We’ve all probably played Scrabble before—three in five households across the country own a Scrabble game—but whether we’ve played it well is another matter, at least in my case. That experience you have with the game can become beneficial when developing a content marketing strategy. To celebrate National Scrabble Day today, let’s look at how Scrabble can teach us valuable lessons that apply to content marketing.
The Rack
In Scrabble, all seven letters available to a player are placed on a rack. Players can move letters around to try to make high-scoring words before they place them on the board. While content marketing doesn’t have a specific word pool to pull words from like letters in Scrabble, it is important to use the right words in the right context. When developing content—for a blog, a website, or even a social media post—consider whether the words used accurately portray the idea that needs to be conveyed to the audience.
Triple Word Score
Scattered all over the Scrabble board are special spaces with additional points, like Triple Word Score or Double Letter Score, which players want to use to their advantage, especially with an already high-scoring word. In content marketing, your triple threat words are keywords. Keywords are terms that consumers use when on search engines, and marketers use these terms to try to provide relevant results to those searches. It is important to use consistent keywords across marketing materials, including content like blog posts or web pages, but also in microcopy, like alt text and meta descriptions. The more relevant and authentic the keywords are, the higher the credibility given to the source.
Hooks
In Scrabble, a hook is when a player adds a letter to an existing word to spell a new word and gains those points. In writing, a hook is a way to draw your reader in: great storytelling creates conflict early and drives an audience to know more. In marketing, the hook is often the first impression someone has of your brand. Without a compelling first sentence in a blog or tag line in an ad, consumers are likely to pass you by.
Two-Letter Words
When the game winds down to the last few moves, two-letter words become the most valuable. Players have to know which words are legitimate and where to place them to have the biggest effect on their score. Likewise, content marketers need to know which words to use to create a strategic message, build upon past conceptions of the brand, and have the most impact on the targeted audience.
Scrabble means “to grasp, collect, or hold on to something.” As a content marketer, you want to hold on to your audience and have them coming back for more. In an age where content is overabundant, make sure the words you use are relevant, useful, and compelling.
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