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Content is not a one size fits all solution!

For small business owners who can’t afford to become publishers there is a more viable approach to online visibility.

It applies even more to activists, charities or non-profits!

What else can small businesses do?

When does content actually make sense and how?

How can you succeed on the Web without a team of writers, editors and graphic designers?

See below!

Are influencers lying about great content?

Internet marketing pundits still push the “content is king” mantra.

When you listen to influencers you get the impression that there is only one solution for all of the world’s problems.

1. Want to rank on Google? Create great content!
2. Want to get leads and sales? Create great content!
3. Want to cure cancer? Create great content!

No. Content creation can’t cure cancer.

Yet there is still room for helpful content, even in the AI slop era.

It might appear strange that I tend to be wary of the content marketing hype. Why?

After all I have been preaching creating valuable content for years.

I even worked as a content marketer for a global company! How come then?

Yes I earned a living by creating content for client blogs for over 15 years!

“I blog for money” as it was called back in the days.

Why would I want to hurt myself? I don’t.

I just think that lying to you will hurt me more in the long run.

Thus I’m just making you a bit more cautious about your content expectations.

Sure, content creation is better to get links than traditional link building with outreach for example.

I would even go so far to say that you need to replace link building with content creation. Why?

You have to earn real organic editorial links in a scalable way.

Ranking on Google is still about links not just content directly though. Don’t forget that!

You can’t rank an empty site or one that has just fluff on it.

Especially the AI slop backlash of recent years has proven that again.

Many SEO experts use the term Mount AI for it.

Sites that engage in “scaled content abuse” by mass creating shallow content pages with AI grow fast on Google.

Yet they drop shortly after that to almost zero.

You can’t afford regular publishing?

What can you do when you can’t afford to become a publisher?

I mean most small business owners with teams of a few employees can’t.

Even offering them a blog is still a hard sell. They are not in the business of writing and publishing.

Do not just resort to using a chatbot to provide random content to fill otherwise pointless pages.

I feel your pain. I know that you can’t write and publish on top of your core business.

That’s one of the main reasons I often get hired as a freelance blogger or social media content writer.

Small businesses are in the business of creating products or offering services and selling them not publishing.

In case it’s just Google that needs your content to wrap their ads around it’s a good decision to seek out alternatives for content.

Not every topic and industry makes sense to be covered in a blog or debated in a community either.

Especially non-profits can benefit from word of mouth and viral spread by doing good!

Using cancer as an example

Cancer is a good example here.

Who wants to write regularly about cancer? Someone who has it?

Well, most people value their privacy when it comes to health issues.

They are afraid that talking about their illness could affect their lives negatively.

They could lose their job for example.

One of the most important reasons why cancer blogs are not as popular is also that

a cancer remedy is not something you can provide by writing a “how to”.

It’s a very sensitive topic so that you have to be very careful what you write at all. You might put people’s health at risk.

Also it’s painful to face death like that. Even when your type of cancer might be curable.

Last but not least conventional therapies and cancer itself rob you of what little remaining energy you have left.

There is no room for side-projects that way.

Cancer survivors might not want to talk about their traumatic experience either.

So content creation is not a great way to deal with cancer.

What can you do instead? Ideally on a budget?

Share your results!

Let’s assume you are a charity supporting cancer patients or laboratory working on a cure needing more funding.

What else can you do instead of creating and promoting content?

You can highlight what you already do!

How do you achieve that? Not only by writing about it and creating more content nobody reads or shares.

You can show off your work by the results.

Publishing promising results from time to time may be much more rewarding for all parties involved.

Ideally studies or “first party data” from your own experience are useful!

Something like “out of our 100 cancer patients x reported feeling better due to MBSR (Mindfulness Based Stress Release)“.

Continuous content creation without substance is in contrast less valuable.

A charity could share stories of the people they have helped already. That’s also results.

Involve prominent supporters

Sometimes a well known name and face can make people stop and listen:

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie was perhaps the most well known Hollywood couple.

They could revel in their fame but instead they put it into use on an ongoing basis.

They were also living proof by giving shelter to children who were not as fortunate as they are.

You can get a lot of publicity by involving prominent supporters

You wouldn’t get that with mere content. Also the media attention leads to more links and ultimately higher ranking in Google too.

Try to actively approach public figures for support.

In case it’s not such a lofty goal like healing cancer a testimonial about your business might be enough.

Of course you don’t have to seek help from celebrities either. A local hero will be enough.

I really like how PETA has managed to motivate many public figures to speak out an animal welfare.

Do something inspiring

You haven’t any results to show off yet?

and you can’t attract prominent supporters to showcase your process either? Do something amazing!

Nobody wants to see how you sit behind your desk and stare at your screen.

Greenpeace has been doing amazing stunts for decades.

(Yet even online they manage to create participatory campaigns like Detox My Fashion.)

Other NGOs like Robin Wood or Sea Shepherd have followed suit.

Not all small business owners are prepared to climb steep chimneys or harass poachers in Antarctica but you get the point.

There are far smaller by scale deeds with at least as significant impact to get you publicity from the local press or niche bloggers.

• You can give something away for free
• You can contribute to a charitable organization
• You can do something positive like cleaning up your neighborhood

Don’t do something stupid but something that inspires. For example I suggested to a client of mine to

organize a “barbecue mob” akin to a flashmob.

They were scared by the idea initially because they assumed hundreds of people will invade their barbecue.

Then we scaled the event down a bit, inviting only selected bloggers and fans and it became a success.

The meat and the wine have been sponsored by some of their partners.

At the end of the day everybody was happy to get delicious food and good publicity.

Of course there was blogging and blogger outreach involved.

It wasn’t just “get the food and get the links”!

Yet again you get the idea how it may work for you on local level without a huge budget as well.

* Creative Commons image by Jonathan W.

Merken

Merken