I recently attended an excellent Social Media Breakfast here in Maine all about creating content. The three presenters, Dave Weinberg, Chris Cavallari, & Jaica Kinsman, all talked about how painless creating content can be.

But when it comes to creating content that motivates your prospects to action, pain is a requirement.

For better or worse, that’s just how we’re wired. And don’t feel too bad about it, because if all of your prospects were perfectly content they wouldn’t need you now, would they?

Whether you’re creating content for your web site, blog, podcast, online video…whatever, you need to understand the pain points that will get your prospects to pick up the phone, fill out the contact form or click Buy Now!

Now this doesn’t mean you have to be a sadist! In fact, what your product or service does is alleviate the pain of your best customers.

How do you find your prospects pain points?

If you’re not sure what motivates your prospects to action, think back to some of your most satisfied customers. What problems were they facing that you helped them overcome? It’s also a good idea to call them up and ask them, as there may be additional pain points your product or service fixed that you didn’t even know about.

You can get more insight into your customers’ pain points by reviewing the sites of your competitors. Are there certain words or phrases they use? What do they claim their products resolve? If these resonate, be sure to include these ideas in your own content.

You can also perform a keyword analysis to give you more insight into what keywords your audience is using at Google. This can be done by hiring a search engine marketing firm, or if your on a tight budget, you can try using the Google Adwords Keyword Tool. This free online tool will generate similar phrases, along with the competition you face for ranking well for that term. It’s one of the keyword analysis tools we use here at flyte.

Once you have some good ideas of what’s frustrating your audience, it’s time to create your content.

How do your prospects find your content?

It starts with using the keywords you’ve uncovered in the title of the content piece. That will help your content rise up in the search engine ranking. Of course, the rest of your content–your headers and body copy–need to support that title.

With the rise of social media, a title is even more important. Very often, people will share your content via Twitter or Facebook without even reading it! The title is enough to get them to share it with their network. (Hopefully they do read it, and are motivated by it, but sharing with friends can be just as, if not more, powerful.)

Your prospects are using both search and social media, so you need to make your content as findable and shareable as possible.

What are some examples of content that address prospects’ pain points?

Here are a few; use as appropriate to your own business

• The 10 Costliest Mistakes DIY Homeowners Make
• Tax Help: 5 Ways to Avoid an IRS Audit This Year
• Weight Loss Tips: How to Drop The Freshman 15
• The 11 Biggest Mistakes Small Business Bloggers Make

Just be sure to backup those juicy titles with content that helps your prospects, and end with a persuasive call-to-action that will get them to call, contact or drive over to your office the moment they finish reading, listening to, or watching your pain-relieving content piece.

Now it’s your turn…what are some titles that would motivate your prospects into action? Please put your ideas into the comment field below.

Rich Brooks
No Pain, No Gain

Photo Credit: Juha-Matti