See the show notes for this episode: S 01 | Ep 61 Navigating the Evolving Landscape of Content Marketing: Insights on AI, Video, and Audience Engagement | Show notes
0:00:01 - Alex Shevelenko
Welcome to a very exciting episode of Experience-focused Leaders! I'm delighted to introduce you to Pamela Wilson, a leading voice in marketing and the author of two books on content marketing: Master Content Marketing and Master Content Strategy. But the best part is that Pamela is actually practicing, living, breathing CMO at DCS. Pamela, welcome to the pod!
0:00:29 - Pamela Wilson
Thank you so much, Alex. It's great to be here!
0:00:31 - Alex Shevelenko
I can't wait! Well, Pamela, I mean, wearing all our hats, we are enabling content marketing. We are creating content marketing together with you right now. We have a technology that I've developed to relate to that; it utilizes content for the B2B world in particular. So what I'd love to hear is your take on the state of the art in content marketing in the AI world that we live in today versus five years ago. What has changed? What's changing at a pace that you didn't expect? What has remained the same?
0:01:14 - Pamela Wilson
It's really funny because everybody is kind of up in arms about AI and its impact on content marketing. I think that there are so many exciting things we can use AI for. However, I do think we have to be a little bit careful. I've said from the very beginning, since ChatGPT was first released, that after playing with it a little, what I saw was that the results were a little bit like what you would get from an intern who's had way too much caffeine—so an over-caffeinated intern.
They work fast, but maybe they're not very accurate, right? You need to provide guidance so that you can get the best from that person. And that's the way AI behaves. You can get some interesting ideas from it, but it definitely needs human guidance. That said, we use it; we weave it into our entire production process at DCS. I always say I would challenge you to find it, because what we try to do is weave it into different parts of the process, but then we go in and leave our human fingerprints all over the final product. So it makes everything move faster, but we ensure that the final product is definitely human-created and has our tone of voice. It includes our subject matter experts' quotes, quotes from our clients, real numbers—things that AI tools really don't have access to.
0:02:47 - Alex Shevelenko
Right. And so, for example, when you say "tone of voice," are you achieving that manually? Are you introducing a series of prompts, for example, when it comes to text generation or visual content generation? How are you doing that? Because I think that's something we struggle with to keep consistent, and I wonder if you’ve found the miracle cure.
0:03:15 - Pamela Wilson
You know, the person to really listen to on this is Andy Crestodina of Orbit Media. He has published some amazing content about creating a customer avatar using AI and then how you can apply that customer avatar to get better results from AI. So I don't pretend to know everything Andy does; he's really smart about it. But what we have done is basically feed it information about our customers, see what it produces, and then edit it really heavily. What I find is that AI tends to be full of hyperbole. It's very flowery and has some verbal tics that it tends to use. So if you ask it to write an email, it's almost guaranteed that the email will start with something along the lines of, "I hope this message finds you well." And whenever someone sends me an email like that, I'm like, "Oh, hello, robot."
0:04:11 - Alex Shevelenko
Yeah, you're starting to notice these emails, right? They kind of pseudo-scrape your name from somewhere and then pseudo-repeat and regurgitate what your company does, and then they go into their shtick, which is completely generic. It feels like, "Who do you think I am?" All those moments, right? So that’s the really challenging part: where does the right magic lie? Where do you automate certain things that do personalize them but bring in something beyond just a copy? Have you found ways to move people with more than text in your recent experiments?
0:05:00 - Pamela Wilson
Yeah, I mean, we invested pretty heavily in video a couple of years ago. We actually have a staff videographer. What we're doing is looking at our content and deciding which pieces we're about to publish would make for great video. We look for ways to incorporate that video into our content. It's posted within the blog post, and then we take excerpts and put them on social media. So we are very video-forward, and the videos feature our own people and our own customers. This is stuff that AI cannot create. It does not look generic; it's definitely only ours, and that has really been a strength of our content. I think we incorporated that years ago. The company was smart and invested in that.
0:05:48 - Alex Shevelenko
How would you make videos accessible? One of the things I am increasingly realizing is that, especially when running a pod, you're constantly asked to consume lots of long-form videos. It's great if it fits right in the sweet spot of where you're most interested, and you're like, "Okay, I'm going to block out time and spend 20 or 30 minutes on this." But you know a lot of content doesn't give you that time, right? The right podcasts are now doing little quick, controversial snippets to get you interested, but that's just one snippet; it's not the foundation of an hour, typically. So we're thinking a lot about how video needs to become a little bit more like a document, where you can kind of get to the right parts without having to read every page and every letter, but you can skip around intelligently. What have you been finding in making the long-form video format accessible?
0:06:49 - Pamela Wilson
We are not producing much long-form video. Actually, I know that on YouTube, for example, if you want to monetize your channel, your videos need to be at least eight minutes long in order to insert ads. However, we are a B2B marketing department, so we are not really concerned with monetizing our YouTube channel. We want to reach our prospects with our YouTube videos, so they are short—typically three to four minutes, and sometimes only two minutes.
We try to get to the point quickly, and then we'll take excerpts that are even shorter, sometimes just 30 to 45 seconds. We put those on social media to drive people to the full video and the complete blog post. The shorts end up functioning almost like ads for the content. They provide a juicy tidbit from the concepts covered in our blog posts, enticing viewers to consume the larger point. We do mix it up, though, because we also conduct webinars. These webinars last 25 to 30 minutes and are more educational in nature. If someone is genuinely interested in the topic, they can do a deep dive and really understand it by the end of the content. So, it's definitely a mix—a mix of lengths.
0:08:07 - Alex Shevelenko
Got it. And what would you say to that busy person—the busy B2B professional—that we can come back to? How do you get them to recognize and know your brand? I know you have some creative ideas there. But what are you doing at the very beginning? What snippet captures their interest and gets them excited and motivated to learn more? Are you literally sifting through the longer episodes to find the juiciest bits? Do you have any tools that help with that? How are you experimenting in this area? It feels like we’re battling a lot of inertia in the B2B world, and we have a limited audience to experiment with. Since our audience is probably limited, we can't take crazy risks. But if you don’t take any risks, you end up stuck in the status quo. I'm curious about what you've found as effective ways to experiment, interrupt people, and get them to pay attention to Pamela’s content.
0:09:19 - Pamela Wilson
Yeah, you know, I think it's important to understand who you're trying to reach with each piece of content. In my books, I discuss beginner, intermediate, and advanced audiences. The beginner audience is really just trying to grasp the basics, and you need to grab their attention. You might say, "Hey, we have a solution; you should pay attention to this." For this audience, using a very compelling first sentence in your video or blog post is crucial. You might also take them into the middle of a story that's in progress, which can engage them. The main goal is to capture their interest and bring them into your ecosystem to some extent.
Then you have the intermediate audience, who knows enough about your topic to figure out how to apply it. Their questions are very "how-to" focused. Blog posts or videos that start with “how to” (e.g., “How to do this,” “How to accomplish that,” “How to achieve this”) tend to engage that audience effectively.
Finally, the advanced audience is nearing the buying stage. To engage this audience, you need to provide content that compares the vendors available in your industry, detailing the features each one offers, or looking at pricing. They are much further along in their buyer journey, and for that audience, you want to provide in-depth content that they can use as a research source while making their purchasing decision.
0:11:11 - Alex Shevelenko
Yeah, actually, I'm going to quote your book. A seismic shift has happened in marketing. Consumers now hold the power during the purchasing process. Instead of waiting to see which ad catches their attention, they search for answers proactively. They arm themselves with information so they can make a qualified buying decision. It feels like that's the kind of motivated, educated consumer who knows they already have a problem and doesn’t want to be talking to a sales rep or going through a discovery call in the B2B context. They want to get to the meat of the solution and maybe have that call once they're more educated. Is that the shift you’ve been seeing?
0:12:01 - Pamela Wilson
Absolutely! And you want to hear something wild? I actually wrote that sentence in 2016. So how much more true is it today?
When I wrote it, I mean, I've been doing marketing long enough that even the idea of going to a website or searching the web to figure out who to work with was still relatively new in 2016. Now, people are using AI tools to find the buying information they need. Tools like Perplexity AI and even ChatGPTs and other similar platforms are helping to inform B2B buyers about who they should consider for their purchasing decisions. Showing up in those tools is becoming increasingly important as well.
0:12:55 - Alex Shevelenko
Great plug for Perplexity! One of our guests, who is the business officer of Perplexity, also happens to be my brother. I do agree that they are becoming a great entry point for very busy folks. It's about saving time while still getting credible sources.
0:13:31 - Pamela Wilson
What I really think is great about Perplexity is that I believe Google will have to watch out, honestly, because it’s very efficient. You go there, ask a question, and you get all these answers that are well organized and cited with links so you can find the original sources. Our company happens to be showing up really highly in Perplexity; we're doing well there. I think it's because our content has been structured effectively. We have more than 400 pieces of content—it's up to about 450 now on the website—and it's always been organized in a way that makes it easy to extract the main points. Perplexity seems to love the content at DCS, which has been really good for us. As time goes on, I think this will become more and more important because people are not just using AI tools to research the companies they should look at. Eventually, I believe they will start using AI tools to help make some decisions for them, especially for smaller purchasing decisions. Wouldn't it be great to go to a tool and say, "I need...?"
0:14:36 - Alex Shevelenko
XYZ.
0:14:39 - Pamela Wilson
I need XYZ. I don't want to pay more than this. Find me the answer and sign me up. Maybe they already have your credit card and can plug it right in. I think there’s so much potential coming down the line. As content marketers, we need to focus on how we're showing up in search engines today, but we also need to think about structuring our content for future AI tools, which will be increasingly used for buying decisions.
0:15:11 - Alex Shevelenko
That's really interesting. We both operate in the health and insurance space, and as we were discussing earlier, we serve some customers there. What I've noticed, and maybe you’ve seen similar examples, is that for decisions around employee benefits, some of the biggest fans of our AI capabilities are in this space. These could be carriers, brokers, HR personnel who support employees with questions, and the employees themselves. When they have all the policies and documentation available inside a benefits hub, they want to know things like where they can get the best coverage for fertility benefits. They don’t just want a generic answer like “fertility, blah, blah, blah.” They want to be directed to the right document in a library of 50, go straight to the right page, or even multiple documents, and see everything in context. They want to read the before, the after, and get the full story.
This is very similar to what you described with Perplexity, where there are references and deep links to the content. The answer is good, but I'm not going to trust it completely. However, I could delegate 80% of the search and decision-making to it and let it help me navigate through the complexity. It feels like more and more buyer behavior is shifting in that direction. I’m curious, when you mentioned Perplexity and how well your content is structured for it, are you starting to measure the percentage of traffic that’s coming from there, or is it still more of an innovative space? It's interesting to discuss, but in terms of volume, it’s still kind of a margin of error compared to Google.
0:17:24 - Pamela Wilson
It's funny, Alex. Maybe you can connect me with someone who knows how to do that. I’m not sure exactly how to determine what’s coming in from Perplexity. My guess would be that it’s a small percentage right now, just because of the industry we serve. I don’t know how much they're using those tools to research providers, but I do see it growing in the future. I think it’s going to become more widely accepted.
I consider myself pretty savvy about these things. I was one of the first people, at least in my circle, to try ChatGPT within a week of it coming out. So, I’ve always been an early adopter with these kinds of tools, but I don’t want to assume our audience is the same. Even among the people I know, I don’t know many who are using these tools to make B2B buying decisions, but it’s pretty obvious that things are heading in that direction.
0:18:27 - Alex Shevelenko
Yeah, well, certainly for Perplexity fans, if you're selling to venture capitalists, they love talking about it. But that also highlights a reason for frustration in the B2B marketing world. What are some things you really dislike about the B2B space? What feels stuck, like it’s not moving with the times, and is sort of hurting itself by sticking to outdated techniques?
0:19:16 - Pamela Wilson
Yeah, it’s such a shame we’re still having this conversation, but one thing AI has made significantly worse is content quality. When I first started with content marketing, which was in 2010, they used to talk about content mills—companies hiring inexperienced writers just to generate words for blog posts. There was this attitude that as long as the content had the right keywords, it didn’t matter if it was good, engaging, or built trust by being accurate. The quality wasn’t the priority.
0:20:13 - Alex Shevelenko
It was just about publishing words on your website.
0:20:16 - Pamela Wilson
Exactly. It was all about driving traffic—publish frequently, and the quality didn’t matter. That was a problem back then, and now, with AI making it so easy to churn out random content, it’s gotten significantly worse. I hope all of my competitors fall into that trap because, for those of us willing to put in the effort to create thoughtful, high-quality content, there’s a lot of opportunity. I lay out the process in my books, and it’s not impossible. But for those who are just publishing without caring about quality, it’s a huge missed opportunity. It also makes those of us trying to create high-quality content look bad by comparison. Then again, if they’re my competitors, it makes me look better. So, I guess I’m torn on how I feel about it. But it’s surprising that this problem still exists. I think people are finally starting to realize how crucial it is to build trust with their audience and show them that they actually know what they're talking about.
0:21:50 - Alex Shevelenko
Exactly. This is fundamental to how we’ve approached the content world. The best marketers are taking cues from the best teachers and sales executives. They build an interactive, trust-based relationship with their audience. Part of that trust is being honest, maybe even saying, “This might not be the right fit for you,” or offering a different point of view. It’s about guiding people on a journey, not bombarding them with a monologue about your product. The best marketers are embracing the talents of the best educators and sellers. And in turn, the best salespeople and educators need to improve their visual communication and simplify their message, especially with so much noise out there. Like you said, the content mills are churning out AI-generated stuff nonstop. So, what’s your take on that missing step? It feels like the people working in the content mills wouldn’t recognize a world-class sales rep at an enterprise company if their life depended on it. They’re doing something completely different.
0:23:23 - Pamela Wilson
One of the things I’m really grateful for is the strong relationship we have with the sales team at DCS. They constantly share the questions and objections they hear when talking to prospects.
Whenever they bring us an objection, we turn it into a blog post, and it often ends up being some of the best content we create. This content directly addresses a question, fear, or something holding a prospect back from committing to work with us, and it ends up performing really well. Another type of content that tends to do well is comparison content, where we list all of our benefits and include our competitors. This allows people researching to find a blog post or video that compares everything in one place. And of course, the bonus is that they're doing the comparison on our website, giving us the opportunity to showcase everything we can offer in a space we control.
0:24:34 - Alex Shevelenko
So it sounds like some of your best-performing content is more focused on the later stages of the buyer's journey. Historically, SEO tends to focus on the top of the funnel. Is that accurate?
0:24:54 - Pamela Wilson
Yes, absolutely. That’s not to say we don’t have a lot of content that generates traffic. We're on HubSpot, so we can actually tie content to deals. We can see traffic that brings people to the website but doesn’t lead to deals, and then we have other content that leads directly to a lot of deals. For example, we have one piece of content we published at the beginning of 2023 that has generated 144 deals. We were just reviewing it the other day. It’s incredible—when you hit the right topic, it can be astounding.
I was in an executive meeting last week, and I said it's a bit like baseball. You have to step up to the plate and take a lot of swings, and then every once in a while, you hit a home run. But you don’t always know ahead of time which post will be a big hit. To find those big successes, you have to consistently publish high-quality content. Worst case scenario, you just get better and better at creating high-quality content over time.
0:26:18 - Alex Shevelenko
That challenge of discovery and volume ties in well with another topic we’ve noticed: the use of gates and lead magnets, and the evolving thinking around gating content. When tools like Marketo, HubSpot, and Eloqua first came out, gating was the go-to strategy. Now, there's a different philosophy—people are starting to remove gates or at least delay them. What’s your take on the current best practice? Does it change based on the customer’s stage—whether they’re an advanced customer or someone just starting out? There’s a lot of confusion and anxiety around whether to gate content too much or not enough. I think our audience would love to hear your expert perspective on this.
0:27:17 - Pamela Wilson
I think it has to be a mix. In the early stages, if you can create really valuable PDFs, webinars, or something that people want when they're just starting to learn, you can put those behind a gate. Now, granted, most things are out in the open these days, but if you put something truly awesome and useful behind a gate, it allows you to engage with those leads early on. This way, you can educate, nurture, and help them progress along their buying decision. So, I see a place for that, but in a limited way, as part of a larger system where most content is freely available.
One thing we do, for example—and this isn't a new idea, it's something I’ve used for years—is to publish a post once a month on the website with what we call a "content upgrade." It's essentially something that takes the content to the next level. So, maybe the blog post has five tips, but the content upgrade has 10 more. It's about a topic our audience is interested in, and people sign up for it. That allows us to identify which leads are struggling with that specific topic because they wanted more information about it. It helps us nurture them further.
As they get closer to making a buying decision, though, you need to remove as much friction as possible. Make it super easy, like, "Okay, we've been helping educate you, and now it's time to indicate your interest or schedule a call with our sales team." You want to make it feel like sliding down a smooth, easy path.
0:29:21 - Alex Shevelenko
Like, whoop, just slide down and make that appointment so we can have a conversation. That's fascinating. I sometimes see the opposite—people give away the educational content for free at the start, but then gate the later-stage, more valuable information. However, what you're saying about reducing friction makes sense. The friction is crazy. I don't know what statistics you've seen, but I’ve seen drop-offs of 95% to 99%.
That’s wild, right? You really need volume to compensate for that drop-off, and you have to have your nurturing strategy finely tuned to make up for that. What are your thoughts?
0:30:19 - Pamela Wilson
Yeah, I mean, we've all seen those forms, right? You’re offered a valuable piece of information, but they want your name, address, phone number, your firstborn’s name...
0:30:33 - Alex Shevelenko
Yeah, your pet's name, what color and model your car is...
0:30:37 - Pamela Wilson
Exactly! They ask for all this information, and you're right. If you're making a buying decision, it’s because you have a pain point. You’ve finally overcome the inertia and decided, "I need to fix this." You don’t want to fill out a mile-long form—you just want to talk to someone and make a decision today.
0:31:13 - Alex Shevelenko
Right! And some of these marketing tools, I’m part of the industry, but I hate these tricks. They think they’re being clever by making it look like you only need to fill out your email. Then, once you submit that, a whole new form opens up, asking for the rest of your information—your firstborn’s name, too! I know all about commitment and consistency from Cialdini’s work, but when you start doing things like that, you lose trust. What are you thinking?
0:31:46 - Pamela Wilson
Exactly.
0:31:46 - Alex Shevelenko
You're just shooting yourself in the foot. You think you're a clever marketer, but you're really not. You know what I think?
0:31:59 - Pamela Wilson
One company does it, and then a lot of other people see it and think, "Oh, this must be the way we do things now."
0:32:01 - Alex Shevelenko
Right, yeah.
0:32:02 - Pamela Wilson
People aren't using common sense and considering the experience the prospect is going through, or the mindset they're in when they really need a solution. You can't make it hard for them to find that solution. It’s like closing a door and locking it in front of the salesperson who’s ready to help them. It doesn’t make sense to me.
So, my philosophy is to find a way to nurture people early on—give them plenty of free information. But also, put out some appealing bait, right? We’re fishing for leads, after all. You put out something enticing, and see if you can get some people to sign up, so you can nurture them and continue to engage over time. And then, when it’s time for them to buy, you want to make that as easy as possible.
And so, I’ll just say—and you're the expert here—but I’ll describe what I think is still considered relatively state-of-the-art in B2B processes for these late or middle-of-the-funnel gating strategies.
0:33:14 - Alex Shevelenko
So, you've got this form—either super long from the start or trying to trick you, right? Okay, I fill out the form. Then I get a "Thank you, you’ll get an email from us" message. And I'm like, really? Do you think I want to go fishing through my spam folder for your email right now? But let’s assume I’m really motivated. I get the email, and it’s a link to download a PDF.
If it’s a sales rep or someone doing lead generation, it’s just a PDF. Let’s say it's a link to a PDF. If I’m on my phone, this already takes me out of the equation. But, assuming I’m still motivated, have my attention, and actually find the email, I download it. What we often see, especially with those long-form quality assets, is a PDF with many pages. And guess what? It has a nice cover, but there’s no real navigation. Maybe there’s a table of contents, but it’s not even clickable.
0:34:33 - Pamela Wilson
Oh, that is such a pet peeve of mine! Right? I mean, have they heard of the internet?
I have a background in publication design, so when I see these PDFs, I’m like, "Oh my gosh!" It’s just not a good look. You’re not building trust or impressing your audience. It’s such a lost opportunity when you just dump a bunch of words into a PDF and make people fill out a long form to access it. I’ve seen very well-done PDFs, but they have to be thoughtful. Just like long-form content, they need to be thoughtful and carefully crafted. You’ve got to put your best foot forward every step of the way if you want to achieve your goal.
So, let’s keep going.
0:35:23 - Alex Shevelenko
So you’re like a sister from another mother—I’m not sure if that’s the right saying, but you get what I mean. This is music to my ears because it boggles my mind. We're kind of insiders but also a bit of outsiders. I look at this and think, okay, now I have this 40-page PDF. Let’s say it’s great content—thoughtful, not AI-generated—but how am I supposed to get to page 29? How do I get there, right? I have to click through the whole thing, meaning I’d have to click 29 times.
0:36:07 - Pamela Wilson
Exactly, that’s how you get there—click 29 times.
0:36:09 - Alex Shevelenko
Right! So let’s say I’m motivated. Obviously, on a phone, I’m already out, but assuming I’m still motivated to get to page 29—finally, I get there. Page 29 has the goods, the content I need, but if it’s an average PDF, it won’t even have a call to action. There's nothing for me to do once I’ve found what I need, no action to guide me to the next step.
We talk about AI agents all the time—just put a call to action! Forget about AI agents for a second—a call to action is like a basic stone-age agent you’re not using. It could drive me to, say, watch the full video testimonial or take the next step we were discussing. And sure, great marketers do this. We’re fortunate to work with companies like Salesforce, and they create beautiful content.
But here's the challenge: If it’s still in PDF format, you're leaving the site, right? That’s probably one reason they avoid putting the call to action there. The moment you leave the PDF, you're out because it opens in your browser, and, like many people, you might have 50 or even 100 tabs open. I don’t know about you, but I’m constantly working to clean that up. Switching between tabs creates friction, especially if the PDF redirects you to YouTube. Then you get distracted by political ads or angry people promoting causes, and whatever positive brand association you had with this B2B provider starts to fade.
One solution we’ve found interesting is creating immersive experiences. These could include immersive calls to action, videos, or case studies. That’s our approach to solving it, but I’m curious—what else are you seeing that people are doing to improve this experience? We’ve talked about navigation already. What other methods—like interactive content that doesn't rely on PDFs—would be your advice for our audience?
0:38:42 - Pamela Wilson
Yeah, again, it's a mix, but some of it is super low-tech. For example, I talked about those content upgrades earlier. When we decided to do that, I set up a template in a Google Doc, believe it or not. The Google Doc template uses our fonts, our colors, and has our branding on it. In the footer of the Google Doc, there’s a small call to action so people can book a call with our sales team. Every single page of that content upgrade has that little message and link in the footer because, like you said, they might be most interested in page 29. You want them to be able to see the call to action no matter where they are, right? It’s such a small thing, but it’s really important.
On our website, part of the design is to make sure there are easy-to-click calls to action that are visible in the header and footer. So, when someone finally jumps off the fence and decides to speak with us, they can easily find where to book a call.
0:39:52 - Alex Shevelenko
I think this is genius because, stepping away from marketing for a moment, if you look at an average sales presentation that’s often sent as a leave-behind, you rarely see a call to action. I’d say 95% of the time, the most you’ll see is “thank you.” The most sophisticated might include a QR code, but it feels like such a missed opportunity. If you have content that’s being consumed without you in the room—or even if you are in the room—you want people to go and do something, whether that’s visiting your site or signing up for what you’re discussing.
What I’ve noticed—and tell me if I’m missing something—is that people stress about the content. The good ones do the legwork, the research, they prepare. They even dress up, practice their delivery, and really get ready. But it’s like they’re running a 100-meter race in the Olympics. They’ve trained and they’ve run 95 meters, but then they stop. They think, "I’m almost there; I can see the finish line," but then they don’t care about those last five meters. It’s like human nature to drop off at the very end. But you’ve addressed that by putting in the template that ensures they think about the full journey. Because, really, why are you creating this document? You want people to talk to you, right?
I’m curious—have you seen this pattern with content creators, where they do everything but miss the final steps?
0:41:59 - Pamela Wilson
Yeah, I’ve seen it a lot, Alex. There’s something I say to help people remember: if you don’t include a call to action at the end, what you’ve created is content, not content marketing. It becomes content marketing when you include a call to action. Otherwise, you’re just publishing content—putting things out into the world that aren’t actually marketing the business you're creating them for. The call to action is what turns it into content marketing.
0:42:36 - Alex Shevelenko
That gave me shivers! Maybe that tells you how excited I am about what we’re discussing. I’m totally geeking out over this. That’s such a great phrasing—I wish I had come up with it myself! But I’m definitely going to borrow it and attribute it to you, Pamela.
0:42:53 - Pamela Wilson
It's all yours, of course.
0:42:56 - Alex Shevelenko
I think a related idea—the best quote I’ve heard—it’s allegedly from Steve Jobs. He was talking to his team about a product they were building, and he said something along the lines of, "You guys baked a beautiful cake, but for the frosting, you covered it with dog shit." It's a very visceral image, right? It’s memorable, but it’s also a powerful reminder. Why do we love the feeling of opening an Apple product? From the very first touch, like the texture, it’s special from the beginning to the end. There’s thought put into every aspect of it, right?
It's not just the branding upfront. It’s tactile, it’s experiential, and somehow people forget that content is also a product. They think it's just content, like you said. There’s this mentality that if you write 200 pages, it means it's good and everyone’s going to read it. But why has there been 500 years of book cover design? To help convey good ideas! That "judged by the cover" concept exists for a reason. What's your take on that, the importance of first impressions with content?
0:44:35 - Pamela Wilson
First impressions are crucial. In the content world, that’s usually either the way you lead into your podcast episode or the way you start your video. It's the first sentence you say on screen, or the headline and the first sentence of your blog post. You’re trying to capture their attention and keep them engaged long enough that they’ll keep reading or watching. So it's super important. The call to action needs to be there at the end, but they’ll never make it to the end if you haven’t nailed the beginning. You have to get that first piece right.
That’s why one of the smartest things you can do, if you’re nervous about using AI, is to ask it to generate 50 headlines for you. I guarantee 48 or 49 of them will be terrible, but one will have some phrasing, and another will have some phrasing, and if you combine those two, you’ll have an amazing headline. You can also tell it which keywords you want to include. In my books, I’ve recommended that people come up with 25 to 50 headline ideas before choosing one. AI makes that process easier. Most of the ideas will be bad, but there will be a couple of gems. And when you understand what motivates people to take action, like any good marketer does, you’ll recognize those gems or recombine ideas to get exactly what you need. But that headline and first sentence? Crucial.
0:46:35 - Alex Shevelenko
I couldn't agree more. If you consider the other side of the marketing equation, which is the visual aspect, you brought it up in the video segment. There’s a reason why people work so hard on B-roll, right? There are these brand positioning projects that can be expensive but well done. People put in that effort because they want to create an amazing feeling. We obviously see before we hear or read anything, so the very first subconscious impression hits our “crocodile brain.”
Here’s some low-hanging fruit: add B-roll. This can be a technology-enabled thing, but you might even be able to do it manually. We see people using our tool for this, and they love it. That’s why I wanted to share this nugget.
It’s about adding either a pre-done background that fits your narrative and story or your corporate B-roll as a kind of background filter to your text. Immediately, it brings something to life. It feels like you care about the audience's experience. It’s special enough to not just have a PDF; it can have substance, style, and emotion. If something inspires awe or is mesmerizing, those foundational elements get us to open up to new ideas. We want to feel excited about what’s coming. This sounds basic in some ways, yet it’s rarely done.
I’m curious about your take on this. Whether it’s the hook you mentioned or the visual element—the visual hook—why aren’t people spending the time on this? Do you think it’s an assumption that their ideas are good enough to speak for themselves? Are we not trained enough in this area? Is there not enough emphasis in the industry on it? What’s preventing people from focusing on this?
0:49:08 - Pamela Wilson
It's funny because I find that question really difficult to answer. To me, it’s so obvious that you have to hook someone from the very beginning. It boggles my mind why people don’t understand that. If you and I are walking down the street in a town we've never been to before and we're both hungry, we might see three restaurants in a row. One of them has a shut front door, and we can’t see in the windows. We can't even tell what kind of restaurant it is because it has a generic name. The next one has open doors; we can see inside, but it’s a little hard to tell. But the third one has a sign out front showing the menu and today's specials, plus a funny message indicating what kind of food is inside. Its doors are wide open, and there’s someone outside available to answer any questions. Guess where we’re going to eat lunch?
0:50:11 - Alex Shevelenko
I’m getting hungry.
0:50:11 - Pamela Wilson
I'm getting hungry too! That’s what our content needs to do. You have to pull people in from the very beginning. People are busy and literally have their hands on whatever they use to click on their touchpad or mouse. They are ready to leave, so you need to grab their attention with something that tells them what they’re going to get and why they should pay attention. That’s your headline and your first sentence. It’s wild to me that it seems so basic, yet people overlook it. If competitors aren’t doing it, I’m happy!
0:50:58 - Alex Shevelenko
Well, Pamela, I can't thank you enough for your time today. You’ve grabbed my attention and that of our audience. I’m sure there are some real wake-up calls for people if they aren't doing some of the things we just discussed. Where can people learn more about your publishing work and your company? What’s the best way to connect with you?
0:51:18 - Pamela Wilson
If people want to find my books, they can visit PamelaWilson.com. I have my name on the internet, so that’s a good place to learn about my books and read more of the content I’ve published. However, where I’m actively working is DentalClaimSupport.com. That’s the business I work for in the dental financial industry, which has a very niche audience. We’re applying all the tips and techniques we talked about today on our website and getting a lot of leads every week from the content we publish. So if anyone wants to see this in action, DentalClaimSupport.com is a great place to visit.
0:52:00 - Alex Shevelenko
Amazing. Pamela, thank you so much for sharing your insights with us.
0:52:03 - Pamela Wilson
Thank you!