Is the information you’re offering of any value?

Posted by Wildfire Marketing Group | March 12th, 2008

There are a lot of people using the internet to generate exposure for their businesses these days. Unfortunately, there are also a lot of people using the internet incorrectly in an attempt to generate exposure for their businesses as well. With blogs, email and article directories, it’s easier than ever to blast your information out to millions upon millions of people with little effort and as a result, just about everyone is doing it. The problem is that so few people are doing it well.

You can not simply write a vague article on a common subject that has already been written hundreds of times by hundreds of other people, post it on your blog and/or various article directories or email it to your mailing list, expecting to make any sort of an impact. If you want to make an impact, you’ll need to come up with something new and useful, something that hasn’t already been beaten to death. The keys are originality and usefulness. I’ll give you a perfect example in each case:

Example 1

I recently saw an article in an article directory titled “How do build an effective email list” which went on to say that you need to build an email list, and you should do so by allowing your website visitors to sign up on your website. The article then rambled on for about 150 words or so about how this was so valuable and you need to do it and so on, until ending with a large paragraph extolling the virtues of the author and her brilliant internet marketing experience. So, here we have an author publishing an article telling readers something they already know while not providing any original or useful information, then going on to talk about how wonderful she is.

Example 2

Take a look at Aaron Wall’s SEO Book blog where you will find frequently-updated, original and useful content on search engine optimization. Seth Godin’s blog is another example of someone who is doing it right and of course, our marketing tips blog is a fine example as well, if I may humbly say so.

The people who follow example 1 either they have no value to provide to their prospects and clients, or they have so little that they’re afraid if they give anything away, they won’t have enough left to sell. Unfortunately for them, this keeps them in a scarcity mindset and they never grow. The people who follow example 2 develop a following and build trust over time, resulting in far more revenue than they could ever hope to earn by keeping all of their knowledge to themselves. So, which group are you in?

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