In the past couple of months, my social media feeds have been inundated with “How I” posts. I’m sure you know them too:
How I got to 100k followers
How I get clients
How I built a 7-figure business
Much like life itself, marketing thrives on imitation: a new format appears, someone popular endorses it, and it starts spreading like wildfire. Blink and they’re everywhere.
They’ve already started to morph into other types of content, notably blog posts and podcasts.
This begs the question:
What’s the appeal of “How I” content?
Humans are curious critters. In business, “how I” content is a close equivalent to tabloids. When you read it, you know that very little of it will be applicable to you. But you read it nonetheless because you’re curious about how others do it.
“How I” content is sexy and haughty — just enough to make people extra-curious.
Quench their thirst and, in return, extra-curious people will like, share, and comment.
For the publisher, this type of content can be a good catalyst for growth — only if done right, of course (we’ll get to that in a bit).
But should you go the extra mile to turn everything into a “how I” piece of content? Is the visibility boost worth it?
Rarely. Square pegs and round holes don’t go well together.
To understand why balance matters, let’s look at the basics.
Your content should alleviate four basic needs
- Money
- Fame
- Health
- Love/sex
These four things are the roots of all human problems. At any given moment, everyone needs help with one or more of these things.
If you cater to a B2B audience, look no further than money. Anything you sell should eventually lead to more revenue or profit for your clients — directly or indirectly. Money is the ultimate goal of any business. It’s right there in the name: “for-profit”.
If you’re in the B2C space, then you can cater to any of these four things. Your content should help people get more money, become (more) famous, get in (better) health, find or nurture love.
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Think about the thing that’s missing from your life or business. You’re looking for information on how to get it. Which of these would you respond to? Which would you read first?
Queue the most hated answer in marketing: “it depends”. It depends on two things:
- Who’s writing it
- Who’s reading it
Or: it depends on relatability.
Inspirational vs educational; ephemeral vs long-term
Rihanna owns a cosmetics brand called Fenty Beauty. She’s also a singer, by the way.
If she wrote “How I built a cosmetics empire from scratch”, I’d read that with the same curiosity I read about the latest bloke who broke Taylor Swift’s heart. I know I can’t use her process to build a cosmetics brand. Perhaps there are 1-2 tactics I can adapt for myself but that’s about it — there’s no real educational value in it for laymen.
On the other hand, if Rihanna published a piece called “How I write songs that top the charts”, I’d read everything and take notes (if I were in the music business, of course).
Similarly, if I wanted to grow my social media audience, I’d read other people’s success stories mostly as entertainment. I know they will have far fewer tactics than a more comprehensive “how to” piece. There’s more for me to go on in the latter.
See the difference?
Most “how I” content isn’t relatable for the readers — this is its most tragic fault. I’ve written about this before, about how storytelling can become toxic.
There’s a reason you don’t see Lady Gaga or Rihanna brag about their follower count or try to teach you how to reach it with “How I” content. Context is everything. If your readers don’t have a VERY similar context to yours, you’re not helping them.
Haughtiness can bring you traction. But real educational content is where the gold lies.
“How I” content inspires. We look to Steve Jobs for inspirational quotes but it would be foolish to try and replicate his strategy. “How to” content is a better educator because it accounts for context.
When you write a “how to” piece, you’re forced to look beyond your business. You’re forced to figure out which tactics would work for your audience and which were your own, singular lucky breaks or tributary to your unique skillset.
Where real authority resides
To be able to write a “how to” piece, you need more than one success story, especially if that success story is your own.
You may think “how to” posts are boring. You’d be right — they aren’t nearly as fascinating as “how Is” because they lack the tabloid-like glitter and appeal. But they are great for those readers who are truly interested in a blueprint, a roadmap. If you promote them to the right audience AND if you have the expertise to back them up, they’re well-oiled cash machines.
Does “how to” feel too impersonal? Change it to “how can you…?”. Kill the drudgery and retain the benefits of a piece of content that doesn’t pretend to be universally applicable when it’s about a single business.
Think of it this way: your GPS doesn’t tell you how Jason got from London to Paris in 6 hours. It tells you what the best route to get there in six hours is, based on objective data. To do that, Waze relies on satellite-based positioning and context information.
As a driver, you couldn’t care less about Jason. You want the blueprint that worked for as many other people as possible.
A blueprint for a well-rounded strategy
“How I” posts may have that “bro” sound to them but they have a lot going for them too. They’re great for social media engagement and growth, for instance. They also work in newsletters and podcasts but less so in blog posts. They’re akin to ultra-simplified whitepapers.
The catch is that they work as long as you don’t abuse them. Spoiler alert: this goes for nearly every marketing tactic. If you had an eight-figure advertising budget, I’d recommend you don’t use it all because people will start hating your brand if they see your ads non-stop on several channels at once.
Much like ad saturation personal story saturation is a real thing too. “How I” or “how we” are great ways to add a personal touch to your communication. But an overdose of first-person makes the reader feel ignored. Ignored people may like, share, or comment, but they rarely buy from you.
Whether you have a solo business or a “traditional” one, I recommend you stick to 20% or less “how I/we” content. That is enough to show you’ve been around the block once or twice and to get you the engagement you need to move your readers to the next phase.
For that next phase, give readers something they can act upon, something that’s applicable outside your unique context and skillset. A real expert knows that happy accidents and their own momentum do not equal strategy.
TL;DR: use “how I/we” content for vanity metrics (likes, shares, traffic) and “how to/how can you” content to establish real authority in your space and generate leads.
That being said let’s talk about:
A tragic imbalance
The creator and solopreneur spaces are mired with first-person content. On the other hand, traditional businesses still shy away from it. Save for the occasional case study, you’ll usually see “how tos” and a lot of “you”.
Because that’s the first rule of copywriting, right? Make the readers the center of attention and speak directly to them.
I like to break rules, though (I break most copywriting rules in my launch email sequence). Just as creators and influencers could use some toning down of their self-centeredness, traditional businesses could use more of it.
They could use more personable approaches and more behind-the-scenes in their content. It’s a belief I’ve held for a very long time now. So long, in fact, that I’ve perfected a technique to turn “how to” blog posts into sales pages of sorts by combining “how to” and “how I/we” into a single piece.
This technique has been responsible for bringing in 90% of my agency’s clients. We’ve also implemented it for our clients and turned their blogs into lead magnets, not just organic traffic magnets.
Bonus: it’s fun to write. I’ll tell you all about it next Thursday, in the next issue of Ideas to Power Your Future. I’ll also share a template you can use to build your own magical content.
See you then!
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Adriana’s Picks
- My friend Vaughan Broderick writes a weekly newsletter on innovation, design thinking, and strategy. If you like in-depth explorations of business topics, you’re going to love his newsletter. You can sign up here
- Twitter just can’t catch a break: its ad sales have fallen by 59% and are expected to keep going down.
- Fun AND mildly depressing: this website tells you how old you are, how many breaths you’ve taken, what major events happened throughout your lifetime, and more.
Here to make you think,
Adriana
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