What is the difference between authentic marketing and superficial marketing?
Authentic marketing uses care as its true north. That means care for its clients and potential clients.
And authentic marketing demonstrates that care by having a sustainable routine of sharing helpful content that marries with the needs and questions and "pain points" of its audience.
Superficial marketing just dumps messages into the marketplace on an "as needs" basis, namely, when they need sales they make noise.
This reflection was spurred by a weekend post from the Northern Business Breakfast Facebook account. Let's get stuck in.
Have you heard Steve and David's podcast?
An alert on Facebook let me know that the most recent episode of the Talking About Marketing Podcast, The 49 Rules, was being promoted by the Northern Business Breakfast.
It stopped me in my tracks because although I spoke at one of the breakfasts last year, there are plans or discussions in place about a return visit.
In other words, this Facebook post was not being shared selfishly by Northern Business Breakfast to promote its events, it was being done out of care for its audience.
The team behind this account thought the theme of this particular podcast (the Sandler Method of generating sales), was going to be universally helpful to the people who usually attend their business breakfasts, so it was shared on its own merits.
Posts like this communicate that the Northern Business Breakfast is an earnest enterprise that truly is there to help local business people thrive.
Why should I practice authentic marketing?
I argue that you will benefit the most from practicing authentic marketing because it is based on a foundation of crafting some pillar content that demonstrates to the world how you apply your knowledge and experience to the problems your potential customers care about.
Yes, that will typically mean creating some core blog posts that address the most common and useful questions you receive all the time, as well as stretching yourself with some deeper thinking about how to apply your field of expertise to the world around you.
The mere act of doing this gets you thinking about your world from "their" perspective, and helps make your communication more customer-centric.
Another aspect of authentic marketing can be curating content you believe is relevant to "your people". The Northern Business Breakfast post is a great example. They did not create the core content, but they did bring some helpful content to the attention of "their people".
Perhaps you might think about the marketing content you share (if you share any). Is it really steeped in your favour, or does it lead by being helpful to others?
In this case, Northern Business Breakfast got an expanded mention about their breakfast meetings, a monthly business breakfast for networking in the northern suburbs of Adelaide. What might happen to you when you share some love?
As the classic marketing expert, Bob Burg, originally said, people buy from people they know, like, and trust. Authentic marketing is a great way to start moving through these stages.