Brands should ‘get out of the way’ of their content urges Mahlab Media editor
Marketers looking to engage professional audiences with serious content need to loosen up and approach the task with a view to entertaining their audiences.
James Chalmers: “You want to get people engaged in your content before they even know what they are doing”
Speaking at the Mumbrella Finance Summit in Sydney, James Chalmers, managing editor of Mahlab Media, said that too often the businesses were focused on trying to deliver a professional message but made the fatal mistake of losing their audience in the process.
He said that businesses needed to entertain, citing one example where dry video presentations featuring people talking about complex insurance issues were replaced by short, fun animations, leading to a massive uplift in views that surprised even him.
“You want to get people engaged in your content before they even know what they are doing,” Chalmers said.
Chalmers cited a project working with the National Insurance Brokers Association which was looking for greater engagement with its audience of professional insurance brokers as well as driving attendance to its events.
NIBA also wanted content that brokers could use in their interaction with clients.
He set out five rules business needed to follow when looking at content, led by the idea that brands should simply “get out of the way” and let compelling content do the job.’
In the insurance industry – as in the wider world – he said people were interested in reading about things that had gone wrong.
Rather than write about the product, he said a story that captured the attention of readers focused on a jet-powered toilet going out of control and destroying a $15,000 camera – a dry idea brought life by the brand not focusing on itself.
Other ways brands could do better was by helping the reader out by making things look interesting such as not using dull, stock.
Highlighting the need to “inform and entertain” he said readers had been drawn to a complex story on policies and on what defined the difference between terrorism and crime by presenting it in the narrative of Batman and Gotham City.
“Is the Joker a criminal or a terrorist,” Chalmers asked.
“Would Batman be liable for the damage he causes while trying to foil the villains.”
Chalmers urged brands to use professional storytellers able to lure readers into difficult subjects and said design should sit at the heart of everything, making it “look good”.
He said by changing from a dull, dry, approach to the content to one that entertained and competed in quality with the sort of content they would find in mainstream media, NIBA saw email open and click through rates surge from 36% to 50%.
Video views rose five times and three quarters of NIBA members attended an event as a direct result of the content they had engaged with.
Sharri Markson,
You must be very short on worthwhile topics,when are you going to get of Barnaby back. Why don’t you ask your friend Malcolm when he will start building coal fired Power Stations
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