How to Create Provocative Content That Gets Noticed

Unfortunately, most of the content I view on the web is pure and simple boring and does not grab attention. I also refer to it as suffering the “blah” syndrome. During a conversation with one of my clients today, here is the quick list of tips I develop to create provocative content that gets noticed:

• Negative titles are a great way to grab attention. For example: “5 ways to guarantee your business is eliminated in 12 months or less!” or “Why is your marketing plan extinct as the dinosaurs?” I suggest you use these at times.
• Select a key question your clients are asking you and then start you paragraph with: “The last thing you want to do is….” So for example, if a client ask me how to select the right web master, my answer would be: “The last thing you want to do is select a web master. What you need to consider doing is choosing an Internet business strategist. Here are the key distinctions….”
• Another option is to start with: “This may be counterintuitive yet….” So, in order to be somewhat contrarian and when someone asks me about overcoming writer’s block, I would respond by saying: “This may be counterintuitive but the best way to overcome writer’s block is to actually sit down and start writing!”
• One of my favorite ways to respond when someone asks me about developing a web site is to say: “You are thinking about thus completely wrong. Rather than thinking about creating a web site what you need to start focusing on is how to develop your ultimate repository of great and remarkable content. Your web site then is one of the vehicles (among others) to drive and engage your content to and with your audience.”
• Select a company you respect that you would like to partner with and then create a piece of content that discusses what they do great as well as your thoughts on what they can do better to further improve dramatically.
• Similarly, pick out an article from a respected and established publication, such as the wall street journal or business week, and then provide additional ideas to improve further.
• Create a reverse logic. So for example instead of talking about how to drive your products to your clients, why not describe how to drive your clients to your products.
• Name your products, services and your models in a unique way that grabs attention. For example: “The Internet Strategic Profile” or “Digital Empire Creation” and so on.

So there you go. One more step to strengthen your thought leadership. You now have the tools to start creating your provocative content. And when you do, please share your provocative soundbites here.

© Chad Barr 2012. All rights reserved