An AV and integration-focused podcast broadcast weekly

This week's episode of Automation Unplugged our guest is Deby Rubi, Lead Writer in One Firefly.

About this episode:

Deby’s been with the team for nearly a decade and leads our content department, overseeing the writers and editors who bring our clients' brands to life through thoughtful, engaging content. She’s passionate about writing, and it shows in how she helps AV integrators connect with their audiences in meaningful ways.

This episode is hosted by Kat Wheeler, and together she and Deby cover a lot of ground.

Here are just a few things you’ll hear them dive into:

• How storytelling helps integrators stand out and build trust.
• The common ways content falls flat—and how to avoid them.
• Tips for finding your voice and making your message resonate.

SEE ALSO: AU #312: From Finance to Smart Homes - Jaime Garcia's Entrepreneurial Journey

Transcript

Kat:

Hi everyone, and welcome to a new episode of Automation Unplugged, the Marketing Expert series. I'm your host, Katharine Wheeler, and today's topic is the power of storytelling and AV marketing, and why most content fails to connect with customers. I. I thought I'd start today with a quote as I like to do, and this one is from Donald Miller from StoryBrand. His quote is, no one will ever buy from you because you have the best content they buy from you because they trust you and believe you understand their needs. And with that in mind, I'd like to invite today's guest, Deby Ruby, a professional writer at one Firefly who helps AV businesses tell their stories in a way that actually connects with the customers.

Deby:

Welcome, Deby. Hi, Kat. Hi. Thanks for joining us today. I am very excited to be here and get to represent our very lovely content team

Kat:

here at Firely. I'm, yeah, I'm excited about this one. I think you know that I am. But before we dive into everything today , could you ex, you know, give yourself a little introduction, tell the people who you are.

Deby:

Sure. So, as I said, I am the content lead here at One Firefly. That means I manage our wonderful team of writers and editors that are in charge of creating hundreds of content pieces each month for our clients. Um, I joined One Firefly about 10 years ago. Um, so I can vouch for how wonderful we are here. Um, I started, at the time we still had kind of a hybrid digital. Marketer role that was both an account manager and a writer, um, until we shifted that about four or five years ago. , And then I shifted to my love, which is writing and got to spend all my time on that, which I'm very happy about. Um, initially I had started before I came here to sports writing background, journalism background. So, , to your point that we'll talk about here a lot more. It's the same there. You wanna tell a story rather than just report on what happened. And I think a lot of that I bring over here of just wanting to make sure that people are able to connect with what you're talking about. Um, so I'm very excited to be here and get to geek out with you about writing and content and things we both love. I think.

Kat:

, Yeah. You know, writing is like my favorite thing. , Next to sales. Let's, you know, let's be fair. Yeah, of course. Um, but since it's your first time on the show, I thought, and we were gonna talk about writing. We could do something that was a little fun for me too. I thought we could play a little game. Let's do it. All right, we're gonna start, so we'll start it off a little simple, and this game is called in or out. So all you need to do is say if something is in or out. And what I have done is prepared a short list of, you know, common writing tropes or, you know, controversies or whatever can get really, really heated in this discussion. But, , I know you have opinions as I do, let's say, or something, in or out. So. First things first, the Oxford comma in or out.

Deby:

I am an in on this one. I know that's controversial, but you know, it, the more clarity, the better. So I I like that there.

Kat:

Yeah, no, that's the right answer. It's not controversial, it's it that's, I shame on people who don't use an Oxford comma shame.

Deby:

It was very weird to me when that first controversy came out. 'cause I didn't realize there could have been any room for. For, yeah. Controversy or other options there, but there's not, they can have their own opinions, but I, I think they're wrong.

Kat:

Um, all right. This one is pretty controversial and this one I think we're gonna be on different sides of just because of our age range. , Two spaces after a period.

Deby:

I am, , out on that one. Oh, I'm in. I

Kat:

can't stop it.

Deby:

I did briefly own a typewriter, so I understand, you know, the origin of that one. To, to get going, but I think these days it's just. Unnecessary.

Kat:

I realized that it's unnecessary, but it's not actually from a typewriter. Every class that we took when I was a child and computers, I, I had a computer since I was born, but we had to take keyboarding classes in elementary, middle, and high school, and in every class. It was two spaces after a period, and you had to do it so much that now I can't not do it.

Deby:

I get it now. It just feels wrong when you don't do it.

Kat:

All right. Okay. This one a little less controversial maybe, I don't know, starting sentences with and or, but. I am in on that one. Oh, I'm out.

Deby:

Oh man,

Kat:

I don't care for it. All right.

Deby:

Gotta break up the tempo a little bit every once in a while,

Kat:

but not with an, oh, whatever. You know what? I'm not gonna argue to my worries. I'm gonna, I'm gonna die on the hill of the two sentences after a period. I'm not gonna worry about Andrew. But, um, this one though, this one really grinds my gears. This one is exclamation points in marketing copy.

Deby:

I'm trying not to like, straddle the fence too much on things. So I'm gonna say in,

Kat:

I'm gonna say out. Okay. Just because I find that people overuse it don't, it's easy to abuse. Yeah. Yeah. Like if it's all caps and it's sale. No, I just can't, like everybody calm down, like

Deby:

, yeah, I'll give you that one. I think if we have to err on either side, I'd be out as well. 'cause I think it's very easy to go overboard and then you're just, yeah, you're just yelling at people.

Kat:

All right. This one is gonna be controversial using AI to write content.

Deby:

I'd say a no on that one. I think it has uses in the kind of process of writing, but I think when you actually are putting pen to paper, for lack of a better word, I think it's better that it comes from a human and have kind of a soul in it to give it a little more emotion and feeling. I think AI is good at creating sentences, but not necessarily conveying a message particularly well.

Kat:

Yeah. Um, I'm with you on that one. I'm an out and just because I, I find the way that it can write again, crafting a sentence, sometimes it's a, a very obvious and b, way too wordy. Yeah. It just doesn't feel, it doesn't feel, you're right. Soulful may be a good way to put it. All right. One sentence, paragraphs in or out. I'll sit in on that one. Me too. I love a one sentence paragraph. Sometimes you just gotta, you just gotta get it out there.

Deby:

Just gotta leave them hanging there with a little. Like I said, it's good to break things up every once in a while.

Kat:

Yeah. Get a little bit of rhythm, get something going. Yeah. Um, okay. This one is the bait of my existence. Clickbait headlines. Like, you won't believe what this home theater can do.

Deby:

That is a no for me.

Kat:

It's a no for me too. Nobody's, nobody's clicking on that. We're all over it. We've seen it enough.

Deby:

Yeah, I think, I think we're over it. I think there might be a weird turnaround back to it. 'cause AI speaking of doesn't do a lot of that, so it kind of makes you stand out a little, but. I think it's the wrong overcorrection to do.

Kat:

I would agree with you. Okay, and final one, and this, this one is, God, I've said this a bunch already, but this one may be my favorite is ending a sentence with a preposition.

Deby:

I'm gonna say in.

Kat:

In. Yeah. Hey, it's, you know, I get that it was the old school way to do it, but talking evolves as language evolves as you know, we evolve as a people, and I think this is where we are now. Ending a sentence with a proposition is fine. Well, that was fun. Okay. Thanks for indulging me in a little game today. Deby. I'm, I know we hit some controversies right off the beginning of the show. I hope we haven't offended anyone greatly. All the anti Oxford comma people out there. Um, but I think it's a good way to kind of, you know, explore the theory that. Writing rules aren't always black and white and neither is content creation. So what you and your team do is a huge challenge, , trying to, you know, architect everything to be for specific businesses and in their voice and, you know, deliver their messaging. So I think it's a good way to start out.

Deby:

Yeah, and I think a quick thing I'd add to that I think is also, I'll talk about this later, it also just to your point, makes you have a personality, a voice. I think if we're all very strict about the way we write, we'll end up writing the same.

Kat:

Yeah, nobody wants to, it's

Deby:

blogs, you know, we don't have to be following a strict style guide here. It's that we wanna just make sure we're connecting and being approachable.

Kat:

100%. And in that kind of vein, I think we should kind of talk a little bit about, you know, go back to the beginning and talk about why storytelling mark. Storytelling matters in AV marketing. So when you're writing content for our customers, why is it that you guys, you know, focus more on telling a story than talking about, you know, specs or technical things?

Deby:

I think a big part of marketing is taking people on a journey. Um, and you'll find this in also very technical terms of like the buyer journey and leading them to the purchase. But I think it's very important to connect with people like you say here emotionally where they're at, and then guide them to where they you want 'em to be. Mm-hmm. Um, rather than just, this is the product. And I think it's also a way to differentiate yourself, right? Like everyone, to be perfectly honest, a lot of the people, especially in this industry, were selling the same products. So what really makes you stand out? If I just give you a spec sheet, they can just look at the spec sheet and decide who to buy it from. Mm-hmm.

Deby:

Or if they want it or not. But if they really wanna sell yourself, your company, you really wanna tell a story and connect with people directly.

Kat:

Yeah, I think you're 100% right. And I think, you know, another way that you guys kind of work that into your messaging when you're writing for our customers is kind of building trust. You know, building that trust with the company that, you know, they know what they're doing, they have experience, expertise, that kind of thing. So, you know, is that the kind of story you guys tell when you're, when you're writing.

Deby:

Yeah, I think we wanna tell the story that kind of like we mentioned StoryBrand earlier, you still wanna center the reader, the buyer, and what they want and make sure, 'cause I think you can err in the other direction too, of like, now we're just talking about ourselves and how great we are and no one cares. They care of like, why do I care? What's it to me? So it's really important to create that story and that framework of. This is what we do and this is why you should care. So yeah, we have attention to detail. That's great to hear. But creating a story about it of what that means in your home theater, what that means as far as like ease of control and reliability and making sure you're painting the whole picture for them and kind of lining that path for them rather than just trying to state facts.

Kat:

I love that you said that because nothing is more true than as a human being. We're all going, yeah, but what does that mean to me? Oh, you've been in business for 30 years. What, what? Why do I care? How does that affect me and what happens? , So yeah, you're right. I think being able to, to relate that to the customer is probably the most important part of those stories.

Deby:

Yeah. And I think that's something that comes up. Some other training we've done is with the Copy Hackers training, and that's a big part of it, of when you're writing copy, as soon as you're. Finished reading. Something you always wanna do as part of your editing is to ask, so what if you're the reader, cool, you do this, so what? Why do I care? And you really need to make sure that you're finishing that sentence for them and that thought process for them.

Kat:

Oh, I love it. That's so smart. Um, all right, well, I, you know, couldn't agree more that storytelling matters and marketing and storytelling matters more in our industry where there's kind of a disconnect sometimes between the end user and what they think we do and what we actually do. So I, I thank you guys for trying to bridge that gap, and I know it's not always easy. Yeah. And since it's not always easy, let's talk about some of the, some of the ways it goes really off the rails really quick. So what are maybe some of the biggest marketing fails that happen with content out there?

Deby:

I think number one, and I do think we've gotten better about this, is just writing for a computer. So keyword stuffing, getting too obsessed with like when you say something, how you say something. Even just coming up with key phrases of like, well, this key phrase ranks really well, but it's five words, and now you're trying to fit those five words randomly in your headline and in your intro paragraph, and getting obsessed with that. And then it doesn't remain legible for the reader. Mm-hmm. Um, like we mentioned earlier, the number one thing you need to do anytime you're writing content is to think about the reader. Um, the other one we mentioned is. We don't have it here, but I think one that's big, it's to just being generic, which kind of goes to this, like you're focusing too much on the product. You're too high level. Um, and I understand that we have to be a little high level. I don't think the whole point of why our customers do what they do is that it's hard and. A layman doesn't understand it or know how to do it, so we don't wanna get too in the weeds of the programming and the wiring and stuff like that. But I think you do need to get deep enough to let them understand what,

Kat:

like the value. The value that the dealer Yeah. The

Deby:

value of what you're doing. Um, and make sure you're not. Too afraid to, to dig into that. Um, and then, yeah, just saying, oh, I wrote about lighting control without having a clear strategy of why you're writing it, what you're writing about. Um, and this is something that we get into with our clients too, of. And I think it comes from a good place, but they'll often just be like, well, I don't have any ideas. You do what you wanna do, or, you know, you're the expert. Um, but I think it's really getting the clients to understand like you're the expert on you though. So we need as much input as possible from the client to tell us your story and what you are to a customer. When you sell something, you know, maybe you don't write it down, so it's hard to visualize, but what are you telling people? How are you convincing them in the showroom to buy something? And I think. Getting more of that information, getting more of that background and kind of recreating that same thing digitally is kind of the goal. Like I'm sure when you're selling a demo, when you're demoing something, you're not just reading the specs off the spec sheet, you're showing them how it works. You're showing them what it can do for them, and I think it's just getting in the head space of doing that as well. For any online content you're creating.

Kat:

I love that. That's such a good point. Because they do, I mean, all of our customers have a way that they sell a strategy that's worked well for them, you know, over, you know, that's made their businesses successful. And translating that story and that messaging to their digital presence as well really helps build that brand. So, but again, you're right. It's such a challenge, um, because I think people do things without knowing that they're doing them sometimes. Yeah. And so getting them to, you know, kind of put it out and put it into words can be, can be really hard.

Deby:

Yeah. And that's part of why it comes natural, right? 'cause you're not overthinking it, you're not reading a script. Ideally you're, you know, you're the salesperson here. I'm sure you don't have a script in front of you when you get on the call. You have to pivot and adapt to who you're talking to. And it's the same idea here.

Kat:

That's cool. Um, why do, like, you know, for one piece of content, we can talk about blogs 'cause everyone's familiar. Why do blogs fail? What do people do wrong when they're out there writing that kind of content?

Deby:

, I think a big reason that they won't work is that they're not connecting with someone. They don't have a point of view. Um, and I think this is. Getting even worse with, with ai. 'cause I think a lot of fluffs being put online. And one of the big issues with ai, which again will make you stand out if you don't use it, is that it doesn't really say anything. It doesn't wanna offend. So it won't pick a side. And I

Deby:

think blog will work best if it has a point of view, if it has a personality, it can't just be like three benefits of lighting control. I mean, that's a good intro to your page or to your service page. But if you wanna connect, I think you need to go deeper than that. Um, why we recommend doing it this way, why this is great for your bathroom. Why getting ready in the mornings will be easier with this kind of lighting. Like really connect with them and give them a way to connect with the product that's not just like cool, like it's a little easier to control something or, um, I think the interesting thing is I think sometimes the stuff that's maybe easier to sell or more obvious is harder to write about. Mm-hmm.

Deby:

Um. But I think you still need to paint that photo for them, that image of how it's gonna work, rather than just listing benefits that kind of just weave that story together.

Kat:

No, I think that's a great point. So taking that one step further, um, we talked about ways that things fail. How can we make AV content resonate? How can you make a win?

Deby:

Um, I think number one, I think it's interesting that you mentioned earlier, I think it was Apple and a couple other companies, um, beyond just going through the process. They have a very specific like personas and personalities. Um, and people will always connect to that more than they will the content. Um,

Deby:

so you wanna make sure you're not sounding too robotic, you're not sounding too vague. Um, it's always great if we're able to get from clients of. What kind of style or tone do you wanna have that's really yours? Like, some people wanna be a little more conversational, some people really wanna be more kind of elevated and luxurious, and it's just making sure that you're choosing something that makes sense rather than just sticking the talking points or being overly technical, um, that people will kind of just glaze over once they don't understand something. Or it sounds too much like they're reading a book. Um, no one's clicking on a blog and wanting to get a. A textbook. Um,

Kat:

is that like a common thing too, that people make it too wordy? That it's too much and people are like, , TLDR. Like, I just, I'm not into that. Like, I, I won't,

Deby:

yeah, and I think that's getting to know your reader. I think for most of our clients, you wanna keep it straightforward. You wanna keep. Short paragraphs, even short content. To be honest, I think it's better to have kind of a lot of bite-sized pieces that have one specific story to tell, one specific feature to talk about than to go on for 2000 words about the whole service as a whole. Um, I think the exceptions, if you're talking to like an audio file, like you're super into high-end audio or you're doing commercial that gets technical and then they probably do wanna get like a how to or a deep in depth product review. But you have to be very careful that that's what they want. Um, but I think on a day-to-day content, it's easier to just do kind of bite-size pieces, like connect with them, um, and have 'em kind of just be able to get to the point quickly.

Kat:

It's so funny because that's one of the things that when I talk to our dealers and we're talking about, you know, content calendars and moving forward with what other strategies look like, I have to always constantly say to our customers in a very nice way. But not everything has to be everything to everybody all of the time. Yeah. Like it can just be one thing. If you try to make it too much or too complicated, it's not gonna work. 'cause nobody's gonna be interested.

Deby:

Yeah. And I think that's, that comes up in StoryBrand training as well of like. And I forgot the exact phrasing for it, but you'd have to have your one reader, one promise, one point per page, right? Like you can't talk about everything at once. You have to be a very specific person in mind that you wanna talk to. 'cause you'll experience people that are at different levels. Um, of knowledge of interest, stuff like that, that's fine. And that's something you can maybe address if they do reach out for a sales call or a consult, but to lure 'em in. You kind of wanna make sure that you're focused on one of those at a time, because otherwise you're just gonna confuse people. You're gonna maybe turn off one off, but yeah, be mindful that this is not the one and only blog you're gonna write. And especially

Kat:

that you're ever gonna do.

Deby:

Yeah. And if, if you do plan out your calendar in advance, we do have clients, for example, that will do like three point series and like in the first blog on home theater, we're gonna cover this on the second we're gonna cover this, or the third we're gonna cover this. And you get your peace of mind of it's all gonna get covered. And you can even mention that in the blog if you plan ahead of time. Like, stay tuned. It's, next week we're gonna talk about x.

Kat:

That's amazing and gives you also an opportunity to link internally, which we know is very successful way to boost page authority and domain authority. Okay. I'm not gonna go down that hole. I'm gonna, I'm gonna do this since we've talked about it a couple times. Just for anybody in our audience that isn't familiar, since we've said StoryBrand a couple of times today, , StoryBrand is a format of writing. , Where it's based on seven key parts of every compelling story. So the StoryBrand framework helps you kind of simplify your messaging so that you cut through a lot of noise and can collect, connect with your customers better. And so it's just a, it's a style or a way of writing that helps you kind of alleviate some of the, the jargon and the nonsense that is especially prevalent in the AV industry. Would that sum it up, Deby?

Deby:

Yes. And I think it's very relevant to our point too, because not to give away. StoryBrand, , whole thing. And I definitely recommend seeing the courses and if you can go to a promo, but even with them, something they'll say. And an issue that I think we've had with clients in the past that are familiar with it is you don't need to put all seven things in your content. No, no. Yeah. Like your content can focus on one of them. And I think that's where, um, speaking of like the say here with the customers, the hero. That's part of the StoryBrand framework too, and leading them and guiding them. But one specific content could just be about you guiding them. One of them could be about the solution. You don't need to throw everything all at once.

Kat:

Um, I think about it like this. Like one can be about pendant lighting. It doesn't have to be about lighting control holistically. The seven different types of lighting that you install, the lighting design services that you offer, you know what your service and support looks like after the per. It's like that is. That's too much. I'm overwhelmed already, and I just said it out loud. Like for me to read that much stuff, I wouldn't do it. And I'm a reader.

Deby:

Yeah.

Kat:

And if the readers are dodging you, you know you've got a problem.

Deby:

And I think you need to be able also just give some credit to your reader. Like I think they're aware if you're talking about pen lightings, that you probably offer other lighting and that you're gonna be able to help them with other things. So I

Kat:

think you have other pages and other links. Yeah. Other ways that

Deby:

internal linking to your main lighting solutions page. Like it's

Kat:

talk to me, it's them properly. Talk to me a little bit about personality, because this is like, and voice, and when we talk about that as a, you know, like a story kind of feature, like how customers do that. If we have a dealer, let's say, that's either a new dealer or changing their business strategy or redefining themselves as they explore like new categories or new service products, how do they find their voice? How does somebody like decide how they wanna talk to an audience?

Deby:

I recommend talking as naturally as, as you would, so something I definitely would recommend. To your point, and this kind of goes back to like you shouldn't write with ai, but it can be useful. Something that can be useful is, um, and it's something that we've done on our end too, is for clients that aren't sure about that, we'll get on a call with them and we'll talk with them about. Content or anything in particular, or maybe this topic they really care about. And then going back, taking that transcript, taking that video, and going to AI and be like, Hey, what do you think about this person's tone? And they'll catch things that maybe you wouldn't be able to say of like, oh, they use we a lot. They like to be inclusive, or they are very direct with their language. Or they talk about, they use nouns that are very aid focused, so they like to help people. So I think even that might help a client realize like, oh, it seems like you do this and this's something we could do in your content. Because you wanna be authentic more than anything.

Kat:

I love that. Okay, so speak. So let's pull on that thread a little bit more and say, speaking of being authentic, you said something earlier that um, kind of sticks with me and is that have an opinion or have a point of view and that can get really tricksy In the world that we live in today, having an opinion sometimes is not always the best thing to do. So how do we straddle that line? Where you can be opinionated without being offensive or you know, you know, down downgrading one brand to boost up another. You know, how do we do that?

Deby:

Yeah. I'd say I think it's very important to make sure that your opinions based on the specific to our point of like. We wanna be very specific with our content. So without like hedging too much, like say, in my opinion, for these types of applications and this type of client, this is the best solution. It's not to say, for example, a common example we give clients. It's like, do you want a soundbar or do you want a full home theater like surround sound setup? Mm-hmm. If you say the latter, it doesn't mean mean like soundbars are terrible and they're the biggest scam in the industry or anything like that. It's just like if you want a dedicated theater that's really gonna be booming, you need. Your speakers, if you're definitely just have a family room just getting started with AV and you just wanna start getting a feel for better sound than your TV can give. Yeah. Soundbar's amazing. But I think it's framing, if you frame the argument properly, you can say like what you wanna say without necessarily having to bring somebody down. Um.

Kat:

Because that's never the right option. Right? You don't wanna ever write hit pieces or No,

Deby:

we do not recommend just going out there and saying, X brand is terrible. Never use them. It's more about framing it, of like, we use this brand because of, um,

Kat:

I love it. Okay. Well I think we've all learned a little something here today. Is there any, like last bits or pieces of advice that you can give our customers about how to, you know. Like how to think about what they want, the content they wanna put out, or how to kind of, I know we talked a little bit about earlier that sometimes they defer a little bit too much to us and say, you know, I don't have any ideas. I need some ideas. Is there anything you could tell them to kind of a way to find ideas or think about what stories they wanna tell?

Deby:

Something that I'll bring up, and this came up too, and, . The other training we talked about with Copy Hackers, which is more about conversion copy. Um, but I think a lot of it applies to blocks as well, and it goes back to being authentic. I think having your day-to-day conversations, I can recommend like writing down to your point of like in the moment you realize it's happening, but what are the discussions you have with your clients or even in the office a lot, like with your text of like, again, you don't have to necessarily. Put someone down, but that's what's a common complaint you hear from, from your technicians or from your clients that could be turned around into content of like, how to avoid X or how to do it better. Um, I think just taking time during your day-to-day to see what kind of stories you're encountering that you might not realize are. Applicable to your marketing, but definitely are. 'cause you're the one connecting with your end user on a day-to-day basis, or maybe not day-to-day, but more regularly. Like what questions are they typically asking? What might be something that keeps them from wanting to make the purchase at the beginning and how can we address those questions specifically, I think will help the most. I mean. To our point, every client's unique and every region that they work in is unique. So you're the one on the ground floor and I think have the best access to what is needed. Messaging was done. And to your point, don't, don't cross a checklist of, I need to talk about lighting again, and I. Um, something else is if you really can't think of anything to write about, maybe we don't need to write about it. You don't have to force it. Um, and I think it's better to follow the better stories, follow the better ideas that you have, rather than feeling like I have to talk about this service this month, I.

Kat:

Um, do you think it's a good idea for principals or people in marketing to ask the rest of their teams, , like the installers, the programmers, the service people, the sales team, you know, what kind of common questions they get and if they have any ideas?

Deby:

Yeah, definitely. And we have some clients that will even, um, connect us directly of, like, if we're talking about a specific service. That they're not familiar with. We might be, for example, a common example, since it's a little more divided that way is like service plans. Mm-hmm. They have a specific service team, so they might direct us to our, their service team. Like, Hey, this is our service lead. If you wanna like, reach out to him with questions, you can, and we'll kind of, you know, get CC'd in the email and we can talk to them directly, um, and get to talk to them of like. What are people calling in about when they need help? What's a common troubleshooting issue? And then maybe make a blog about that. And that's not only gonna connect with clients, but probably gonna help them in the long run of like, oh my God, they're not gonna call me every time this happens. I can just send them the link. You can have that link handy, um, to help 'em out. So I think the more you involve your whole team, the better. Everyone has a different point of access to your service and what you do. Um, so definitely, and also just there's no reason to take it on yourself. Yeah.

Kat:

Well, and, and I think to that point though, everyone in the, everyone in the organization interacts with the end user in a different way. Yes. 'cause some are at the beginning, you know, before the sales cycle happens. Some are after, some are during. And the questions and comments and concerns that they get all may vary about, you know, where they are, where they're meeting that customer. Is it at the beginning when they're stressed out and, you know, in a new build and building a house and everything's, you know, crazy? Or is it at the end when they're super happy and everybody's, you know, in a great place. We're somewhere in the middle, we don't know, but you know, they're having that interaction at some point and so they might have a different view or a different opinion about what, what customers wanna hear from you.

Deby:

Yeah, and I think that's important kind of to where we started of these buyers are on a journey. Your customers are on a journey, and you also wanna hit all of them, right? You don't always wanna be pitching to people that have never heard about you or that mm-hmm.

Deby:

Never had your service. A lot of our content now with impact content is about reconnecting with your clients. So that's a great opportunity to talk to people within your team that connect with them after the sales process to say, yeah, what, what do they wanna hear? What's gonna make 'em connect with us and keep 'em this relationship strong between us? Um, it doesn't have to be an immediate sale, but yeah. If these are common upgrades they ask for, this is common questions they have right When they start beginning their process of using the service, that's something that we can create that is gonna connect more than just a sales pitch when. Like you already bought from you, but how can you make that relationship stronger?

Kat:

Well, and I think too, you know, we, we see it a lot with a lot of the content we write, be it webpages or you know, emails or whatever they may be that your existing customers matter just as much as new customers. 'cause they're the most likely to refer you to their friends and family and they're the most likely to buy from you again. And you might get more deeper wallet share if they knew more about what else you sold outside of what you maybe did for them or anything new that you're adding to your business and all that fun stuff.

Deby:

Yeah. And I think that's a great thing to mention of, especially in this industry so much as that, that we have had people that have had their newsletters forwarded to a friend and then they're able to make a sale off that because we already have this or, but you guys should be interested in this and you know, you should reach out to them. And it's such an easy way for them to forward that and connect with someone without it having to be a more complicated process. 'cause they got all the information they need right there. Um, and it's just about. Making sure that the content just makes sense. Right. And I think that's kind of at the end of it, the simplest way to say it. Don't make content just to make content. Make content that makes sense. Exist existing as content of people Actually wanna read this

Kat:

and I, okay. I know we're over time, but I still wanna ask this. Do you write like. From the idea, or do you write from like the end goal? So is it saying this is what we want the customer to do if they read this and we're gonna write backwards from that? Or do we write forwards from the idea? Or is it kind of a combination of both?

Deby:

It's probably a combination of both. I think for blogs it's more about the idea and making like content that just. This is something that's come up, connects. If it's more the conversion copy, like in a landing page, something like Super SEO focused, it's a little more about the end product of making sure you're guiding them to that call to action at the end. Um, and those are the pages that are a little more condensed. They're a little more straightforward. Um, but from the beginning you should have the idea of what you want 'em to do at the very end and make sure that the content's going that way. So again, it could start very high level and then slowly. Get more strategic to get 'em to understand the benefits and why they should reach out.

Kat:

Alright, well again, , thank you Deby. I appreciate you taking the time to join us today and share some of your insights with us. I it's gonna, it's very, I'm sure you're gonna be very interesting for a lot of our customers who don't have a lot of one-on-one interaction with our writing team and would love to hear more about how you guys work. So this was really great. I appreciate it.

Deby:

Yeah. And thanks for having us. I know we're a, a bit of an introverted team, but um, we do, at least in writing, have a lot to say. So I, we'd love to, to get ideas and get to write more fun stuff and get creative and, you know, it's better for everyone involved.

Kat:

I love it. Well, again, thank you so much for joining us today and , I'll see you soon.

Deby:

Alright.

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Ron Callis is the CEO of One Firefly, LLC, a digital marketing agency based out of South Florida and creator of Automation Unplugged. Founded in 2007, One Firefly has quickly became the leading marketing firm specializing in the integrated technology and security space. The One Firefly team work hard to create innovative solutions to help Integrators boost their online presence, such as the elite website solution, Mercury Pro.

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Resources and links from the interview:

• Deby Rubi LinkedIn Profile


• Content Marketing Services at One Firefly


• Kat Wheeler LinkedIn Profile

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