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Content marketing is one of the most profitable ways to market your biz because of its ability to multiply your visibility and easily connect to ideal clients. In this episode, content coach Melanie Lea gives listeners easy content ideas to pick from and implement in order to make more sales online.

Melanie Lea provides content coaching for online brands with a focus on mental health, brand development, having fun, and selling through your content.

Website // Instagram

The episode:

Katrina Widener: Hi, everybody. It's Katrina. Today I'm here with one of my good friends, Melanie Lea. She has come and spoken to group coaching twice to talk about branding, which is what she used to do. But I'm so excited to have you here today, Melanie. 

Melanie Lea: Thank you. I'm so excited to be here. Hello everyone. 

Katrina Widener: So Melanie now is more of a content coach than a branding designer. And so I don't know if you wanted to give everyone just like a little bit of an introduction of what you do and who you serve and all the amazing goodness that comes out of your business. 

Melanie Lea: Yeah. I actually have ended up using a lot of my background as a branding and website designer for content coaching because so many people, they want to do content planning. They want to get more visible, but what does that revolve around? It revolves around your brand reputation! So it's really, it's really helped me in this... I'm going to call it my new life online, my new pivot for business. But yeah, I work with online brands who are wanting to get more visible who maybe even potentially are afraid of putting themselves out there in a genuine, authentic way.

They don't know how to do that in a way so that they can sell their stuff online. So that's really, my main focus is working with people, helping them understand who they are, that reputation that they want to build, and then who they want to connect through their content or connect to through their content.

And then all of the magic that goes into actually attracting these people, getting them to engage with you and ultimately just selling more of your stuff online through content marketing. 

Katrina Widener: Yay. That's so fun. I also love that description of content coaching, because I think that it's like a newer term that people might not always be like, "Okay, so what does that look like?" But really breaking it down and making it feel accessible and easy for people is just like, "Yay!" 

Melanie Lea: Yay, that's good feedback, thank you. Yeah, that's definitely the goal is we want it to seem fun and not like a drag because if you're going to show up and make money online, content is the way to do it in not every case, but in a lot of cases, that's what our, our goal is. We, I, hear people say they want to be more consistent and it's not gonna happen if it doesn't seem fun or approachable. So I'm really glad that it seems that way, I guess. . 

Katrina Widener: So when it comes to content, like real quick before we dive into some of the nitty-gritty details, what would you say makes it so powerful and makes it be one of the things that can really connect you to your goals and to your audience?

Melanie Lea: The reason why it's so powerful is because a lot of the people that I work with are just one person and that's the business and you can't possibly be selling 24/7, but your content can. And so if you create really good strategic content that's rooted in who you are, it ties back to your offers, it's going to be engaging for your audience -- that can sell for you. And then it just gives you the permission to show up and be whoever you are, build that brand reputation, and become known for whatever it is that you're doing.

Katrina Widener:  I love that actually a lot, because I do think that, that just makes it so  easy for people to be like, "Oh, duh this is why I create content. This is why I want to do this is because I want it to be easy for my clients to come and find me." And you can't be online all the time, especially for solopreneurs, which is like a ton of the people who will be listening to this, so I'm like "Ooh, that's juicy." 

Melanie Lea: That's good. I really want to get people to think about "Okay, if I show up in whatever way how can I be representing my business and selling something all the time?" Which I'm really excited to dive into fun, actionable ways to do that too. 

Katrina Widener: Yes. Okay. So Melanie is going to teach us a couple of options of content types that we can use to really achieve our goals. So let's just dive in and give us, give us all of the juicy tidbits of what we want to be doing. 

Melanie Lea: Okay, cool. So when it comes to content, I'm going to start broad and then we're gonna, we're gonna hone in on like the specifics that I think people could use as like their biggest opportunities to increase their engagement, make sales. But so starting broad, there are six objectives that I like for people to think about within their content. Objectives or intentions might be another good word for it. A lot of people are thinking like what are my content pillars going to be that really, I want you to think, what is your content intention going to be? 

So the six content, intentions or objectives are to teach, coach, connect, promote, entertain, or provoke. So a lot of people they're teaching, but they're trying to be Google through their content and they're still not getting engagement and they're not making sales -- it's because you're not actually getting people to connect to you and you're not actually selling your services necessarily through teaching content.

Okay. So the two that we're really gonna focus on are entertaining and provoking, and I feel like people get really tripped up with these because they're thinking "I'm in business. What do you mean entertain?" Or "I'm just a small solopreneur. What do you mean provoke? Does that mean people aren't going to like me?" So the reason why I like to focus on those two is because they are going to bring the right type of people into your business. And it's going to level up your expert, I guess, authority like, whoa, when you're doing these. So when you entertain, you're humanizing your brand, you're attracting like-minded people who get you. When you're provoking, you're getting people to think, and you're building authority.

So entertain's pretty straightforward: Share your sense of humor. That's what I wish more people were doing all the time. I don't know who else scrolls through Instagram as "Wow, this is the same thing. Wow, this is the same thing." When you share your sense of humor, it it adds a little, I'd say it like abrupts the scroll where you're like, Oh my gosh, how refreshing. It gets people to get excited about what you're doing, get your humor, because again that kind of brings like-minded people into your business, which is exactly what you want when you're trying to make sales online. 

And then when you provoke -- I feel like provoke makes it sound scary, but really what you're doing is you're sharing your opinion and you're taking a stance on things, which as we all know, like that's really important in our online climate, we want to work with brands who align with the things that we take a stance on. So whenever you share your opinion, whenever you take a stance on something, you're actually increasing loyalty from your audience because they're like, yeah, this is my person. For both of those things, when you share a sense of humor and when you share common beliefs, you're just strengthening the foundation of the relationship between you and your audience. 

Katrina Widener: I think that's really important too, because a lot of people think about how to attract people, but they don't think about also the idea of repelling people, which I personally believe is just as important as attracting people.

If we think about having a popular brand or popular Instagram account or social media platform, whatever you might be on. But then you think about having a profitable Instagram platform or profitable business as opposed to a popular business.  Like I know people who have tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of followers, but if you're attracting everyone then you're not exactly going to be able to really narrow down in on the people who are going to purchase from you, who are going to be like, "Ooh, I see myself in your service, or I see myself in your offering. And I want to like actually hit the buy button." 

Melanie Lea: Yeah. And we really want to be deepening the relationship. We don't want it to stay superficial, which is really important. And this is a total side note, but I love people like you who go through and clean out their followers. You're like you didn't unfollow me, I removed you. Because you wanted to have an audience of people who make sense and who engage.

And I don't necessarily think you need to take that extra step to remove people, but I do think it's an awesome thing to let people know about because it's not the end of the world to lose followers. Like it has nothing to do with your self-worth or the success of your business. Yeah, repelling people, do it.

Katrina Widener: Totally. 

Melanie Lea: It's going to strengthen your brand and your sales.  

Katrina Widener: So, when we're thinking about entertaining and provoking, how would you recommend people do this? What types of, obviously the types of content are entertaining and provoking, but if we take it like a step more specific and we really make it super implementable for people, what does that look like?

Melanie Lea: Yeah. So I've got lots of ideas. You are really good at both of these, by the way. So, Yeah. So I'll start with something you've done before, which is sharing a meme or a graphic. And then like you've done it before where it was like a baby picture of you. And then you're like my face when.

And then you gave like these different situations that had to do with something that clients think or situations in the online business world. And that was really cute because you're showing baby Katrina, but you're also like poking fun at something. 

Katrina Widener: Totally. Baby Katrina shade..

Melanie Lea: Yeah, totally. Someone else who's really good at this is Vix Meldrew, she's an Instagram queen, but she is really good, like at sharing a meme or like a GIF or something and like imagining the scenario where that GIF might be happening. So that's a really easy way to show just a little bit of humor.

Another idea is to act something out. So this could be good for...You could do video where you are dressed up as two different people and you're going back and forth between like person one and maybe that's like a client who asked you something, and then person two is you in a different outfit and you're answering the client. 

It's a way to share like advice you've given or like I said, a conversation you've had with the client, but it's a way to just add a little bit more personality where you're not just writing a post being like, have you ever heard this question? Let me answer it. Where you're taking it that extra step by acting it out. 

Something else you can do is imagine like personality types for something. So something for me, like I do content coaching, so I could say here are the five types of content creators I see out there. Which one are you? And I'm imagining like personas and getting people to think. You could do it with like five types of small business owners. And it could reflect like the type of clients you have and how they're all welcome in your business. Or for me, I see these five types of content creators. I can help each one work through their unique personality and come up with a content plan that works for them. So you can see how you can even tie it into your business and promote at the same time as entertaining and showing a sense of humor. 

Katrina Widener: So how about when we're talking about provoking? Being entertaining might force people to step out of their comfort zone a little bit, but I'm sure provoking does as well. So what advice would you have for someone who's looking to go in that direction?

Melanie Lea: Yeah. So I've got a few different starting points for you. So something really easy you could do. And remember provoking is just sharing your opinion. So something you could do is come up with a this or that list. Do you relate to this or do you relate to this? Option A or Option B, and then you come in and you go: "I relate to Option A because blah, blah, blah." So you're giving people the chance to share their opinion, but then you're going first. So an example of this is I did a post last year that said, are you wanting to push people into your business or are you wanting to pull people into your business?

And I was making a comparison of attraction marketing versus like ads, like think of a YouTube ad when you're watching a video and then the ad pops up. Do you want to be that type of marketer or do you want to be someone who's just attracting people into your business? And that's, that was a really easy way for me to be like "This is what I'm all about, and if you're all about this, then you probably would like working with me." So that's an example of how you can also sell at the same time. Another easy way to provoke is to make a prediction. So this was, I saw this all over the place at the end of the year. We were going into 2021 and people were showing like, this is what I think is going to happen in my industry this year. That's a thought leader, someone coming in saying, "I had to pull this out of my brain. I had to come up with this myself." It's your opinion, it's you taking a stance. And I think that's a really good example because you can make a prediction and it not come true. And, and it's still okay.

You still put your opinion out there. People still saw you as a thought leader because you did it. Yeah, it's a really easy way. I think too, that might be a little bit scarier, but I'm just going to share for the people who are pushing themselves. So you could go on a rant about something that drives you crazy in your industry. That's definitely going to provoke people. They're either going to agree with you or they're going to disagree with you and I've had people, people do this for me. I am not a fan of all the TikTok videos where the text is showing up on the screen and before you can read what it says, it disappears, but people certainly are fine with it. People love TikTok. And whenever I talk about how TikTok videos drive me crazy, I inevitably have so many people who respond to my stories, they DM me, and they try to convince me to love TikTok, because they love it so much. And so it is in a sense causing a divide like people are saying, "No, I have this strong opposite reaction."

But it's still okay. Like I still get to have my opinion. I still get to put it out there. I still get to, have followers who love me, even if they disagree with me. I'm saying all of this, because I'm trying to encourage people to do it anyway cause I know it can be scary to put your opinion out there.

And then the last example I'll give of provoking is to do something with a little bit of a shock factor. And I think you should do this sparingly. I don't really love shocking people. I rather like ease them into something, but you can do it in clever ways. So an example of this is I did a post where I was talking about Beyonce pooping.

Which I feel like is a shock factor because most people when they think of the Beyonce they're like, "Oh my God, she's a queen. I love her. Like president Beyonce." And I come in saying, you know what, everyone's favorite person Beyonce still poops. Like you hold people to a higher standard because they feel above you, but keep it in perspective. Like we all sit down and poop every day. So like hold yourself up instead of down when comparing yourself to other people. 

So just want to, you know, it's not like shocking, like you're causing a divide and getting people to react negatively, but just think about creative ways where you can share a different perspective.

And yeah, I do think it got people to think, cause they were like, "Oh Beyonce probably does because, I imagine she's very healthy, you know. Every single day and I do too, maybe we're more similar than we thought.".

Katrina Widener: I love thinking. Not, I don't love thinking about that, but I love that idea. I love thinking about like the idea that like we're, we're all human, right? Everybody poops. Okay. I have one last question for you, which is just what advice would you give to someone who's like, okay, these are all great ideas, but I feel terrified to try, or I feel terrified to get started. What would you tell them? 

Melanie Lea: I would say don't think about doing all of it. Don't think, okay, I need to put entertaining, humorous stuff and shocking, provoking stuff. Don't think you need to do it all at one time, but I am willing to bet out of these two options you're leaning more towards one or the other.

So pick one. Am I going to try to start entertaining people? Am I going to show my sense of humor more? Or am I going to put my opinion out there and start getting people to think and show people that I'm a thought leader. So just pick one and then go back and listen to those examples that I gave.

 Okay, I picked humor so am I going to find a GIF or a meme and add it to my feed or add it into a blog post or an email? Or, am I going to act something out? 

Or am I going to try to put myself out there as a thought leader and share an opinion, do  this or that, make a prediction. So just pick one or the other, and then pick one example that I gave and put one post out there, see what happens, and then come back and tell us what happened, how it went.

Katrina Widener: Yes. I really like the idea too, of just like you don't have to try all of it. Just experiment. Start small, but just start. Thank you so much for coming on here. I wanted to end making sure that everybody knows where to find you. So if you want to share a little bit of information on where they can look you up. 

Melanie Lea: Yeah. So I mostly hang out on Instagram. My handle's @MelanieAnneLea. So, um, M E L A N I E A N N E L E A or you can go to my website, MelanieLea.com.

Katrina Widener: Perfect. Thank you so much.

Melanie Lea:  Thanks Katrina.

QUICK LINKS:
Beyonce Poops Instagram post
Push v Pull Marketing Instagram post

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