Episode 20 – Part 2: Common mistakes to avoid in content creation with Nigel Lewis, The Negotiator

The following transcript is autogenerated so may contain errors.

Matt Nally  

I suppose common mistakes people make with the way they tried to put stories and content out? I suppose. I mean, that’s more from the angle of you’ll see a lot of content get sent in. And you have to have to decide what you think is going to be of interest to your to your readers, or your audience. Is the common mistake people make with the way they present information for it to be engaging enough in the first place?

Nigel Lewis

Yeah, I suppose just from a journalistic point of view, or writing point of view, obviously, a lot of the information we get is not in original stories, it’s press releases, that’s probably six is the output from companies who want publicity, and that 60% of your stuff comes from that 20% comes from other sources, other third party sources, but not companies that maybe other media or national newspapers, but broken the story, and you’ve got something you could add to that, or you need to report on it, because it’s relevant to your readership who may not read that newspaper, and so on and so forth. And then the other 20% is sort of its original digging, and, and that sort of, I think, most people would admit that some percentages, or those are the percentages, but and the mistake most most people take with press releases, and other material that are given is, is they tend to take the spin that the person writing a press release has, and you’re quite and it’s not unusual, in some areas of particularly trade media for press releases to be regurgitated verbatim. And it’s rather depressing, actually, but because because the writer involved is either too busy too under resourced or a too bored by their own jobs, to sit down. Because quite often, I will say, to our reporters, and other people who want to be, you know, or people who come to you and say that I want to be gentle, is that quite often, it’s always it’s a running joke that quite often they’ll put a quote from the chief executive at the end of the press release, he will then drop in a bomb at the end of the second, the second paragraph of their quote, which is much more interesting than the rather dull stuff they put in there trying to get out of the top, which annoys the PR people intensely, but that’s their fault for putting it in the foothills, the end of the quote. So all it is required to do is read the press release properly and go. Is their angle actually the most interesting piece of information on this piece of paper or PDF? And is it is this what we should report? Well, if that was the case, because they’ve just launched a whole new business, that’s fine. But it does annoy them when the chief executive says at the end of that, oh, by the way, our competitors ones are rubbish. So we thought we’ve watched the video. So You therefore have your new headline, which is Chief Executive made eight major state agency says competitors are rubbish as he launches new business. Do you see what I mean? So So a common mistake is to is to not rank for the information you’re saying whether it’s in a press release or interview or, or whatever, and just not always take the line of the people who are feeding that information as being the correct blind to take in, in contact with a story whatever.

Matt Nally

Interesting, okay. So as a as an editor there things that you see tonnes of blog posts that get put out by different firms that is all obviously all generally all trying to generate interest around a topic, you finding that it’s all often quite samey and hasn’t looked at the audience properly. In terms of the bit you mentioned earlier? Or do you see that actually, generally people do quite well, trying to tailor the advice? Or does it look like it’s just been spat out over an AI?

Nigel Lewis 

Now, that’s a very good question. For a period five years ago, I, yeah, it was good fun and stuff, but I probably wouldn’t do it as a career. But I worked for a major UK bank, as you know, doing content for them via an agency who I was employed by. And the trouble with the SID bank, who I won’t name, obviously, but you know, I just, but was that they were incredibly conservative about what they put out, they were acting petrified, anything they put out was going to be picked up by the national media, and they’d be crushed underfoot, you know. So So consequently, all of their contents was interesting and useful, but certainly had nothing really that picked up the general readers interesting. So they had spent a lot of money delivering that information via social media paid paid social media and paid paid CRM marketing campaigns, which is true of estate agents as well, you know, to try and get get the cut through. The problem is that limited companies and corporations alike are understandably afraid of reputation damage, damage from a content that’s a bit too fruity. And I get that I’ve got no problem with that. It’s not a bad thing. It’s just a fact of life. And I remember, I helped out once with a South London estate agent who wanted some blogs written, and he was a sort of friend of mine still is, but he said, Can you write some blogs for us? And we’ll pay you I went, Okay. And I suggested they do do, I did write a piece about how the fact that they’re most of the patch was absolutely teeming with celebrities, and they had sold several properties on behalf of celebrities, and very successfully, and they’re very happy with that. But sometimes they wouldn’t do it, because they, because they’re going oh, no, no, what happens if all of our celebrity clients take offence to the fact that we’re sort of highlighting how we work for them? You know, what would happen? We’ll know we’ll lose like, you know, reasonable customers, they might complain, which is understandable, but that that is a difference in content for which is content for a commercial company, and content for a commercial journalism output is the two are very drift when it comes to reputation. Because Because unless, yeah, other than being sued, no, no newspaper is has any reputation to defend. Because you’re because you’re because you’re because you’re you’re you’re supposed to be a neutral commentator, and on on what’s going on in your industry. And you’re supposed to also, but also you’re supposed to write stuff when when companies are doing bad things. So whereas an estate agent has a different reputation to a very, you know, their business is their reputation. Yeah, they’re very different. Two very different things.

Matt Nally

And it’s tough, I think you’re right, because you want to put content out there. That’s interesting. But you do need to be able to showcase a bit of personality with it, I think, as a company, brand, whatever. But it’s there is that inherent fear of Will it get misconstrued or taken taken out of context. I get that because I actually had this with a PRPs we put out years ago, as a different company, not as heavy worker. And a lot of the content that was in the post got attributed to me actually, as a things I’d said, there’s only one single quote I’ve made within there. So if actually was completely incorrect, and it got torn, torn into different bits and segments that took things out of context. And it was quite damaging, actually. And they ended up taking it down completely because they acknowledge that it was a you know, factually

Nigel Lewis

creative with what was quoting what wasn’t quoting.

Matt Nally  

Yeah, very, very. Um, so I can see why companies would fear that but I suppose at the same time, it’s an opportunity to stand out and you know, you’re not going to not everyone’s going to be your customer. So that those that then resonate with the type of message and personality you’ve got a more likely to engage.

Nigel Lewis  

That will actually the the liveliest amongst all of this are the conveniences and so conveniences have this reputation for you know, that they are legal professionals, so they they’re respected, and quite often that, you know, there’s two things was exercised and one is government in lack of action in their industry to make it better. And also, the other one is that they like to moan about estate agents who make a mess of them, well, they claim make a mess of their, you know, their sales and stuff. So their pipeline, and this sort of thing. And during COVID There’s a lot of sort of, you know, by I’m lobbing over the wall by both sides because they’re getting frustrated by the slow pace of sales during code. But but but conveyances are quite good at doing that sort of output and that sort of content, because everyone respects them, because they don’t have reputation problem. And also they are but and I suppose the learning will be for anyone who wants to do content is they talk about topics which they feel they would never be criticised for being fruity about, you know, so they might say, you know, the housing Secretary Michael Gove has done nothing for us the last four years, you know, while you put his finger out and help convey and help general public by helping conveyancers sell homes quicker. And they because NGOs not going to sue them. And everyone’s going to applaud them for having a pop at the government that it loves you pick your subjects carefully, whereas celebrities are much more dangerous area because celebrities are incredibly sensitive people about their their own private lives and their own houses and where they live and who lives near them and who sells their homes. So

Matt Nally  

I completely get that.