In this article, we're are going to look at writing informational content on your website.
In other words we will write marketing as education that people will find valuable.
We're going to look at what types of content works best in architect marketing.
And we're going to look at how to deliver it.
After you go through this blog post you'll know exactly how to write educational content for people to turn them into clients.
In addition, if you find watching video better than reading an article simply scroll on down to the bottom as there is a video version of this blog post down there.
I'm a big fan of American barbecue and I've got a Weber Smokey Mountain to prove it.
And my butcher Mark is a ninja.
And I discovered just how much of a ninja he was the first time I bought some meat from him.
I went in to buy some beef brisket and walked out with the beef brisket, a shoulder of pork and 6 racks of ribs for a dinner party I was hosting!
Needless to say that is a lot of meat!
And all he did was explain some techniques he was using when smoking these specific cuts of meats.
I was sold and went from spending around £100 to spending £200 overall.
That's the power of educating your potential clients.
Never forget that every piece of content we write must move the reader closer to becoming client.
To do that we need to have a single call to action in every article and every webpage on our website.
This is how we interact with potential clients.
But what do we write about?
Most people who are experiencing a need have very little education about their problem - and about how to solve it successfully.
Even with access to so much information, most people are still in "quiet desperation".
If you try and fix something in a way that you think is right then the chances are you will make it worse.
Education can be used successfully to both help people solve their problems & to help people SEE their problems.
Educating also helps build credibility and trust, which are essential to ACTION.
By providing valuable educational content to your prospects, they will also come to see you as a trusted advisor, someone who has their best interests at heart.
And that’s a great thing to be viewed as by your prospects and puts you in a fantastic position to not only get hired but to increase your fees as you’ll have displayed your expertise in solving their problem.
A new "form" of Marketing has evolved with the mainstream adoption of the internet.
This is called "Content Marketing"- which is basically creating content that attracts Prospective Clients.
This is really the ultimate "Education Marketing" - as it's typically in the form of an educational tip, blog post or video.
Content Marketing is also very alluring to those "Marketing Chicken Shits" who would prefer to avoid any kind of selling or marketing.
But don't get distracted - the best Content Marketing uses all of the "power tools" of Direct Marketing - it doesn't "skip" them.
A time-tested way to increase attention, interest and response to your marketing is to format it into an "Editorial" style or design.
Info-mercials, advertorials, magalogs, many blogs, and other formats exemplify this strategy.
Editorial Marketing looks like an article in a magazine, a blog post, etc., and it's this design that has the perception of being true.
Designing your marketing to like an Editorial alone can increase/decrease views and engagement by 500% or more.
By simply making your architect marketing look like an editorial, it can increase conversion.
We unconsciously believe that our ads should look like ads.
The client sees it and doesn’t see it as valuable.
We do see value in editorial formats.
Design useful educational pieces and put your marketing inside it.
It's not "intuitive" that you can increase your response and your results so dramatically by simply laying out your marketing differently.
Start paying attention to how news sites, blogs, magazines & educational videos design and format their content.
Begin using these styles to increase response.
Fonts, colours, layout, etc are very important too.
For me the best medium by far to have to provide informational content is by having a blog on your site.
It just makes it so easy especially if you have a WordPress site.
For those who don’t have a website just yet my advice is to go with a WordPress site.
There’s tonnes of themes and layouts you can use and the dashboard for them makes them very easy to edit so you don’t need a developer for the most part.
That all said, I’m going to share what types of content have worked best for me.
The content that has best worked for me BY FAR are blog posts called Listicles.
As the name suggests they are simply lists of things put together in a single blog post.
My 3 best performing blog posts by far have been:
These are all list blog posts and to create them is very easy.
Simply come up with a theme that fits the type of clients you want.
I want house extension clients so one of my blog posts are all about kitchen extensions.
If you wanted restaurant clients for example a good blog post would be 12 Classic High End Restaurant Ideas or 15 Bizarre Restaurant Layouts.
What can you come up with for your architect marketing content?
You need to have a catchy title for your content but it must not be 'cute'.
Successful content for architect marketing needs to get to the point and use strong language.
For some reason words like ‘weird’, ‘bizarre’, ‘crazy’ or ‘insane’ tend to work quite well.
You can use these websites to check your titles:
So whatever type of post you want to put together you then simply find examples on Houzz, Pinterest or wherever.
You can even use a competitors examples too if you wish, I’ll show you how to get this to work in a second.
Add the photos to your blog post.
Write a catchy headline above the photos.
And write a little blurb underneath describing the photos and what they are, maybe a bit of a background story to it or an architecural description.
And here’s the important bit: add a link to the source.
When you add a link to the source then you bypass copyright infringement.
In addition, you will also be providing free traffic to the source so it’s to their benefit anyway.
And that my friends is how you do a listicle.
If you want to see what one looks like here’s a link to my kitchen extension one: 15 Classy Kitchen Extensions
Also make sure to embed your offers inside your blog posts.
Just look at the 2 offers inside this one?
The blog in the link above also has offers embedded in it.
Most prospective clients are relatively uneducated about how to solve their challenges in the best way.
One way to build credibility & trust as well as create motivation in your prospects and an advantage for yourself is to educate as you market & sell and embed that into our architect marketing.
The key to using education successfully in your marketing is to make sure that the education you’re delivering leads to a sale – not just to more knowledge.
Where does your prospective client have misinformation or lack of information that is dangerous to them?
What information, if your prospect were to learn it, would help them see how important it is to solve their challenge NOW – instead of waiting?
What types of educational materials can you create that would both educate and sell your services?
In the next blog post we will introduce a concept called Stair Step Marketing.
Most architects try and sell their services from the bat whereas Stair Step Marketing allows us to build a relationship with prospective clients first which results in more clients in the long run.
If you find watching video easier that reading a blog post then this is for you!
My name is Declan Connolly, founder of Affluent Architect.
I’ve been designing homes since 2000.
I started my own practice in 2009.
And now I teach Architects from all over the world how to generate Custom Residential projects for their practices.
And after all that, I can safely say:
The ‘normal’ way of educating potential clients on the benefits of hiring an Architect…
...is NOT THE ANSWER to getting great clients & projects.
If that worked Architects wouldn’t find themselves in the constant battle of:
❌ Talking to people only interested in free advice…
❌ Writing proposals for people who only use them as a fee shopping exercise…
❌ Being underpaid & treated like a commodity…
These problems happen because Architects haven’t been taught something crucial:
How to articulate the value of their services in a way that impacts their clients on an EMOTIONAL level.
Instead, they try to ‘logically’ educate potential clients on:
❌ Reasons to hire an Architect…
❌ Project process…
❌ How they deliver their services, etc…
But high-quality clients don’t care about these things.
In fact, they view these things as OBSTACLES to them getting their new home.
It’s like when someone books a flight for a holiday.
They don’t care about the number of rivets in the plane & the stitching in the seats.
All they care about is enjoying their holiday at the end destination.
Similarly, all that matters to the potential client is the new home.
Along with all the lovely lifestyle benefits it will give them.
All the ‘logical’ based approach does is position Architects as a ‘set of plans to get the permit’.
So, here’s how we fix this.
My Architects attract creative residential projects with clients that pay top dollar for great design.
And the key to this is my proprietary A.V.I.D. Method (Articulate Value & Influence Design Method)...
…which creates marketing messages that emotionally connect with their potential clients.
This A.V.I.D. Method has been developed by trial & error in the real world since 2009.
And it’s the only method specific to the single-family residential market for Architects on the planet.
It’s enabled me & my Architect students to:
✅ Work with celebrity clients on their new home like Mark Owen from the pop band Take That...
✅ Work on jobs that have been featured on the TV Show Grand Designs…
✅ Work on homes worth as much as $18.75 million…
And the secret to this is something I learned when I was struggling to get decent projects for my practice.
I had hit a brick wall and decided to study how past Architects managed to do it.
And who better than Sir Norman Foster himself.
He got started in the high-tech industrial market.
Which is a super-competitive market against far bigger and more established firms.
Sir Norman Foster didn’t go and try and ‘logically’ educate potential clients.
Instead, he described what his target clients’ businesses would be like AFTER they built one of these buildings.
And once I applied this same principle to Custom Residential it completely changed the game for me.
Describing a potential client’s life AFTER they have built their new home is what gets their attention.
✅ It instantly creates trust & respect because we are describing what they really want...
✅ It creates an air of 'exclusivity' & ‘uniqueness’ around our services which clients pay more for...
✅ Defines who our target clients should be & where to find them…
However, it must be done in a certain sequence.
And that’s exactly what I’m going to show you on a special Case Study recording.
Where I show you how the A.V.I.D. Method works.
As well as how it creates my students’ marketing for them which saves a bunch of time.
This Case Study also shows you loads of examples of our students' marketing that is working like crazy in the Custom Resi market:
Click Here To Register For Your Free A.V.I.D. Method Case Study
So, if you're sick and tired of being treated like a commodity...
And you want to finally work with appreciative clients who value what you do…
…get paid the fees that you deserve & have a great income for a change…
…and work on fulfilling creative jobs without sacrificing time with your family…
Then let’s get the A.V.I.D. Method working for your practice.
Go ahead and register for your free Case Study right now:
Hi Declan,
Interesting approach, however I am one who writes a blog just to increase my searchability on Google by creating interesting content not necessarily marketing to a niche. Fresh content equals positive ranking through Google's algorithms. I have run out of gas after a couple of years but every once in awhile I get inspired. You can check out my blog here:
http://www.aricgitomerarchitect.com/blog/
I market these blogs throughout social media and not so sure anyone actually reads them except for Google but it works for me. I'm not sure I understand your lists, you seem to market other architects and you say that work for your personal reach? If that really works I'll have to give it a try.
Thanks and great read!
Hi Aric, thanks for checking out the blog post and leaving a comment!
I base practically all my content on Google search terms and search volume.
And the reason being that if it isn’t being searched for on Google then no one is going to read it.
And if no one is going to read it then they won’t become a lead and it’s a waste of time.
Google ranks your pages based on Google Search Terms that your content contains so that should be the foundation of your content strategy,
For example the latest blog post on my home design website is 11 Insanely Clever Loft Stairs Ideas You Can Copy For Your Home (https://www.bespokehomedesign.com/blog/loft-stairs-ideas/).
The idea for that is purely based on the fact that 'loft stairs' has a monthly volume of 5400 search results per month in the UK which is where I'm based.
It also has incredibly low competition for these search terms which means I can rank for this pretty easily.
As it's all free traffic I will get a lot of leads for the larger loft conversion projects.
It also opens up joint venture possibilities with loft stair manufacturers cause I can sell advertising space on the blog post or promote them for a share of the sales.
All my content is done with joint ventures in mind as well as my own home design services.
I can do a FB Live session where I show how I do the keyword research to base my blog posts on them if you are interested in knowing more how I do it?
As a note aside I had a look at your blog and you could improve your blog post titles a lot.
I’ve got a headline swipe file for some good examples and I’ve added it to the FB Group for you.
Thanks Declan, Would love to hear about your keyword search techniques!
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