Year: 2024

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Five ways to show the before and after in your marketing

Image shows a woman sitting on a beach. How do you show the before and after in your marketing?

Good marketing shows your customers that you understand where they are now and where they could be with your help. Showing them the before and after can be really powerful. It can be easy to show a transformation in a couple of pictures, but it’s not the only way.

Read on to discover how your writing can show your customers the before and after.

Feeling better

When you think about ‘before and after,’ the first thing that probably springs to mind is a pair of photos showing someone before and after losing weight or having a makeover. If your business offers a physical transformation, using images is a great way to showcase your results. However, your words can show your audience more. For example, you could talk about all the things your clients can do now that they couldn’t do before, like going for a long walk or running around after their children.

The change you offer might not be visible, but it can dramatically improve someone’s health, like physiotherapy. Describing your results or sharing customer testimonials lets your readers understand the benefits.

Making life better

What do you give your customers that they didn’t have before? There’s more than one way to bring practical change into someone’s life. Do you make tedious but necessary tasks easier or save them time or money? Think about what that change might look like for your customers and how it helps them achieve their goals.

For example, a travel agent might help people get a family holiday on a budget or find the perfect relaxing break for a wealthy CEO with no time for research. Your knowledge and research help both, but in different ways, so you can tailor your content to suit.

Greater self-worth

Facing a challenge can be frustrating but can also impact how you feel about yourself. A new parent struggling to get their baby to sleep will experience many different emotions and might conclude that they’re a terrible parent, even though they’re nothing of the kind.

Finding the right help and guidance can help people feel more competent and in control of their situation. Create content that shows people you see their struggles and can help them.

Show the emotions

Even if you don’t transform the way someone feels about themselves, you might still bring about an emotional change. A good café offering a hot cup of tea can provide a few minutes of calm on a busy day. Even online ordering can ease someone’s stress, knowing they don’t have to find time to go to a shop.

If you save people time, think about what they might do with it instead. I often picture a business owner still writing their blog when they’d rather be reading the kids a bedtime story. What does that look like for your customers?

Better relationships

If you’re a marriage counsellor, you could literally save relationships, but other businesses could, too. Maybe saving someone time gives them more hours to spend with their loved ones instead of being ships that pass in the night. Perhaps you sell really great presents so your customers always know where to shop first.

If you want to write in a way that shows your customers the before and after, I can help.  I’ll write blogs, posts, emails and whatever else you need to engage your audience and encourage them to get in touch. If you’d like a chat to find out how it works, you can book a call here. Or, use the form below to sign up for monthly content writing tips straight to your inbox.

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How YMCA Burton helps the local community

Following the Christmas festivities, the new year can feel a little daunting, not only as we prepare for the year ahead but also after a very busy and expensive time with presents, Christmas dinner and spending time with family and friends. For a lot of people, this is a time that they look forward to in the year, as it’s filled with a lot of joy. However, for others, it can be a difficult time either because they’re alone, struggling with their mental health, are grieving, or perhaps they don’t have a safe place to call home.

How we help

At YMCA Burton, we’re here to help anyone in our local community who needs our support in a time of crisis 24/7, 365 days of the year. Whether it be homelessness, needing an emergency food parcel, wanting to rebuild strained relationships in the home through mediation, needing affordable, good quality second-hand furniture or just having a safe place to have a cuppa, a chat and a hot meal, we are available at YMCA Burton to support in any way that we possibly can.

The heart of our services, Reconnect, which houses 31 units of accommodation, our Foodbank as well as our Family Mediation service and Counselling service. Opposite Asda on James Street in Burton on Trent.
The heart of our services, Reconnect, which houses 31 units of accommodation, our Foodbank as well as our Family Mediation service and Counselling service. Opposite Asda on James Street in Burton on Trent.

There’s more demand than ever

With a strong reputation in the town of Burton-on-Trent for over 135 years, YMCA Burton has faced its highest demand to date across all of its services in 2023. Waiting lists have formed for the first time ever within our Family Mediation Service, the foodbank service has experienced its highest distribution figures in its 23-year history, and our accommodation has constantly been full. It reflects the incredible need for this type of support across the local community as well as the challenges that a lot of individuals and families are facing in their daily lives. This is the harsh reality at the moment, and without us, thousands of individuals and families in and around Burton would be in desperate need of support.

How you can support us

At YMCA Burton, we change lives. However, we can’t do what we do without the help and support of others, as donations are needed more than ever. There are multiple ways that you can support us, depending on the best way for you. This can look like a one-off monetary donation, you could become a monthly donor, giving whatever you can each month to continuously support our work and services. There are also options to donate items of food to our foodbank, leave a gift in your will or perhaps choose to become a volunteer. Whatever way you choose to support us will make a massive difference to our charity and ensure that we can continue to remain a central charity in our local community and help to change lives.

To find out more about our charity and our impact on our local community, head to our website: https://burtonymca.org/. Furthermore, if you’d like to help make a difference to someone’s life today, please contact our Fundraising & Comms team via fundraising@burtonymca.org / 07754045869

On behalf of all of us at YMCA Burton, thank you very much!

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Why is a human content writer better than an AI?

Why is a human content writer better than an AI?
Image by Julie Grant Photography

AI can be a helpful tool when you write content marketing, but a human writer will give you better results in some situations. An AI can help you plan or develop ideas (and yes, I asked ChatGPT for some suggestions for this post). When is a human content writer better than an AI? Read on to find out.

Humans are more creative

An AI only gets information from online sources, which can make its content a bit generic. If you use AI for ideas, you can put your spin on them to make them unique.

An AI won’t change its tone of voice in the way that a human content writer can. It’ll typically use the same writing style, although you can ask it to mimic someone. (My son once asked ChatGPT to rewrite something he’d written in the style of a Donald Trump speech. The results were hilarious and accurate.)

Humans have emotional intelligence

Powerful writing engages your reader’s emotions and makes them feel understood. You understand the feelings that motivate your customers to work with you. Your marketing can show that you know how they feel now and how those feelings will change when you’ve worked together. It could be something as simple as offering home delivery or having a big car park so they don’t have to deal with the stress of finding a parking space. An AI wouldn’t understand that, but a human content writer does.

A human content writer can understand your audience

An AI can help identify potential concerns among your audience. However, it can’t write content that helps you form a personal connection. Your audience might want a serious take on a subject or prefer something more light-hearted.

An AI won’t get to know you and understand the language you use to talk about a subject, but a human content writer will. If you serve a niche audience which uses specific terms or references, you can find a writer who understands your niche in a way an AI won’t.

Talking about sensitive subjects

Some topics are hard to talk about. Your work might involve conversations about illness, death, or other painful personal experiences. You might offer a service that helps people prepare for the worst, such as will writing or life insurance. Marketing means discussing topics your audience might rather ignore, and your language must reflect that.

You might need to share stories about others and decide how much information you can reveal without compromising their privacy. An AI can’t choose for you or even act as a sounding board in the way a human writer can.

We can speak from personal experience

Your story can be compelling when it comes to attracting new clients. You might have started your business because you wanted to help others in the same situation. I often work with other mums because we all balance business and family life, and I understand how that works. That wouldn’t happen if I didn’t talk about my children in my marketing. Speaking from personal experience creates a human connection. An AI is more objective, so it can’t offer that.

If you want to work with an actual human to create engaging content that lets your customers get to know you, I can help.  I’ll write blogs, posts, emails and whatever else you need to engage your audience and encourage them to get in touch. If you’d like a chat to find out how it works, you can book a call here. Or, use the form below to sign up for monthly content writing tips straight to your inbox.

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How can AI help your content writing?

I know you probably expect a writer like me to react to any mention of AI the way that Dracula might respond to someone brandishing a cross in his face. Basically, hissing and hiding my face. However, it’s becoming more of a feature in the content writing landscape, and I can’t ignore it. I’ve even found myself using it a bit. So, how can AI help your content writing? Read on to find out.

How can AI help your content writing? I might be hiding from the answers!

It’s excellent for topic suggestions

When you’ve been in business for a while, it can feel like your marketing has covered everything you could possibly talk about. You’ll have new followers who won’t have read it all before, but you still want to create something fresh.

You can ask ChatGPT for original ways to talk about your product or service, which will give you a list. They might not all be usable, but some will, and it could inspire you to come up with more.

It can come up with new and unexpected angles

Sometimes, writing new content involves presenting the same information in new ways or from a different angle. You can create beginner guides and tips for people with more experience or choose a particular interest group. If you serve more than one type of person, their needs will vary, and you can write for both groups.

AI can help you find new angles, so ask something like “Who would be interested in x and why?” and see what it suggests.

You can use it to mash two ideas together

You might have a great idea for an analogy but struggle to make it work in practice. Writing a blog post could be a bit like cooking a meal. You need the right ingredients, cooking techniques and a big serving dish… wait, where was I going with this?

I could ask ChatGPT to explain how writing a blog post is like cooking a Sunday roast to get the juices flowing.

It can help you get your brain unstuck

Sometimes, you need to translate jargon so your audience can understand it. You try to write an explanation, and your brain goes blank.

When that happens, head to your favourite AI and ask, “How can I explain x in layman’s terms?” The answer might not be a perfect explanation, but it can give you some phrases to use as a starting point.

How can’t AI help your content writing?

AI can be helpful in the right circumstances, but it’s a bit rubbish at human emotion. You know, the stuff that helps you connect with your audience and shows them who you are. As a small business, your personality and values help you stand out from other businesses offering the same type of product or service. That’s why you still need to write your own words or work with someone like me, who’ll get to know you and put your personality into your content.

If you want to work with an actual human to create engaging content that lets your customers get to know you, I can help.  I’ll write blogs, posts, emails and whatever else you need to engage your audience and encourage them to get in touch. If you’d like a chat to find out how it works, you can book a call here. Or, use the form below to sign up for monthly content writing tips straight to your inbox.