What is content? – Part 1: An effective Twitter bio

The “About me” section in your professional Twitter profile is like a little digital business card. It’s one of the first things that comes up when potential customers search for you, so when writing your bio, think about your ideal client and how you can explain how you can help them.

Here are 3 key things to keep in mind with your Twitter bio. We’ve paired our tips with tech companies that nailed theirs.

  1. Have laser focus

What are you a master of and how can you help? An overly descriptive explanation of many things your company does doesn’t sound reliable. State the key skills or services you’re are really good at and say why you’re qualified to gain their business.

Likewise, if you’re an individual, listing off a bunch of professional fields you’re into will make you sound like a jack of all trades and master of nothing. i.e. “Writer, yoga instructor, DJ, singer, tech genius, ad tech expert.”

This bio from travel data analytics company, Sojern sums up what they do succinctly:

Untitled

  1. Write to attract leads, not followers

Followers you can buy, engagement you can’t. Don’t hard sell on your bio, make it conversational. If you can’t think of one, imagine how you would introduce your company to a stranger at a conference. Hammer in your key messages and keywords. Then, leave enough space for a call to action with your contact.

Check out this bio from Eyeota:

2

  1. Lay off the superlatives

Likewise, don’t over compensate. Are you really “The world’s leading…” with just 300 followers? Twitter has only been around for a decade, but it’s already riddled with cliches. It’s better to be understated than exaggerate. If you’re an individual doing a professional bio, for cliche sakes don’t be a “guru”, “junkie”, or “ninja” of anything.

Here is a perfectly understated bio by one of the world’s most successful startups:

3

The square bracket takes the smoothness out of the bio, just pretend it’s not there.

Beyond Twitter, have consistency across social media channels, but change your tone. LinkedIn is business, Twitter is engaging with strangers, and Facebook is about friends – but everyone is a potential client. Don’t have the same tone for each platform; pick a key consistent message you really want to push and repeat its in each bio.

Most of all, have fun with your Twitter bio!  Here is our personal favourite Twitter bio:

Hillary-clinton

 

Stand out from the crowd and let us help you create an amazing bio. Contact us at hello@mutant.com.sg.

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What is a content strategy?

Writing one epic post isn’t enough anymore. In order to reap the benefits of a content marketing strategy, you need an entire body of work that serves to tell your brand story to the right audience, while adding real value to their lives. Tricky, isn’t it?

There isn’t enough word count to wax on about how disruptive your company is, so focus your message around what your company can do for its target audience.

Why is content marketing so hot right now?

The offline world has moved online – from booking a taxi or a housekeeper, to fixing a light bulb or searching for holidays – and people are receiving too much information. Ad blockers are making it harder than ever for display advertising, so smart and creative content marketing is the solution to all of this.

A strategy isn’t simply sending out a company-wide shout-out for a blog post. It starts with a goal and an overarching theme over a longer period of time.

For example, content you need to think about might include:

  • Your Twitter Bio
  • Your LinkedIn Summary
  • LinkedIn account and activity
  • LinkedIn Pulse strategy
  • Website copy and tone
  • Thought leadership articles

Over the next few articles, we will go more into depth on individual content pieces. Stay Tuned!

Need help with your content strategy? Drop a message to hello@mutant.com.sg 

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Why Words? A brief interview with Joseph Barratt, CEO

Content marketing works, but there’s too much of it out there and engagement is dropping.

The world of content marketing is saturated and people only have time to read insightful articles tailored just for them. This is what we do at Words.

We help businesses engage professional copywriters for services ranging from website content to proofreading and editing. Our parent company, Mutant Communications, is a leading public relations and content marketing agency. However, the digital consumer is evolving, so we’re adapting with a site solely dedicated to your Words.

So, why should you trust us with your content?

To save you time, Words Content Manager, Jane Leung, sat down with Words CEO, Joseph Barratt, to grill him on why clients should be using our service.

JL: Joe can I bother you for a sec?

JB: Well, I’m actually-

JL: It’s about Words! 

JB: Oh, what’s up?

JL: Can you tell me why you started Words? How does it differ from what we do at Mutant?

JB: Well, Words is targeted for clients who need ad-hoc and on-demand content. It’s for businesses who don’t necessarily want to jump into a full-blown PR package immediately, but could still use the wit of our wordsmiths to better articulate their brand messages.

JL: Sounds good. Remind me why we’re the best again?

JB: The content at Words can be produced quickly, with an average turnaround of 3-5 days. We only use in-house, experienced former journalists and media professionals like yourself, who know how to research content to help brands scale their content marketing strategy.

JL: What’s special about Words?

JB: You tell me, you’re the Content Manager

JL: Well, we’re real human beings writing words for real human beings.

JB: That’s true.

JL: Cool, thanks, for the info.

JB: Can I see a final copy of this?

JL: No, bye!

Well there you have it!

Need help with your content? Drop a message to hello@mutant.com.sg 

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Go small or go home: Why boutique PR agencies are crushing big firms

At the speed of digital trends, do you want a PR agency that’s agile like a fox or sturdy like a buffalo?

Big PR firms have the manpower, resources, and contacts to execute campaigns quickly, but advances in technology means brands need the flexibility to pivot to suit the mood of today’s on-demand audience.

Here are a couple reasons why you should hire a boutique agency over a big firm:

Skilled Staff

More manpower doesn’t mean a higher quality of work. At some larger agencies, smaller accounts may be handed down to junior members or even interns.

At a boutique agency, there is a specialist for everything. By nature, these smaller companies follow lean organisational structures stripped of multiple management levels and stringent systems and constant revision. This makes the team more nimble, enough to weave past unnecessary approval processes that eat up your billable hours.

They’re part of the ‘hacker generation’

Smaller companies tend to have a startup mentality: Fearless, resourceful, unorthodox problem solvers.

They are known to approach barriers from the outside and sometimes, through the backdoor instead of waiting for the higher-ups to approve a solution. On top of that, staff at leaner agencies enjoy taking the unconventional routes that keeps them on track with or sometimes even ahead of the consumers.

They thrive on change

Change is the constant of boutique PR firms, and they are well-equipped to move along with key industry trends and developments. Rather than fearing new technology, smaller agencies race to be the first to use a new platform or tackle a new social media trend.

With fewer people, revisions are also easier for boutique agencies. If an internal structure is holding back results, managers at small agencies will not hesitate to remove or reform them, to power your business and theirs forward.

Skilled Staff

With the internet bubbling over with too much information, brands need more creativity, quicker.

It’s become clear that advertising is no longer just the business of selling your product or services. Instead, it is now all about making their brand a part of the customer’s everyday life. In order to be there with the customer every step of the way, brands need to be able to tailor strategy at the very last minute.

This is typically where the big players have struggled to keep up, given their internal business reglementations put in place to ensure consistent organisational structures.

What I feel is imperative for businesses today, is to steer themselves away from the traditional view of how bigger or more is better. This can be done through re-evaluating business goals and looking further into what the boutiques can bring to their table, helping business owners get the best bang for their buck.

Need more advice on choosing the right agency for your business? Contact us at hello@mutant.com.sg

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Less is more: 4 tips to choosing the right social media channel

With the increasing global smartphone ownership, social media surrounds us. It’s inescapable, and for businesses, it means we can interact with anyone at any time.

Having said that, it’s a common misconception that  brands need to be on every social media channel possible to achieve mass coverage. I’ve seen businesses get excited and set up accounts across all the major social media platforms expecting a wave of new business overnight. And then… nothing!

Like a content marketing strategy, social media takes focus and dedicated long-term commitment – there is no overnight success.  Let’s take a look at Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Pinterest. Each social media platform is targeting a unique audience with a dedicated engagement purpose:

social-media-mutant-blog

So, how do you go about selecting what is right for your brand?  Well, to make it simple, here are some handy tips to get you thinking about how to make the most of your social media.

1 – Start with purpose

Goal tracking matters! There must be a purpose to your online presence. Write down why you are actually using social media and what it is you would like to achieve. What is the business goal of your strategy? Hint: It’s the things your CEO or investors want.

Get everything down on paper, as chances are, you’ll more likely stick to your goals!

2 – Be strategic

Most companies can’t be perfect on every platform so, instead of being average at all of them, select a couple that match your business goals and rock them!  Here are  a couple of things to think about:

  1. Who is your target audience and how will you reach them?
  2. How does your social media strategy help you reach your core business objectives?
  3. How will you nurture your followers in order to convert them?

You need to have a clear social media strategy and work out a plan to realistically implement it. Set up a schedule for each week and stick to it – and you can always review it as you go.

3 – Allocate your resources and budget

Do you have time to work on your social media? Or do you plan to outsource this? Whether it’s yourself or someone else working on it, there needs to be significant time dedicated to social media posts and engagement every day.  

The intensity of your posts depends on your goals but ensure that you have a solid structure in place in the form of a content calendar that will help you keep track of everything. Allocate a budget that you are comfortable in spending to boost or advertise your posts as this will also help you widen your reach and, is cost effective at the same time.

4 – Keep calm and be patient

Be persistent and don’t freak out if you aren’t an instant overnight success. Remember that a solid social media strategy takes time and patience. The more time you dedicate to  your social media strategy, the better outcomes you will get!

Brands have a massive opportunity to utilise social media and if your business does not have some sort of social media presence, chances are you are still living in the dark ages. Step out from under that rock and embrace the social world…it’s truly powerful, and a great and cost effective way to engage with your target audience.

Be careful though, if you don’t have a dedicated in-house social media specialist, there is absolutely no benefit to having any channels linked to your business. In 2016, social media is a full time job. Keep it simple and remember that less is more! Only pick what’s right for your business!

mutant-social-media-cta

Looking for some structure and strategy around your social media campaign? Get in touch with us at hello@mutant.com.sg

10 steps to Instagram success for unsexy companies

Can you tell your brand story in nine images? According to eMarketer, Instagram’s global mobile ad revenues are expected to reach $2.81 billion by next year. With 400 million users and growing, visual content via social media is becoming an increasingly important part of a marketing campaign.

Corporate tech giants like IBM, Intel, Salesforce and Cisco are killing it on the photo-sharing app. How? The key isn’t in exotic landscapes, squat workouts, or well-lit bacon burgers – it’s about telling your brand story in a cohesive tone that’s unique to your company.

Here are 10 steps to success on one of the world’s most influential platforms.

1. Start with your core company values.

If you don’t have a tangible product to work around, the sky is still the limit for creativity. Pluck out key points from your brand manifesto. Concepts like ‘delighting customers’, ‘teamwork’, ‘encouraging innovation’ are possible to illustrate in a creative photograph.

2. Profile staff.

If the global success of Humans of New York doesn’t have you convinced, check out some of the creative staff posts from IBM. Your employees are all part of the brand story. Include a short description or anecdote of your staff member’s role in the company. Plus, there are tons of fun ways to take a profile shot for Instagram.


3. Be cohesive.

Have one picture lead to the next. We don’t just mean with colour and lighting, but with the tone of each picture. Have transitions between uploads. For example, if you’re posting about a company outing, have some transitions or pre-event hype: i.e. “T-minus 45 minutes ‘til we pile into the car for the conference!”

4. Show behind the scenes.

Context is a great way to express your brand values. Showing the magic behind what you do with a sneak peak at of your office, lab, or even toilet.

5. Engage with your community.

Instagram didn’t get to 400 million users by just being a photo app. Comments, captions and trending hashtags are chances to engage directly to your audience like a friend. It’s not the place to sell. Use the space below the snap to ask questions and likewise go through other accounts of similar companies. Then tag, comment, hashtag, and of course, double tap.

6. Humble brag about your office space.

Get inspired by accounts like @apartmenttherapy and post pics from the office. Ask users for suggestions on how to improve a space or what colour to paint a wall. Ugly office? Creative #desk spaces get good hits!

7. Show your company culture.

What do your programmers do when they’re not doing sprints? Create FOMO with your staff. Show happy staff in action, whether brainstorming, in a meeting, or just chillin’ on the couch. A strong company culture strengthens a company’s brand. Likewise, your staff are your brand ambassadors, and happy staff are more likely to share their company activity on social media leading to more engagement.


8. Hop on holidays.

Festive holidays and other relevant events are an easy way to be part of a larger dialogue and increases your chance of being noticed. Even posting a custom greeting card, Christmas tree, or candy hearts spelling out your company name connects you to your users.

9. Focus on quality.

Take an extra couple of seconds to step into the right light and do a little set planning before snapping and uploading. Amateur pics are great to ‘keep it real’, but at the end of the day, you’re competing with millions of photos online. Make each one count.

10. Own it.

Popularised by Millennials inspired to ‘work with what they got’, owning it is taking pride in what you have. Businesses today don’t need to look longingly at National Geographic  or Nasty Gal with envy. Say, if you have cloud-based software that’s hard for people to understand, create fun ways to illustrate it. There are plenty of pretty accounts out there, just make yours looks like you (don’t believe me? Just take a look at Sharpie’s account. It’s only a pen, but it’s one of the coolest Instagram pages around.)

Do more (of what makes you happy) #BeHappy #Sharpie   A photo posted by @sharpie on

We hope this helps your company get its Instagram game off the ground. Tweet us @mutantcomms to tell us how you make your unsexy business cool, or get in touch with us at hello@mutant.com.sg

How to create effective visual content

Over the last 12 months, content has become the cool, hip kid on the block.

Comprising of everything from blogs and e-books, through to social media posts and viral videos, marketers can’t get enough of it… and for good reason. It produces results!

But an often overlooked aspect of great content is visual graphics. These branded images, short videos, infographics and more also fall under the content banner, and should be a permanent addition to any content marketing strategy.

As they say, a picture is worth a thousand words, and people are more likely to absorb visual content. Particularly with the copious amount of information we are exposed to on a daily basis, it becomes hard to absorb everything, so the simpler and more concise the information, the better for the targeted audience.

Only 10% of people remember what they hear, 20% remember what they read and 80% of people remember what they see. (Source)

This means content teams must ensure they are creatively presenting information with more visual appeal, and coming up with campaigns that lend themselves to pictorial and graphical ideas.

Infographics are one of the more popular pieces of visual content around. They’re not only easy on the eye, but also educate the audience in a simple and effective manner. A good infographic has a consistent and sequential flow of information that is presented in easy to absorb facts. Take a look at some snippets of my favourites below:

storing-food-infographictwitter

 

 

 

 

What makes them so good? They tell a story quickly in an entertaining way, with useful facts to draw from.

Here are a few quick tips to get your visual content in tip top shape.

  • Less is more

The biggest flaw is trying to fit in way too much information; it very quickly stops being effective. The idea of visual content is to be clever with how the information is presented, otherwise you might just as well write an article or blog.

You want your readers to remember what you are presenting to them, and keeping it simple and to the point means they are more likely to absorb and retain the information.

  • Get factual

Decide on a timeline of events or a process for how you want your audience to read the information. Then, pull out only the key facts and present only this through a series of illustrations, graphics or videos.

You might have a ton of data, but only use what’s relevant and easy to comprehend.

  •  Colours and content

Colours matter a lot when it comes to visual content. Ensure your graphics are suited to the type of information you are presenting.

Brighter red, blue and green shades are more likely to stand out and get noticed, but darker colours such as black or navy can be just as effective in representing sophistication or something concerning.

Hopefully now you have a bit more of an understanding about presenting visual content. Try and incorporate these tips into your content marketing strategy, and to help you come up with cool and creative ways to present information to educate and inspire.

If you need help with your visual content please get in touch with me at hello@mutant.com.sg

The secret to getting people to open your emails

Getting your point across in an email isn’t as easy as you think.

No matter who your customer base is, chances are they receive dozens of emails and newsletters every day, informing them of special deals, new information or other updates to their business that might be of interest. It’s incredibly easy to get lost in the noise.

People are busy, and you have about one second to grab their attention when your newsletter pings in their inbox (check out my previous blog to help you create a newsletter people actually want to read.) That one second comes down to what you choose to put in your subject line. It’s what determines whether they click to open, or click to delete.

After all, what’s the point in sending out the greatest email there ever was, if no one opens it?

I subscribe to pretty much everything, so as you can imagine I’ve got a decent sample of both good and bad newsletters to draw inspiration from. There are a bunch I delete without taking a second look, but what about the ones that I actually do bother to open and actually read?

Here are some examples of effective emails that have landed in my inbox, which compelled me to click.

Zalora

Email Subject: How to look stunningly well dressed for any occasion
Content: Fashion/clothing options for any occasion

Zalora have crafted some amazing emails and really know how to use the power of email marketing to get directly in front of their readers. They have used what is called a “trendy topic” headline and made it catchy and relevant to their subscribers.

AirAsia

Email Subject: HURRY, grab your FREE SEATS now! Only 4 days left!
Content: A selection of destinations across Asia with free flights

Most people know AirAsia, and in this particular email they have really drawn on the “free” aspect to get people’s attention. Their audience are regular travellers looking out for cheaper deals (why else would they subscribe to a budget airline newsletter?) and so the use of the word “free” is an instant attention-grabber. The subject also has created a sense of urgency that encourages readers to click through – a very clever move.

The attraction to open email newsletters is heavily based on what is written in the subject and how much it appeals to a person at that particular time.

Here’s what you should be doing with your email subject line:

Summarise, and leave the reader wanting more: In a very short 40-50 characters (or less), you will need to summarise what your email/newsletter/offer is about. Keep your readers curious and encourage the clickthrough.

Make it urgent: Where possible, make the reader feel they must know the information you are presenting to them NOW. This is more likely to encourage people to take action with fear of feeling left out.

Keep the content relevant: Writing catchy subject lines doesn’t mean succumbing to clickbait. Your readers will get annoyed if your content is not relevant to what is written in the subject. You can be creative and quirky to capture attention, but ensure that your content is related.

Ask yourself why?: Why would (or should) people bother opening your email? Is what you’re saying important and worth opening to investigate further? Just because it matters to you, that doesn’t mean it appeals to others, so do your research.

 If you would like to look at ways to incorporate e-newsletters into your marketing and PR strategy, get in touch with us at hello@mutant.com.sg

Web

Content Marketing for HR: Attracting the right talent

Hiring good talent is tough. The recruitment process can be long, expensive and exhaustive, especially in a competitive talent marketplace like Singapore and wider Southeast Asia.

Over the past few years, recruiters have had to become increasingly creative with how they attract and connect with the right talent. Today, we know this goes well beyond well-written job descriptions and Facebook likes – you’ve got to go deeper and think long-term about how you make effective candidate connections.

One of the best ways to do this is with content. Regular, targeted and insightful articles about your company, its core values, your people and the way you operate (for starters!) is an enormously effective means of drawing in potential talent with the right skills, personality and mindsets to match your culture.

Then, you can go deeper. Engage your audience with thought pieces from your senior management; share your opinions on newsworthy topics and relevant industry happenings; provide inspirational stories and videos about employees who have done great things within your organisation, or share your insights around any research or data your business and its various units has released.

Let’s be clear: this is not a short-term strategy. In order to actively promote your company as an attractive place to work, you need to consistently and effectively write and share stories on the platforms and networks where your ideal talent spends their time. From brand awareness to creating a desire to click “apply” for a role you are advertising, content can seriously change the way you recruit if you capture people at the right point of the sales funnel.

Why does it work? It’s simple:

  • Because people who agree with you and what you write about will share your content with like-minded people.
  • Because if they don’t agree with your culture or values presented in your content, you weed them out early on.
  • Because if you are regularly producing interesting content for potential employees to read, you’ll likely see an increase in the quality of candidates you interview.

If you’re brand new to the content marketing game, don’t worry. It’s not something that can (or should) be rushed, and it requires a decent amount of planning and strategic oversight to get it right. In fact, producing poor quality content hastily could actually do more damage in the long run.

If you’re an HR professional or business leader looking to get started with content, consider the following:

Do you have somewhere to host your content?

Your content is yours. Make sure you have a good, easy to find, platform on your company website or careers page to host the dozens of articles you plan on writing. You’d be surprised how many businesses think plonking an article on their ‘news’ page amid other press releases and internal announcements is effective. If you can, make sure these articles, videos and other pieces of content really stand out to anyone who finds their way there, and is easy to navigate.

Do you have a social recruitment strategy attached to your content marketing plan?

Although you need to have a place to host your content on your own site, potential talent isn’t just hanging around on that page waiting for you to post new stories or blogs. You need to ensure what you produce is being shared on platforms they frequent. Content needs to be promoted and boosted in targeted areas to boost exposure and ensure the right people are clicking through to read what you’ve written. Anyone can spend money and advertise a post to get thousands of likes, but if you’re not increasing the chances of the right people applying for a job with you, then what’s the point?

Your current employees can be your biggest advocates

But it’s not as easy as forcing employees to share your company’s articles. There is a deeper element of employee engagement that plays a part here, and any HR professional worth their salt knows they can’t simply dictate their employee base to like and share content – they have to want to do it. And if they do want to do it, it’s quite simply one of the best ways to show that your business really is an awesome place to work.

Your content marketing efforts should strongly tie into your overall employer branding strategy and company culture. After all, how can you write about what an amazing culture your business has if it’s not exactly true?

Content Marketing CTA

If you’d like to discuss how content marketing can help your business attract talent, please get in touch with us at hello@mutant.com.sg

How to communicate like Elon Musk

Elon Musk is the world’s raddest man. Sure, he’s an engineer, investor, genius, innovator, and has an actual car startup. But did you know he’s also really good at email?

Musk’s success comes (in part) from his effective interpersonal skills. He’s a stuttery public speaker, but he can pitch. He’s nothing special in interviews, but is often quoted. Being an effective communicator doesn’t mean being a great talker — that’s why politicians seldom create big changes they promise.

Communicating a vision and being a leader takes tact, it’s about having great interpersonal skills: Listening, having manners, social skills, and really understanding who you’re speaking to.

Here’s three ways you can communicate like Elon:

  1. Cut the acronyms in emails:

In an interview with Henry Blodget, CEO and editor-in-chief of Business Insider, Musk joked: “I do a lot of email – very good at email. That’s my core competency.”

His secret? Avoiding acronyms. The man hates them. I found this excerpt from his book on this Quora thread, “Why is Elon Musk so good at email?”

Screen Shot 2015-11-05 at 12.56.11 pm

Singapore’s multi-cultural business environment both breeds and suffers from too many acronyms. When staff in a big company are from different parts of a region, they might not want to spell out the whole word, but how many times have you looked up from your desk and hollered, “Hey does anyone know what AFB is!?” Sure you’re saving on word economy, but acronyms are not good for productivity.

Like Musk says in his email: “No one can actually remember all these acronyms and people don’t want to sit there in ignorance. This is particularly tough on new employees.”

So, the next time you’re sending an email out to staff, be clear! It saves everyone time and gets them on the same page.

  1. He cuts the jargon

Musk isn’t an eloquent speaker, but the worst thing than a shaky voice is one that’s full of buzzwords. In this perfect pitch for Tesla he breaks down his problem and solution in a way the audience can understand, not just in a way he understands. The man got people on their feet, over batteries.

https://youtu.be/yKORsrlN-2k

Musk finds a common problem and tells us about a simple solution. It’s classic storytelling. See the full article on how to pitch like him here.

  1. He uses real content to advertise:

Wait but Why is a personal, yet investigative tech blog followed by thousands of people. But at the end of the day, it’s a blog with stick figures on it. Musk called up the writer Tim Urban and asked him to interview him for SpaceX and Tesla. Um what? Check out his post published two days ago on the Huffington Post.

After Urban finished gathering his brains from off the floor, the blogger agreed and met up with Musk to write the multi-part blog series.

Musk is so good at cutting the crap, he doesn’t advertise Tesla. According to Urban, he refuses to advertise for his electric car startup, because “he detests vague spin-doctor phrases like ‘studies say’ and ‘scientists disagree’, and he refuses to advertise for Tesla, something most startup car companies wouldn’t think twice about – because he sees advertising as manipulative and dishonest”.

Bonus lesson:

You don’t have to be a great orator or rocket scientist to communicate your vision. All it takes is thinking about making things clear and simple for your audience. If Elon can make electric cars and space travel easy to understand, you should be able to, too.

The last lesson on how to be more like Musk is a bonus one: Always say what you mean. We’ll leave you with this quote from the part one of the interview with Musk:

“He’s been saying the same things in interviews for a decade, often using the same exact phrasing many years apart. He says what he really means, no matter the situation – one employee close to Musk told me that after a press conference or a business negotiation, once in private he’d ask Musk what his real angle was and what he really thinks. Musk’s response would always be boring: ‘I think exactly what I said’.”

Do you need to better communicate your messaging through effective content? Get in touch with us at hello@mutant.com.sg

Image Credit: Elon Musk, Tesla Factory, Fremont (CA, USA) by Maurizio Pesce. Licensed under CC BY 2.0 via Commons

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Lessons from @jonnysun: Why content marketers need a journalism background

Emotions make content viral, not the content itself. Anger, awe, happiness, enlightenment and sadness create the urge to share with others. When content is written with the intention to “give you the feels”, facts can become secondary.

In comparison, journalism in its traditional form is designed to inform, yet the lines between the two fields of communication blur in the convoluted slush pile of tweets and soundbites packed nuts to butts on the internet. It’s our job as content marketers to stay on the latter half of the thinning media tightrope.

Fake information spreads like wildfire – take @Jonnysun’s twitter “scandal” last week.

Jonathan Sun, the biggest internet celebrity you’ve never heard of – also an MIT researcher – posted a fake fact about actors Will Smith and his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, online. To do this, he created a fake Google search image about the origins of their children’s names, Willow and Jaden Smith. The made up fact was nothing ‘amazing’ in itself, but what happened next was an eye-opener.

Nineteen thousand retweets and 25,000 favourites later, tweeters were bragging “they already knew ages ago” about this so-called fact, while others were enraged this ‘old’ news was making headlines.


When the jig was up, the experiment had the Twitterverse facepalming, while Sun was praised for confirming what we always suspected: the majority of people online do not fact check before sharing.

As content marketers, we market through shares – of thoughts, insights, knowledge and information. So if there’s something off about our information, there’s something off about our brand.

People are already skeptical, since it’s getting increasingly difficult to differentiate between paid content and well-researched original facts and quotes.

Here are some tips from a former journalist on how to do proper due diligence:

  1. Be hands on. If you’re talking about a product, instead of looking up a review of what someone else thought of it, download it or get your hands on it to form your own opinion.
  2. Pick up the phone. While it’s easier to copy and paste a quote from an article, a sure fire way not to misquote someone is to just ask them.
  3. Check statistics: When you see a stat in a post, look for the original research document that the article cited from. Most of the time they’ll have the actual link.
  4. Um, Google. You’d be surprised how many times I’ve caught a slip up, typo, or hoax just by Googling it.
  5. Read the news. Instead of just retweeting existing news, take the facts from a real news story and spin your own angle on it. This way you can’t possibly be wrong, since it’s your own opinion crafted from hard facts.

In a time when we’re always trying to hop on to what’s trending for engagement, it’s important to step back and say, “Really?” If authors don’t take the extra few minutes or an hour to check facts, readers will start to view content marketing as the new clickbait.

Knowing something intimate and relatable about a Hollywood couple made everyone go “awww” – and it sold. But while tugging at heartstrings racks up numbers and engagement, it’s authenticity that retains and converts.

Mutant’s content experts are all former journalists. If you’d like to chat with us about your content marketing needs, please get in touch with us at hello@mutant.com.sg  

8 tricks to write a viral headline

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Before you pen your next blog post, stop what you’re doing and read these writing tips for more clickable and shareable content.

It’s fairly easy to argue that the headline is more important than the article. It’s not always true, of course, but when most people only read about 50% of your content, drawing them in with a strong, attention-grabbing headline is a must.

It’s easy to leave the headline as an afterthought, but it’s what gets you noticed. Amid millions of articles, tips, advice and blog posts out there, you need to stand out and get in front of your audience in an interesting, unique and confronting way.

But the art of the headline is a difficult one to master, and it often takes even experienced writers years to understand how to construct one effectively. To help you in your quest for excellent content, we’ve got a few headline tips to get you started.   

1. Keep the headline to 6 words

Your audience is lazy. They like to have loads of content available to them, but they can’t be bothered actually reading all of it. It’s reason the inverted pyramid exists in news writing, and why a former editor told me to “write as though you are targeting a bunch of fidgeting 12-year-olds, rather than educated adults”.

You want to draw people in as fast as possible, and a succinct headline is the best way to do that. Keeping it to six words isn’t a hard and fast rule (sometimes longer headlines can work in your favour, depending on the content and platform you are writing for) but it’s a decent guideline to make sure you don’t waffle on.

2. Tap into your audience’s insecurities

Don’t feel bad about this – the news media has been doing it for decades. For some reason, the human race responds better to negativity. I’m not sure whether it’s because we like being miserable or because we have a morbid fascination with things that are bad and wrong (or both.) All I know is that it works.

For example, these are taken from a mix of the BBC and CNN’s homepages this morning:

Hiring? Avoid the friend zone
Google doesn’t care about your alma mater
China’s growth set to be slowest since ‘09
The worst place on earth

Negative headlines work best (i.e. get more clicks) when they inform and alert. Think about how you can use words like “no”, “stop”, “can’t” and “without” in your headlines or sub-headlines for added impact.

3. Track keywords

Let’s all take a moment to praise the development of analytics!

With the ability to track and follow the traffic your articles are generating, it’s very easy nowadays to pinpoint (over time) the types of articles and headlines that work well for you, and the ones that don’t.

At a previous job, we worked out pretty quickly that our audience liked to read about money; headlines with the keywords “money”, “salary”, “cash” and “pay” got significantly more clickthroughs.

It highly depends on your audience. If you’re writing for parents and mothers, words like “baby” and “childcare” might be some of your top keywords, while for a restaurant words like “menu” or “food” could be gold.

4. Make sure the headline matches the article

It’s easy to get caught up in writing the most attention-grabbing headline, only to end up with something that is actually misleading and over-inflated.

If you’ve managed to pull someone in to click on your article, don’t send them running and rolling their eyes when they realise they’ve been duped by clickbait. I personally dislike it when an article claims to have 7 unbelievable ways to [insert promise here] – especially when the tips are actually quite believable. Useful? Yes. Unbelievable? No.

The same applies for “amazing” and “incredible”. Unless it really is amazing, try to be a bit more creative.

5. Use numbers

99 things to do in New Zealand works so much better than Ninety-nine things to do in New Zealand.

Using a number is easier on the eye, and it stands out from the rest of the sentence. As we’ve already established, people are lazy – they want to read the most interesting articles in the most efficient way possible. Numbers and lists will do this for them.

6. Use a trigger word

How to create a viral blog post
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The trigger words are a must for viral content. People read blogs not only to look for information, but to find answers to questions they didn’t even know they needed answers to.

Using the ‘how, what, when where, why’ method indicates immediately to a reader that they are likely to learn something by clicking on your post.

7. To question or not to question?

Struggling to get ahead at work?
Looking for your dream home?
Are you missing this vital ingredient in your PR strategy?

The question headline can be incredibly effective when targeted at the right audience you know are looking for answers. It can sometimes sound a bit advertorial, but the power of the question should not be undermined.

8. Create a formula that works for you

I once read a formula for the perfect headline which went something like:

Number/trigger word + interesting adjective + keyword = PERFECT HEADLINE

So, say you want to write about how to peel an orange (because, why wouldn’t you?) start by thinking about the formula. Instead of “How to peel an orange” you might end up with:

12 effortless ways to peel an orange

or

How to peel an orange in less than 30 seconds

or (in question form)

Is your orange peeling technique out of date?

It can often add an extra impact to include an assurance or guarantee in your headline. It could be to do with time (hence the “in less than 30 seconds” in this example) or something more substantial like, “How to peel an orange like a professional chef”.

Go forth and be viral! But if you need some help crafting, planning and putting a strategy around your content to drive business leads, feel free to get in touch with Rebecca at rebecca@mutant.com.sg 

Content marketing checklist