Creating Authentic Content With Amy Aitman

Madeleine

Hi everyone. Welcome to the Syncast. I'm Madeleine, the host and Synup's content and community manager. Today I'm talking with Amy Aitman about all things content, all things authenticity. Amy, why don't you tell everybody a little about yourself and how you got into this space?

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Aitman

Thanks, Madeleine. I'm so happy to be here. Thanks for reaching out. It's really exciting for me and this is one of my favorite topics to talk about. I can't wait to get started. Currently I am CEO of venture Forth Media. We build niche content sites, we build brands, we build authentic. We try hard to build authentic great content for niche communities. So people are really obsessed with a niche or they need information or. That kind of thing. So I've been there for about 7 years off and on. I started off as a writer slash editor Slash Grove manager, Slash managing editor and worked my way up as we scaled our content production, scaled our content and started really getting into building sites from scratch. I kind of started in this industry as a freelance writer after not being hireable in 2008 in that recession. Finished university. No one would hire me. My mentors were getting laid off and I was like, what am I going to do? I really thought I was going to have a future in corporate communications and a professional writing career. And my husband actually said just try to get some freelance writing clients. And I was like, OK, I figured it's easier to get one client to give me one project. If I could start doing that, then I'd be set and start it from there. And it didn't take long for me to really realize that. I mean, I love writing, I love the process of writing, but for me writing is very slow and I just really love the bigger picture of content strategy, content marketing and how powerful that is. And I'm just a complete content nerd, all types of content. So it is a really good fit. And I just kept working, learning, still learning so much. Things have changed in the last 18 months and the last three months things have changed online, so. It's a really exciting, fun world to be in, and that's my story.

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Madeleine

Awesome. Yeah, I'm so excited to have you on the podcast here today. As a content marketer, I love talking about all this kind of stuff. So right up my alley. Yeah, I'd love to just start off with a little conversation about how you define authentic content and how you make sure that it's incorporated into the content strategy of your clients and how to make sure that communications are authentic going forward when you work.

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Aitman

With some really good questions, because I feel like this word authentic has been used so much like so much before and it was really kind of a hot topic a few years ago. It was like, we're going to build authentic. Content and I feel like just like the barrier for what quality content is authentic content means something different to every person and it means something different for our brand or for an individual. So it means it's very subjective. But I would say authenticity really for me means like truthfulness and genuineness and bringing that like being able to be transparent in the ways that you need to be with content. And I think that it's like. Said it's different for a tick tock influencer who's gonna share maybe like really share their lives versus like a brand who you know, but a brand still needs to think about what being honest and being genuine means for their brand. So that's how I kind of like to define authentic content and also. I really like to think about who is delivering the content. So even with brands or even with like large scale content marketing strategies, I think Google for sure cares a lot about the author of the content now more than they ever have. And they are finding new ways to showcase authors, to showcase individuals. And to me, who is delivering the content is just as important as the piece of the published piece of content. And I think that that's where we're going with content. So it's been something in my company we've worked on for a long time. So to build authentic content always starts with who likes The Who, who's delivering it, is it a bonafide expert? That's something that's like a big, big, deep, deep passion of mine. We even have a service where we help people build authentic content teams, like find the experts and we seem to get the like the Nice year, you know, people that are looking like, I don't know if I could ever find a power washer expert with the tool shed that's really organized and and actually knows power washers and dreams about them, right. And to me. Who is delivering the content that is so important? And I spend a lot of time trying to find niche experts and people that are really obsessed with a topic and a niche, and it starts from there.

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Madeleine

Right. So how do you actually go about finding an expert in a certain niche? What's the process like?

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Aitman

Oh, it's like the first step is probably the funnest step, and it happens while you're developing. We do a lot of building sites from scratch, so when we're starting on the topic. Station and you know thinking about the silos we wanna go into, we think about the team that needs to present this content from the start. And so my advice to anyone that's building a content team, especially around a niche is to live in that world. So I like to move into that world and it's so easy. It's a lot easier today to live in you know to find if you're like a retro gaming nerd like to find those reddits and those forums and you know conferences or. Wherever you need to go to live in that world of that niche. And usually if you find 1 bonafide expert that's like really obsessed about the niche. They know other experts. So I feel like you just have to find that initial wiggle room when you build these and somebody. Shows are harder, harder to find people than others. If it's a digital type of niche that there's a lot of content around or it's something that. There's that people, a lot of people are building content and it's a little bit easier. But if you're doing something like I would say like home studying, that might be a little tougher to find a real home setting expert that lives like that. Maybe, maybe they're not online. Maybe they really are just in and maybe think, yeah, maybe they live off the grid and you have to find them. And I kind of like just really just love finding niche experts and like I said. Once you find that one, they have friends, they know people and they know where to go, where they live. So that's the first step for sure.

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Madeleine

Yeah, yeah. I think that's something really special about building a content team and as you said, kind of getting the experts, finding the right people is that, yeah, you could just hire any content marketer to kind of write about anything and they'll probably do it if they're a pretty decent contact. Martin marketer, sorry, they'll probably do a pretty good job. But like if you don't have people who actually have passion for it and yeah, they, they dream about their organized tool shed or they're like in. In the trenches doing whatever. Um, then, then it's hard to get that kind of feeling of authenticity with the content. I definitely.

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Aitman

Agree. And I think for our sites, the authenticity factor really is really key to our success and to moving into markets that maybe are tougher, building a new site from scratch. It takes time to get that authority and it takes time to find your audience. And so I think those little innuendos of people that are real experts. Are really obsessed or people that are just doing the research and are really great copywriters. Makes a difference. Obviously depends on the niche that you're building in. But for us, like we have a lot of nerd culture video gaming sites and the lingo that they use, the experience that they share, you just can't fake it. You can't fake somebody. Like you, I couldn't do research on FIFA 23 until you all players and tell you all the things. That's my son's obsession right now. But someone that lives and plays that game and has played FIFA 222120 has no soccer inside and out, has all those things. Like there's such a difference and there's like little, you know, innuendos and stuff. And I think that's it. I think the reason why brands and people want authenticity so much is that trust factor and without experts, without like the right lingo, the trust is completely gone, right? So you and once you lose trust, it's really hard to get back.

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Madeleine

Exactly, exactly. So like with that in mind that you would prefer to kind of have an expert telling you what to do versus just some kind of nameless faceless.

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Aitman

Are they?

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Madeleine

Actually in the space or not type of person. Behind the scenes, I know that brands often kind of develop this voice that they use for their social media that they use for their content. Do you think that that's kind of on its way out because it's better to have individual voices or where are we going with that?

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Aitman

I mean, I think consumers, I think like we're all pretty savvy to marketing these days. Everyone knows when they're being marketed to. We all understand the INS and outs of marketing. It's really funny, like I used to. Back in the day, I'd say like a decade ago in my career I would have to really like to explain touch points and marketing and brand voice and that kind of thing. But I feel like nowadays it's just we understand. So I think brands if they're presenting it from the brand, people kind of get it, but I do think that they're missing an opportunity and one of the things that I've seen brands do is and do really well is like you know kind of borrow, I would you know authenticity and trust from. An influencer for example. And that really works because, you know, they're bringing those people in to speak about them. I think people do not want to just hear from the brand. They want to hear from real users of their product. They want to hear, they want to see products being tested in the real world. The people that look just like them or people that sound like them or know you know or are experts in their field. And I think brands need to recognize that and whether they work with them directly, which I think they should. Umm. I think that, yes, we understand that when a brand's talking about their own product on their website that they're going to sell us on the features. But I think that brands that only like sugarcoat things and aren't transparent are missing out on a really big opportunity because that's why we have like, that's why even an affiliate, we have reviews, we have product testing because people do not want to come to the brand. They want to come to us to say, "Did you really like this and what does it look like, what does it look like? We have like a subscription box site where we actually do, we order the subscription boxes and we test them and we try on the clothes and we show you what it looks like on a real body and did this like what was the fabric feel like, all of those little innuendos, I think we're doing that and I think brands need to recognize that people are coming to us and coming to our, you know, team of subscription box testers to test their products and we will tell you the good, the bad, the not so good. He will tell you if this meal kit is overpriced. And if this is you know this didn't come packaged properly we will tell you all of those ins and outs. And I sometimes feel like brand tried to sugarcoat and like kind of like whitewash though the negatives and I think that's a bad thing and I think if brands want to build authentic content they need to address good, bad, ugly because that's what's that's what your buyers are looking at.

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Madeleine

Right, right. Yeah, I agree. It's so much. Easier to trust a brand if you kind of have this more nuanced picture of, oh, this product is great, but it's a little bit overpriced. But if you want to pay for it, then you can versus this is perfect, like 0 changes, five stars.

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Aitman

Because like, I think this is such old school thinking and I had met with a client just this month and one of the types of content that we recommended having on his ecommerce site was comparisons, comparisons to other products. And he's like, why would I compare myself to? A competitor that could be better. I mean like I said that your customers are comparing you to other products already and that's like obviously comparison is a really great commercial intent keyword as well because people are like I'm searching between product A, I'm searching for product B, tell me what I should buy. So for me that's like a no brainer. But for brands they're like they want to be so protective of them and I've said this to so many, I've talked about this many, many times with brands. Better, you know, putting content out and they're like, should I talk about the pros and the cons of both? And I like to be really authentic if you, if you're a competitor, do something better, don't be afraid to put that out there like that. To me builds trust and that's what I want to know. And there's a lot of great brands out there that get that, that are doing that now, but there's still some old school mentality where you break it down.

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Madeleine

Yeah, yeah. I think it's always so interesting when brands kind of act like they are the end all be all of whatever their vertical is like, oh, this is the Emil Kit, it's perfect and you don't even have to look at the other ones because this one is the best. It's so weird because obviously you can have a really great product, you can have a really great whatever and there's going to be someone who maybe likes something else better and.

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Aitman

Yeah. And you're just like, I mean think about it, you're just out of touch with what your customer is. Who your customers are and who your real people are too. And I think authenticity for me also means not being everything to everyone and just, you know, really digging into who you want to be as a brand. And you know, you're like your special sauce and that's OK, you know? And I think that there's so many companies out there that are doing that really well. But like I said, yeah, there's still some old school mentality because we work with brands as well for, I mean, we create a lot of content and we'll work with brands. To like advertisements in the content. And sometimes they'll ask for some revisions that we just don't do. Because I'm like, this is the real experience that they had with your product. And we editorial and monetization are 2 separate parts of the company for a reason. Like I am. I'm an editorial person through and through. It's funny because like, obviously, content marketing is marketing, but editorial for me is really, really important. And to have we spend a lot of time finding experts, real people that are actually doing the things and testing if it's like an RV they live in RV's, they you know spend their summers in RV or and RV parks like they know this world inside and out so. Even if it's not something that maybe makes your brand not look as good, I feel like it's still better. So right.

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Madeleine

Yeah, I I think that's a huge thing, especially if you're talking about reviews. I know that like a lot of sites that offer reviews have been kind of cracking down and a lot of people have been seeing their reviews removed or like their accounts suspended because they had fake reviews up there. And obviously if you have fake reviews, you usually know you have fake reviews. But I think people are surprised by that. Not only like the filters, but just consumers who are looking at reviews can usually tell if a review is from someone who actually used the product versus.

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Aitman

Oh yeah.

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Madeleine

And then there is this. Yeah.

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Aitman

I mean, I think it's like that too. I mean, if I'm gonna buy a dress on Amazon and I'm looking for this, you know, particular dress, I want to know, I want to look like, I don't want to hear from the dressmaker. That's like, this is the best dress. Like, obviously, I know it's a copywriter. I know I want to see somebody, preferably in many sizes and many forms, and say, what does this dress look like? How does it wear? How does it wash? What is it like? That's what we demand now. And I think Google is really pushed forward with that, with the on statistic. Reviews with their, you know, with their helpful content update, it's not over yet. I still feel like there's a lot of review sites, there's a lot of content sites that are still in the rankings without authentic reviews. But I think we're starting to see it. Like we're starting to see a lot. Like there's been a lot of people that took shortcuts that are just being decimated in Google. So it's not only what consumers want, it's what Google demands and it's a good time to be in content. If you're building authentic content. It's.

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Madeleine

What is it like? What are some brands that you feel like you as a consumer have seen and you're like, oh, this is really great, authentic content. Like this is what a brand should do.

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Aitman

Here as far as the consumer goes for brands. Oh, that's a good question. Try to think. You know, like my son's a really big gamer and I think he loves Fortnite, he loves video games. And I think that, like the PlayStation stuff, I think they really found a way to, like, sneak in. I mean, like, that's really great. They have found a way to bring it. Like they have these amazing marketing campaigns in the game now, so they have these events in the game. I think stuff like that's really amazing. Yeah, yeah. It's really smart. It's really clever. I'd say companies like. There's a lot of digital tool companies that I really like. I would say like monday.com does great content. You know, they really, they understand the comparison, they understand how to build content there. I mean they're like the masters of it. I would say another tool that we use a lot that I think is really all about building authentic content, which is ironic because it's an AI tool that is a market muse. We love market fare. They put out like the real deal of things. I think they've spent a lot of time on my current content marketing side of things like that. Of the people that I really am drawn to and then I would say like yeah, I I would say I'm not as brand centric as some people like or it's like when I'm when I'm for my clothing or for my. For that kind of thing, yeah, I'm not as I'm not as brain centric, but right.

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Madeleine

Right. Yeah, I'd love to hear about the process when you're working with brands to kind of develop the messaging and be truthful and kind of read, help the brands see the signals and kind of understand what it really means to have a good voice and have great authentic content too.

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Aitman

So when we work with brands for our company, for our content website, it's like I said, the editorial is the editorial. So we were like we hired experts. For example, we have a wedding and jewelry site. Like we hire people that are jewelry makers, jewelry like jewelry designers, you know, wedding planners, that kind of thing. Like this. And they're real, like real life people, like their moms. And. We create the content. We know, we have a content strategy, we have a content plan, but we create the content and that the brand works with us in that capacity. It's like we find the traffic, we write the content from our perspective. So it's really it's and they're like there is some back and forth. What we do tell brands though, if there's any kind of inaccuracies, if we say, if our research is found like your trust pilot signals 4.6 out of five. And it's really a 4.8, yet tell me it's a 4.8. We will change those things, but we won't change opinions. We won't change personality, we won't change reality. Like when we really are doing product testing, we will like, we won't change our opinion. So for example, we have another health site and one of our health writers did a testing for your protein product and they didn't like the taste and they liked that there was no way around it. They did not like the taste. And. Obviously taste has an opinion and even with protein powder it is like I could love a protein powder and my husband could be like I don't like that protein powder. But this is coming from because we're presenting this content from that expert, from that writer. If she doesn't like the taste, doesn't like the taste. So it was like keep it like that and say I don't like this taste. I prefer you know, this flavor or whatever. And sometimes brands just don't like that. They don't like that. Like you don't. Talk about that and it's but we do. Before we even work with the brand, we're like this is how we present it and it does help you like you still get you know buys and we obviously work with good products that we like. We only approach brands that are ready, like they are already shopping already using and so it's a pretty easy fit but sometimes there's back and forth. That's how we work with brands. But yeah, we don't try to assume the brand voice. I've even had brands send over like pre written things that they want in the content and I don't put it in our content because one, it's duplicate, it's like it's the same content you have on all of like you look at all of these like they have sponsored posts and it's the same verbiage, they have their site, it's the same verbiage. It's not original, it's not fresh and it's not delivered from us. So they're going to come. Brands are going to work with us then they need to work with like it comes from a place of like trust. We build trust with our audience. We have that already. We've you know, we actually are testing your product and testing. That's where it comes from. So I don't instruct a writer to speak like the brand and that's, yeah, that's crazy that out of the editorial I will literally take those kinds of like, you know and then in an article ad, fine. Have you know, a little bit of, you know, I think to me that consumers understand they still have to pay the bills and we're trying to sell this product. But in the actual article itself we try to be as genuine as we can, you know.

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Madeleine

Yeah, yeah, it's. It's always so funny to me how brands painstakingly come up with this. Messaging and like which verb should we use? Like what? What phrase should we use? And then at the end of the day, it's like you can have a recommended, recognizable brand voice and a recognizable phrase and a description. But like, what really Trump's that is like the social proof of people actually using your product or using your platform and what they're saying about it. Like whatever, whatever the slogan that you come up with, people aren't just going to mindlessly repeat.

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Aitman

That, and we're saying.

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Madeleine

That they.

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Aitman

Don't want to. Now I have so many friends in ecom space and there's people that are just crushing it because they're on TikTok or they're on Instagram and they're doing video and they're just sharing like real experience. So they're finding people that are like, I'm going to, you know, use this purse and see what it's like or whatever. And there's brands that are crushing it like that. And yeah, I've been in those rooms too. I've been in those, in those strategy meetings where it's like let's come up with three words to describe our brand and I think that. Like branding and brand, it's so much more than that. And I know that there's people that get paid a lot of money to think of brand voice and it becomes very important and it is something to really consider. But nowadays, the way content is created, what we're used to, the speed of content creation and video, things are shifting.

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Madeleine

Stuff. Yeah, you can't. You can't really have the time to, you know, analyze this. Like going along with our brand voice is perfect and I think that's kind of refreshing. I definitely see and it's funny you brought up ticks.

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Aitman

Tock I've.

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Madeleine

Seen on TikTok, a lot of brands have Tik Toks and the ones that seem to succeed are the ones that just kind of let their, whoever is managing their account just kind of run with it. Like it's not something that's going to be approved by a corporation. It's just them making these fun videos, which is what the platform is for. And I feel like when companies get to. Stuff about stuff and not not just like letting whatever the content might flow, it just turns into ohh yeah.

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Aitman

Great example because I mean there's so many people out there and they're kicking their little hearts out all the live long day and they're creating content and video is the same thing. Like you look at people like Mr. Beast who does like an entire marketing campaign video shoot thing like a day like this takes. I mean corporations and brands like bigger corporations. Your brands would take them six months and there would be levels of, you know, the workflow would be insane and there would be an approval process and that. And yet there's also so many creators out there right now that are just pumping out content every single day and they're not, they're not as worried about. Voice and tone and they're just getting out there and putting out content. And so, like, there's obviously 2 extremes to that. But yeah, I think about those content creators that I'm like, you're right when I want, like when you watch TikTok and you the algorithm is so personalized and you are in that space like it's like an ongoing thing. And people are really drawn to that. People are really drawn to that. You know, we have tons of content out there, but.

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Madeleine

Yeah, yeah. And just like. On the authenticity point, like, it's so just by the nature of it, it's so authentic. Like especially like during the beginning of COVID-19, just like in their rooms. And it's totally like not, not the type of thing people would usually present like oh, like here's me and my like messy office work day or like I love day.

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Aitman

Of COVID for bringing us into people's homes way more. And I mean obviously video platforms, we have better like better ways to capture video now, better ways to capture authentic images and even we tell our writers like if we don't have an image does it, did it really exist? It really happen and. When I was growing up, we used to have like, you know, you'd take camera and film and you'd have to like, wait for weeks to get this process. And nowadays it's like every single thing in our life is recorded, like we, you know, every single part of our day. And with COVID, like even in business. People are like in their homes and their bedrooms. I've seen podcasts where like really engaging, smart podcasts and you're like, these two interviews are in people's apartments and you can see their paths and their dogs behind them and their their homes. And I think COVID just kind of forced that out. But I think that was something that was probably meant to happen anyways because. People just do want options, like I said in the beginning and our beginning talk was like who create, like who brings you the content, who presents. The content really doesn't matter. And so like bringing people into intimate setting and you know, being showcasing their lives. And in many ways I think that's what audiences expect today. Like it's so different from how I grew up. Like you would never. As a brand you would like there was like, you know, dress codes and and you would never ever see an interview in someone's bedroom or someone's you know. Like their pets going around and the kids going around. But I really like for me that means that I will die on this hill. That type of content that's really authentic and really genuine. We'll do way better than a polished piece of work that took you, you know, that went through layers and layers and layers of approvals for sure. And I will die on that hill. I think that's what people want and that's the kind of content I like consuming as well, so.

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Madeleine

I agree with that too. Yeah, the more polished content has its time and place, but it's like there's plenty of that to go around. So it's nice if you're going to watch someone for their experience. Like you want it to be their experience, not just some snapshot.

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Aitman

That was this year approved. Oh, for sure. And I think it makes budgeting a lot easier as well. Like this year we started doing a lot more video and we pulled in our writers, which. Is a funny kind of thing because, right, like, writers are usually introverted. They don't really want to go on camera. But our writers are people that are actually in the thing, doing the thing. So I was like just put a camera in front of your face and they were like, what about shots and this and that? And like, I will take authentic video. I would rather have you, you know, be getting in your garden and showing us how to plant tomatoes and really showcasing it. Then just like, you know, a polished video about how to. Grow tomatoes and that's something that we like. We really dedicated another year to ET to use Google. But for us it really means building authentic content and we yeah we put it, we put a stake in it. You know in a big way like and I think more than what the big media companies are doing. I think a lot of the bigger companies know what Google's you know looking for are. Trying to replicate that, that expertise and the authenticity, you know, they might be testing products in a lab or they might be testing products, you know, in the driveway of their headquarters. But we really are like, you know, people that are testing garden hoses are using the garden hoses in their house. The people that are growing tomato plants are actually growing them in their real climate. And you know, yeah, like we really want that level and we're not 100%. Area we, but that's where we strive for.

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Madeleine

When it comes to.

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Aitman

Building because really, if you are out there consuming any kind of content, there's people out there that are doing it. Yeah. So I think about like, like you said, like the tick talkers, the influencers, the people are starting their own niche blog just because they're super, super passionate about gardening or canning or, you know, forestry or whatever. And they're just like, I really love this and I'm going to talk about it. That's who I look to for inspiration. When it comes to content creation.

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Madeleine

Thank you so much for coming on the Syncast. It was so much fun talking to you about all things content, all things authenticity.

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Aitman

Things yeah, this is so much fun and I reach out anytime. Like, I love nerding out about this. Like this is my thing to nerd out about. So really, it's fun for me. And yeah, thank you so much for having me. It's been a blast.

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Madeleine

Yeah. Thank you. We'll see everybody next time on the side cast.

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