Marketing with emotions
Content marketing strategies are being used to reach audiences, create awareness and drive brand recognition across channels. Whether on the web, a blog, social media or video channel – content can be delivered in all different shapes and sizes. Content is typically created to meet a need, solve a problem or create awareness. As marketers, we need to ensure that content programs also include the ability to create emotional response.
Emotion has a place in good content, just as much as facts do. Whether you’re posting a blog, a social article or video content, evoking consumer emotion needs to be a goal because research shows that results double when marketing is paired with emotion. That is a large increase – and one that shouldn’t be ignored because you’re changing the medium.
It’s human nature to want to share something that made you happy or surprised or sickened. People want to share these emotional experiences with others. That is why emotion needs to be a part of your content development – so people will share, share, share!
If you’re thinking of adding emotion into your content strategy – consider the following:
Happiness isn’t the only emotion that gets shared While happiness is a great emotion to include in content, it can’t be the only trick in your marketing bag. In fact, some say happiness is a little overdone in marketing. However, there is good reason why brands tend to lean happy – content with a happy or positive tone has a better chance of being shared on social media. A study on the million most shared articles on social media, showed that out of the top 1,000 articles, more than two-thirds had a positive tone.
It’s not surprising that happy content is frequently shared. But some may be surprised to learn that anger is also a powerful emotion that goes viral quickly. Anger occurs when someone strongly disagrees with the position being presented. In this situation, people will read, react and respond. You can create anger in your content by challenging existing beliefs and opinions in your headlines or articles. Just be careful not to create too much anger, or that’s all your brand will be known for.
Surprise! Generating the emotion of surprise is one of the easiest ways to get your content shared. Experts recommend pairing surprise with another emotion to get the biggest bang. Think about what surprises people – a joke with an unexpected ending, a startling fact, a thought-provoking question? If you surprise someone, they will want to share the surprise with others because people like to give surprises.
Negative Emotions Don’t shy away from generating some negative emotions with your content. Fear, anger, sadness and disgust are all part of human nature. Fear and anger are two of the top emotions for generating reaction. This may seem surprising, but consider what you do when something makes you fearful? Do you share that fear with someone else? Or what if something makes you really angry – do you vent to someone else? These emotions typically are shared in the course of a day, and content is no different. Sadness, however, is slightly different and typically creates a personal reaction that is less likely to be shared. Not good if you’re trying to go viral, but good if you’re trying to raise money for a charity, for example.
However you decide to generate buzz with your content marketing, consider adding emotion into the mix. Let the experts at B2E help you test and track reaction to the different emotions in your content. Don’t be afraid to try some new things in your content marketing plan!
