What Is Conscientious Marketing and Why Should You Care?

 "Feeling a moral responsibility to do your work carefully and to be fair to others"

According to the Cambridge dictionary, that is the definition of "conscientious." Marketing is defined as:

"Understanding your buyers really, really well. Then creating valuable products, services, and information especially for them to help solve their problems"

You put the two words together, a descriptive adjective followed by a noun, and you get the essence of what our business is all about.

Today, mission-driven organizations and corporate America cannot ignore the mandate coming from their constituencies.  To ignore the planet, to ignore people, to ignore social purpose is a certain path to failure.

Just take a look at the numbers: a 2014 research study by Nielsen reports 55 percent of global online consumers across 60 countries say they are willing to pay more for products and services by companies that are committed to positive social and environmental impact.

While the idea of social purpose is not new (think Patagonia, Ben & Jerry's, Toms Shoes), the "reshaping" of main street organizations and businesses so they can market their goods and services in a conscientious manner is. Which includes everything from how the product or service is created to how it is delivered to how it is marketed.

This where we at HCollaborative come in. We have spent our careers in ad agencies and corporate America. Certainly there is no denying that the marketing of goods and services has been part of our performance. But recently, the two of us felt a "calling" to take our senior-level marketing souls to a higher purpose.

The thinking is simple.

We have a moral responsibility to make sure the work we do provides what the world desperately needs. Not just spitting out strategies or creating a campaign to increase profit, but doing so with humility and in a manner that is fair and equitable to people and the planet.

Which is the essence of what conscientious marketing is all about.

Care to join us?

To get our book, "25 Building Blocks To Create a Conscientious Organization" FREE, go to HCollaborative.com for an instant download.

41 Healthcare Blogs in 45 Days: 7 Steps To Writing Posts Quickly

I just finished a 9-week contract with a major healthcare organization.

During that time, I wrote about newsworthy healthcare issues of the day, covering everything from Zika virus to MS, migraines to Celiac disease, "superbugs" to breast cancer, plus 34 other topics.

Clearly, my client and her team recognized that blogging frequency ups SEO and positions an organization  as a thought leader.  But frequency means tight timeframes.

I had a strict 3-hour window each business day to create a solid draft.

So how did I do it?

After receiving a trending topic (and keyword list) by 11 a.m. from my client team, I would go about my work in an organized, methodical manner to make sure an engaging 600-750 word post landed in my client's inbox by 2 p.m. The operative word is organized. Here was my process:

1. Read the abstract or press release so I understood the medical study.  Sometimes this was not as easy as it reads. These studies were written, for the most part, by lead authors sporting a PhD after their names. In some cases, I had to read through some "mind-bending" study notes. Most of the time I needed to go to other health authority sites such as the National Institutes of Health or the Centers for Disease Control to further enlighten me.

2. Create a simple outline. After grasping the general concept of the study, I put together a simple outline. It started with 4 to 5 title options with the keyword(s) in it. To measure the titles, I made sure they fit under one of the 4 "U's":

·         Is it Unique?

·         Is it Ultra-Specific?

·         Is it Useful?

·         Is it Urgent?

Then I would use a classic copywriting structure to develop the content:

·         Opening Sentence (the summary statement)

·         The Problem (study specifics including "the why")

·         The Solution (study findings)

·         Call-To-Action (what the reader can do)

3. Write the initial draft. I would then "fill in the blanks" of the outline. The opening sentence usually created the greatest challenge as finding the right hook  to draw the reader in  took some serious skull sweat.

To make the content visually appealing, I was judicious in my use of sub-heads and bullets to make the reading easy, scannable and bite-sized.

4. Edit the initial draft.  Here it was all about clarity of the content. Did it make sense to our target audience? Did I overpromise on any of the content as opposed to "suggesting" further research needs to be done (as usually is the case with medical research).

I got rid of all the flab, tightened up the sentences and paragraphs, added "active" voice and generally smoothed out the bumps.

5. Select an appropriate image.  I would then search through the client's stock image library and choose 4 - 6 images that "told a story." Finding real people, not glamour shots, was the directive. This took a bit of time because of the subject matter and so many stock images are "posed."

6. Read the draft out loud. This has always been my "secret sauce." Remember: people read with their ears. While reading, they want to see and hear a certain rhythm. If the content is too static, the mind quickly disconnects.

7. Push send. After I was satisfied with that final reading, I would send my draft and image options to my client team. They, in turn, took the content up another notch or two before posting it the following day.

My client informed me that SEO increased during those 9 weeks. Which, of course, made me happy.

So to create engaging content under a tight deadline, you certainly need writing talent. But you can't do it without being organized. As A.A. Milne, author of several "Winnie-the-Pooh" books reminds us, "Organizing is what you do before you do something, so that when you do it, it is not all mixed up."

To that I say, "amen."