also very hesitant to promote those individuals and their personalities. Why? Well, one of the main reasons I've received is, well, we need to promote our company because that person may leave. And so it's almost like we want to promote the expertise, but we don't really want to promote the
You can't do that. That's a big mistake. I think when you promote a personality, an individual, it's much more human centric and they've got a story to tell. And I'm not talking about, hey, CEO, hey, CFO, I just prepared this script for you. Please go record this video or do whatever. That's going to be very, very personal. No, it's not. I think we have to get our subject matter experts talking on video
personalized and their personality comes through because that makes it more believable and it's really back to the storytelling element of really the art of being human, right? It has to be culturally relevant and it has to be something that we can engage with one-on-one.
Ben Ard (05:46)
I love that. That's amazing. And honestly, looking at it from a consumer's perspective, that's the kind of content we actually want to consume. And if you really look at it and just say, okay, what do my customers actually want to consume? You know, it's probably going to be more personality driven.
Tiffanie (06:01)
Yeah, and I wanted to add in.
Obviously, I like to be prepared in advance of our discussion. I did a little bit of research because I love stats that back up kind of what I'm feeling just to make sure that I'm on the right path.
And advertising week, for example, they recently reported that storytelling is said to be 20 times more memorable than quote traditional corporate messaging and that consumers are going to trust SME 63 % more than corporate brands.
So.
I love the stats that back up that storytelling as we know it's more about engaging with one another emotionally versus you know content that feels sterile and it makes people understand hey this person understands me they face the same challenge that I'm currently going through so yeah.
Ben Ard (06:49)
I love that. And I don't doubt those statistics. Again, they just ring true and I love that. Now on the other side of the coin, it doesn't always have to be someone inside your business that's actually doing the talking. This is where customer stories come into play. How did those play a role? What's your recommendations there and how does that also build the trust that we're looking for here?
Tiffanie (07:09)
Yeah, I can make these statements I'm about to make because I've been guilty of it myself. So I think as even good writers, right, and I consider myself good, whatever I'm using air quotes here, whatever we call good or skilled or a skilled marketer, writing case studies shouldn't be this kind of rinse and repeat. We know what the story arc looks like. We know what
Ben Ard (07:16)
You
Tiffanie (07:35)
telling a good story is supposed to look like, but I think sometimes we can lean too much in the marketing realm of how to tell a story. Well, problem, how we addressed it, outcome. Okay, we understand how that story art goes, but I think what we're missing is really more of the narrative and being honest, just like I prefaced this answer, I did this wrong. know, client X came to me, they needed a strategy around whatever it was.
I really started in this approach and here's where I kind of missed the mark or maybe I was a little bit misguided or misdirected. So I think it's telling the real stories of where we actually maybe had a misstep. We're human and then how we course corrected and what that meant.
Ben Ard (08:18)
Well, in any good narrative, can't just be everything is roses and everything's peachy. There are the ups and downs, and that makes us human, right? And that's what really shows the hero's story, kind of an idea. Yeah, I love that.
Tiffanie (08:24)
We wish.
Yeah, and
I was with a company and it was always the thing, right? And actually I was with a couple of companies. We want to talk about amplifying the message, getting the corporate message out there. You know, let's use the term brand ambassador. We want to create great brand ambassadors, but we want it to feel authentic. Well, how do we do that? Well, the corporate approach is to take a corporate approach and say, you know what? Hey, and I'm again, guilty of this. Here's your Friday afternoon email.
I have already crafted for you five to eight different variations of a lead-in to a LinkedIn case study. Go ahead and share it. What's happening is, yeah, they're sharing it, but it's a rinse and repeat. And people that are engaging with your company, they're starting to see this content, and that is just, it's not the way to do it.
I mean, the average consumer and even B2B, right? I'm not even talking about a B2C, which is a different kind of concept, but very similar is people are watching, they're paying attention, and the average consumer on both sides is very savvy.
Ben Ard (09:21)
100%.
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
on that note, are there any industries that are already doing this well? Are there any industries that are little laggards? What are you noticing out in the space?
Tiffanie (09:47)
I think, should we start with the positive or the negative? Let's start with the positive. I'm a positive person, let's go there.
Ben Ard (09:51)
Yeah
Tiffanie (09:53)
So I have two brands and I was telling you earlier, Ben, that I think one of them you're obviously going to recognize and you'll probably say yes, but maybe not so much the other. I'm local, I'm in Tampa, Florida. Someone that's doing this whole content marketing, brand marketing right, in my humble opinion, is our very own local airport. So our Tampa International Airport, I would recommend to anyone, if you have not checked out their Instagram, please do.
they doing right? I think there's a lot to be said. You guys go on check it out. You're gonna understand it immediately. One of the things they're doing right is
They tell micro stories and with those micro stories, they're not only sharing updates, but they are culturally relevant. They're not using their platform as a billboard or, you know, hey, let me get some corporate messaging out. They are also listening. Go to the comments. I go directly to the comments often and they are responding and they're also responding with humor and they're not doing using the humor at the expense.
of the consumer, it's just observational humor that we can all really relate to. Man, they're doing it right. I'm not quite sure who runs their social, but they're definitely clued in. the other one I would say, which I'm sure you've probably seen, is Wendy's, right? Wendy's social.
Ben Ard (11:15)
Mm-hmm.
Tiffanie (11:18)
Again, they use a lot of humor. They have a definite like human voice point of view. And it's just, it's funny. It's on point. It's relatable. I love it. And they do it very well.
I think, you know, one of the things, again, I'm more familiar with the professional services industry in general. So let's look at the big four, what we call and management consulting. And so that would be your EY, your Deloitte, KPMG, PWC, et cetera. But there's a laundry list. They have amazing content. I know if I'm needing anything that is first person research, I need something that's very well thought through.
I can go on McKenzie, really any of those and I can find it. It's amazing what they do. But when you look and really try to identify their brand, it's really hard.
It's hard to get a sense of the personality of the trials, the tribulations, the challenges, the real heart of those brands. So I think a pivot to really embracing our frailty and our failability as humans, I think could really do that industry and really the services industry in general, a lot of good.
Ben Ard (12:31)
I love that. I love that. Yeah. Showing the failures, the humanity of everything I think is so important. Anyone who is looking at reconfiguring how they do content, especially if they're trying to build trust, what do you recommend?
for them moving into this next year.
Tiffanie (12:48)
Yeah, I mean, based on everything we just talked about, I would say get rid of what we knew, right? I I used to give content marketing training myself and I would actually now shy away from some of the things I trained on. So I would say do less of featured listicles, corporate messaging, overproduced, content, AI-produced content.
Get away from the heavy self-promotion and then I would actually more rely on tone of voice
the context story, setting up the story, trying to engage empathy from your audience and or showing empathy to your client. And then also that narrative consistency on, let me tell the story, but let me do it in a way with transparency and sharing the why I made the decisions I made.
Ben Ard (13:40)
I love that. Okay. I'm going to sneak in one extra question as a bonus question, something that you called out when we were emailing back and forth before this episode, trying to figure out the subject and everything you called out specifically AI. And I know you mentioned that a little bit earlier on in the episode. What should people think about AI's role in this trust-based content system? How does AI help? How does it hurt? What should we avoid? What should we do?
Tiffanie (14:03)
Yeah.
glad you asked that. So I have been working as a freelance writer for a few different magazines in the AEC industry. I love it. And let's say five years ago, I would be assigned a story and I would just do my usual Google research, right? I'm looking for those first person, going down the research kind of rabbit hole, if you will. And I will tell you the good news and see how I'm starting on the positive again for you, just for you.
then. The good news is AI has been great as a research tool, especially when you ask it to provide citations. So that's great. But please let me warn any and all writers or anyone else.
Ben Ard (14:32)
I appreciate that.
Tiffanie (14:45)
Do not trust, always verify the citation, always click, still continue to go down that quote research or attribution rabbit hole until you find the originating research to make sure what is being cited is actually true. And please do not use AI to write your content.
Now you can ask it to write a summary, an outline, and also provide you with directional citations, but then use your voice, your personality to write the content because it's really going to resonate with your clients more.
Ben Ard (15:18)
I love it. This is amazing. Tiffany, thank you for the time and insights today. This has been wonderful. If anyone listening wants to reach out and connect with you online, how and where can they find you?
Tiffanie (15:28)
Well, they can find me at marrcomconsultants.com. They can find me on LinkedIn. Please send me a shout out or an invite. I'd love to connect there. Yeah, either of those two ways. And thank you, Ben. This has been great. I'm a nerd. I'm a content nerd. I'm a writer at heart. So this has been a great discussion. Appreciate it.
Ben Ard (15:45)
This has been amazing. Anyone in the audience listening, please scroll down to the show notes on any platform. We will have links to connect with Tiffany there. Again, Tiffany, thank you so much for your time today.
