why marketing should care about quality

Why Marketing should care about Quality.

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Imagine Barry needs to cross a canyon to spend money with you. There’s a thick fog of uncertainty obscuring his route.

He can only just make out the first small he needs to take. He has no idea what to expect.

Quality is about pushing back the fog and thereby removing perceived uncertainty.

But what is quality?

Quality is the sense you get that someone, or something, has what it takes to offer you a rewarding experience.

[Nice apple] Quality[Rotten apple with worm] Bad quality

(Visual check)

[Wheelbarrow with round wheel] Quality[Wheelbarrow with triangular wheel] Bad quality

(Experience check)

There are a vast number of different reward categories that are checked and measured.

[Expressive person] Quality[Dull person] Bad quality

(Relationship check)

Most importantly we want to know what kind of relationship there might be between us and the company or product.

The ability to sense quality evolved to avoid wasting energy on something that’s not going to be rewarding.

Your mind collects the available information (body), calculates the reward potential (mind) and produces a quality rating (emotion).

How Barry thinks, feels and experiences quality is critical at every step of his journey.

(Aware, Intrigue, Engage, Understand, Emotions, Desire, Action.)

If your marketing content fails any important quality test, Barry might disappear in the blink of an eye.

Quality is about getting more people to cross the canyon and do business with you.

So, let’s have a look at what the mind does to rate the quality of your marketing content.

First, at 60 000 x the speed of text processing, comes a visual check.

Visual communication quality• Wow! Excites.• Oh-hum! creates doubt. • Ugh! sets off alarm bells.

Next, the mind starts sampling the information.

Information quality.• Aha! Excites.• Huh? creates doubt.• Yackety-yak! sets off alarm bells

Then, the mind tries to ascertain if the information is translating into a reward or is likely to do so.

Reward quality check. • Ooh! Excites.• Hmm! creates doubt.• Nope! sets off alarm bells.

The mind also constantly checks the effort it takes or might take to acquiring the reward – think smaller chinks, visuals, video, animation and storytelling.

Quality is always accompanied by emotional responses that strengthen conviction: Wow! Aha! Ooh! Easy!, Yes!

Quality is always accompanied by emotional responses that strengthen conviction: Wow! Aha! Ooh! Easy!, Yes!

[Cartoon strip]Forget quality, let’s go for volume!An avalanche of information descents …We’re going to need a good quality shovel to dig him out.

High quality content is rewarded by high quality inbound links, trust, credibility and authority.

So, what do you need to do to get quality marketing?

Visual quality:

• Make it visually pleasing and exciting. Get a good artist.

• Make sure the visuals communicate effectively. Get an experienced artist.

• Find an approach that resonates with your audience. Dare to experiment.

Information quality:

• Make sure everything is easily understood. Simplicity.

• Make sure everything is factually correct. Check.

• Organise everything in a logical way. Test. Does it make sense?

Reward quality:

• Make it useful. What do they want?

• Make it emotional. What does it feel like?

• Make it engaging. Create intrigue.

Effort quality:

• Make it an appropriate length.How long can you keep the engaged?

• Make it easy to digest. Use smaller chunks, visuals, video, animation and storytelling.

• Bring it to life – use stories, humour, inject personality. Break away from conformity.

Content marketing is about focusing on quality over quantity.

Take the time to create one useful piece of content rather than a bucket load of mediocre oh-hum.

Then slice and dice that content into smaller pieces such as social posts, infographics, cinemagraphs and email campaigns.

That’s it.And hey, remember, I love tobe the character guy for agencies, video companies andyes … you too.

You will also love this Slideshare presentation:

Presented by WAKSTER