Making your content stand out these days is getting harder. The explosion of content across various platforms is undeniable. With tools like Midjourney and GPT-4, AI-generated content is a significant factor in this expansion.
Whether it’s text-based content or social media posts, there’s a rapidly increasing amount of material competing for your audience’s attention. This sheer volume can make distinguishing your content a challenge. When others use AI to generate content at a massive scale, you may find yourself grappling with potential duplication and homogeneity.
The burning question then becomes: How can you make your content stand out? Why should your audience choose your content over the competition?
Let’s take a look at how to make your content stand out in an AI-driven, content-saturated marketplace.
We can count on them to bring new ideas to the table consistently
Leveraging Data and Personal Stories
What separates the unforgettable posts from the ordinary ones on platforms like LinkedIn or Twitter?
There are two critical elements: proprietary data and personal stories.
Leveraging Data
Sharing proprietary data, trends or insightful analytics can help your content cut through the noise. Remember, it’s not just about the numbers, but also the narrative you build around them.
- Proprietary Data: This is unique information that your business generates and owns. It could be anything from user engagement metrics on your website to customer satisfaction surveys, to sales performance data. Because this data is unique to your organization, it provides information that can’t be found elsewhere.
- Trends: Apart from proprietary data, you can also focus on deciphering and sharing trends related to your industry. Are there emerging patterns in customer behavior? Are there significant changes in how your audience uses your products or services?
- Insightful Analytics: Similarly, analytics can help you unearth unique insights. For instance, you could share how a particular marketing strategy impacted your customer conversion rates or how a new feature affected user engagement on your platform.
Dive Deeper: 5 Powerful Ways to Increase Sales by Leveraging Data Effectively
Building a Narrative Around the Data
While data and analytics provide valuable insights, they’re just raw material. The real magic lies in how you present this information to your audience. Raw data might be hard for your audience to digest and understand, so this is where the narrative comes in.
Creating a narrative involves presenting your data in a compelling, easily digestible and relatable manner.
The goal is to transform numbers and stats into a story — a narrative that your audience can connect with.
Consider, for example, sharing proprietary data about a new product feature that boosted user engagement on your platform. Instead of simply presenting the numbers, you could frame it as a journey:
- Begin with the problem — maybe users were struggling with a certain aspect of your product.
- Then introduce the solution — the new feature you developed in response.
- Follow it with the result, backed by your proprietary data.
In this way, you turn dry statistics into a compelling story of problem-solving and innovation.
Personal Stories
Personal stories carry a unique appeal.
When you share a personal story, you are giving people a glimpse into your life and your experiences. This can help build trust and rapport with your audience. It can also make your content more relatable and engaging.
In addition, people love stories and remember stories 22X more than facts and figures, so storytelling in your content can boost conversion rates:
Stories can help us understand the world around us and connect with others. When you share a personal story, you are giving your audience something to relate to and something to think about.
For example, to use personal stories to make your content stand out, try one of these ideas:
- If you are a business owner, you could share a story about how you started your business, including all the failures, challenges and successes. This can help build trust with potential customers and give them a better understanding of your business.
- If you are a writer, you could share a story about your personal writing process. Steven Pressfield shares about his good-luck totems (a pair of lucky boots), evoking the Muse, meditating and going to the gym before he sits down to write. This helps other writers by letting them know they’re not alone and giving them inspiration.
- If you are a speaker, you could share a story about one of your most memorable (good or bad!) speaking engagements. This is a surefire way to connect with your audience and make your speech more engaging.
No matter what your industry or profession, personal stories can be a powerful tool for making your content stand out.
Dive Deeper: 9 Examples of Storytelling Marketing to Inspire Your Next Campaign
The Power of Experiences
While data can be compelling, it’s the shared experiences that truly make your content stand out. As AI evolves, it will inevitably become adept at generating data-driven content.
Remember, recounting personal experiences remains an elusive capability for AI.
It’s the intricate details, the highs and lows of personal journeys that add an irreplaceable depth to your content.
Consider, for instance, the case of someone sharing their battle with cancer. Their first-hand account of their feelings and experiences delivers a level of detail that only someone who has been through a similar journey could replicate. It’s these personal, relatable experiences that make your content unforgettable.
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The Reaction Video Trend
In the realm of video content, consider the growing trend of reaction videos. The best ones don’t just film themselves watching or listening; they add something of themselves to their reactions, making them particularly engaging.
For instance, YouTuber Patrick Bet-David has a daily show where he’s basically reacting to the news. And those tend to do well (some get millions of views) because he layers on his own experiences into his reactions, in terms of how he grew up, what his worldview is, etc..
The key to such content is adding your own experiences, which helps your audience view things from a different perspective. This unique blend of curation and personal insights can make your content genuinely stand out.
Breaking Free from Repetition
Another crucial aspect to consider is the originality of your content. Repetitive, overdone topics, whether AI-driven or not, rarely capture attention.
Finding fresh, untapped topics for your blog posts requires a strategic approach and a keen eye on emerging trends, audience interests, and industry developments. Here are a few methods to source such topics:
- Social Listening: Keep an eye on your audience’s conversations on social media platforms. What issues are they discussing? What questions are they asking? These discussions can often inspire relevant, fresh content ideas.
- Keyword Research: Utilize tools like Google Keyword Planner, Semrush or Ahrefs to identify what your target audience is searching for online. These tools can reveal lesser-known or emerging search queries that may represent untapped topics.
- Industry News and Events: Stay updated with the latest happenings in your industry. Newly released studies, innovative technologies or emerging trends could all provide fertile ground for unique blog posts.
- Forums and Q&A Websites: Platforms like Reddit, Quora, or industry-specific forums can be a goldmine for content ideas. Look for frequently asked questions or popular topics of discussion within your niche.
- Feedback from Your Audience: Directly engaging with your audience — through surveys, comment sections or email correspondence — can provide insights into what they want to know more about.
- Competitor Analysis: While the goal is to find unique topics, analyzing your competitors can help identify gaps in their content that you can fill. Is there an issue they’ve overlooked? A question they haven’t answered fully? These could be opportunities for you to provide fresh perspectives.
- Trending Topics: Monitor trending topics on platforms like Google Trends or Twitter. While these subjects may be temporary, they can sometimes be tied back to your niche, providing timely and relevant content.
- Conferences and Webinars: These events often focus on the latest developments in your industry and can help identify trending topics or emerging technologies that are worthy of a detailed blog post.
Unique, custom content has the potential to pique your audience’s interest, making them think, “This is interesting. I haven’t read about that before.”
Dive Deeper: How to Use ChatGPT for Powerful Content Creation (+ Examples!)
Integrating Influencers and Personal Brands
Integrating influencers and personal brands into your content can significantly enhance its visibility and appeal. Whether it’s a high-profile personality or a micro-influencer in your niche, integrating their unique style and persona can transform your content.
For instance, this strategy is evident in Tucker Carlson’s case. After he got fired from Fox, he started creating his own show on Twitter.
We’re back. pic.twitter.com/sG5t9gr60O
— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) May 9, 2023
His introductory video alone got 132 million views. If you can partner with someone and bring in that personality into your business, that’ll also make your content stand out. People love interesting brands with something to say. And not just corporate brands, personal brands.
So how do you integrate other well-known people? You may not be able to get big influencers, but you could probably get a micro influencer where someone’s just well-known in a particular space that can end up driving you more visibility versus just doing what everyone else is doing and just creating the same regurgitated content:
Check out this comprehensive guide to finding and working with influencers:
Influencer Marketing Strategy: The Ultimate Guide to Growing Your Business with Brand Partnerships
Conclusion: Embrace the Challenge
Experiences, data, personal stories, unique topics, and personal brands can significantly help your content rise above the AI-generated sea.
The path to captivating your audience isn’t straightforward, and marketing will likely become even more challenging in the years – or months – to come.
However, these hurdles can be viewed as opportunities to innovate, to find new and engaging ways to connect with your audience. It’s a challenge, but one well worth accepting.
If you’re ready to level up your business with unique content, Single Grain’s content marketing experts can help.👇
