Content Framing is the process and practice of speaking to your intended audience in a way that is designed to connect with them and appeal to them. In order to do that, you have to know who they are generally. One key area in which business owners fail is that they don’t understand who their ideal customer is. The ideal customer is not “everybody!”
In a crowded room full of people, you can’t just shout to everybody and expect them to hear you… or even want to listen. If you have something important to say or if you want to make a connection with someone, you need to find the exactly the right people and you tailor your communications style with them. That means you need to know two things:
- Who the right people are
- How to tailor your communications with them
Notice I said with them, not to them. Advertising may a one-way street, but communications is a two-way street. We don’t communicate to people, we communicate with people. It’s a common mistake to think of business blogs as marketing tools–they’re not. Business blogs are communication hubs. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. We need to first figure out who the right people are.
Personas: Imaginary Friends for Business
Did you have an imaginary friend when you were a kid? Many of us did. We acted as though our imaginary friend were very real, and in fact this friend may have felt very real to us. Well, one way to help understand your customers or clients in business is to use a tool called a persona. A persona is like a profile, or a dossier of a person’s personality traits and demographics so we can “get inside their head.” Except for one very important difference: this person is a fiction.
Based on well-known demographics information and psychological traits, we can generate personas through a step-by-step process. These personas are like imaginary friends for business. In fact, not too long ago, Greg wrote about personas. But what I’m doing now is showing how personas fit into the overall picture for Gateway Blogging.
You see, what you want to do is create a persona of your ideal customer. You will know a lot about this person–enough to be able to tailor your communications style with her.
Communications Styles and Learning Modalities
Now, you need to remember that we’re not pumping out a polished product here. We’re exploring this territory and drawing up the map as we go. The reason why I want to remind you of that is because this part of Gateway Blogging is new, and so it’s a little wobbly on its legs. But I’m thinking that having an understanding of people’s basic communications styles and of several learning modalities will go a long way to help you in Content Framing for Gateway Blogging.
And I’m also thinking that being able to combine these communications styles and learning modalities with personas is a very powerful tool for truly being able to connect and resonate with our clients. And that will enable a business blog to build trust among its readership, which will lead to sales and business down the road.
