Amanda Natividad's Key to Zero-Click Content
In this exclusive edition of GTM News Desk, hosts Nick Bennett and Mark Kilens are joined by the insightful Amanda Natividad to discuss her groundbreaking zero-click content framework. Dive deep into the art of creating platform-native content that holds standalone value and captivates your audience without the need for clicks. Amanda shares her strategic approach to leveraging social media algorithms while keeping content people-focused. Learn how to optimize your content for both visibility and engagement, ensuring it reaches and resonates with the right audience. If you’re looking to enhance your content marketing strategy, this episode is packed with actionable advice and expert insights.
Thanks for tuning in to this exclusive edition of GTM News Desk, presented by
the Tech Network.
This show is hosted by me, Nick Bennett, and my co-host Mark Killens.
Now let's get to the goods, on with the show.
Hi, welcome back. Excited to dive into the exclusive conversation with Amanda.
If you caught the first half of this, you're probably blown away just like I am
But we're going to dive into Amanda's proven framework, strategy, everything
that has made her
as successful as she is today. So super stoked about that.
So Amanda, the kick things off. What's that proven framework that you feel like
would help people
in this area around content? Well, now that all those people are gone, I could
finally tell the truth.
No, I'm kidding. The proven framework. We're here to talk about zero-click
content, right?
That is the proven framework. So zero-click content is native to platform
content that has
standalone value, where there's no need to click to learn more.
Clicking is only additive to the experience. So what I mean by this in practice
is as you're
scrolling your feed, what stops your scroll, right? Is it the thumbnail of the
person looking shocked?
Like, no, that's a little bit deeper, right? The stuff that encourages you to
stop and stay and
read and consume the content is the stuff that has that standalone value, where
you don't need a ton
of context, right? Like, you're not bogged down in the intro that's like, "Hey,
you're a content
marketer. You're probably looking for some insight." You know, like, you're not
bogged down in that. It's
like, boom, here's the value. There's a problem with the way that you are
creating content. Here's
what it is. There is something that every marketer needs to know about the way
the LinkedIn algorithm
works. Here are those three things, right? And it's all there in like, whether
it's a carousel,
with a couple slides, or whether it's like a 100 words sort of blog post, that
's just written
natively to LinkedIn. So these are one other way you could look at this. Is
that just really,
really good content? Well, yeah, sure it is. But some of the differences here
are because you're
optimizing for the platform, you're essentially optimizing for impressions,
right? You're optimizing
to get seen, to get liked, to get commented on, to get shared. And you can't
really do these things
if you're just sending people to blog posts, right? If you're just sending
people to links because
those links, those will ding you in the platforms, right? We know at this point
that, like, post Elon
Musk, when he, when, when Musk purchased Twitter, he showed the algorithm and
it shows links as a
quote-unquote, definite spam vector. Like, that's true, right? We know this in
LinkedIn. That's why
in LinkedIn, people are saying like, link below in the comments. And that's why
on Instagram and TikTok,
everybody has their little link trees with their storefronts, with all their
little links that they
say, like, link in bio. And by the way, TikTok, by the way, a lot of creators
there don't even say
Lincoln bio because even that's going to get analyzed by the TikTok gods and
they're going to get suppressed
in the algorithm. At least they think, I don't know this for sure. So that's
why they say things like,
you know where to go to find more info? You know what to do? You know where to
go next? Think about
that for a second. That's actually really weird, right? That's a, that's, that
's kind of weird, right?
To be posting on social media and thinking, you know where to go? Like, it took
me a while to pick up
on this because I was like, I don't know where to go. Who are you again? Right.
But what I'll also say is,
now I'm not saying never ever post links. What I am saying is be very strategic
about the way you're
creating content, the way you're publishing your content and the way you're
using links. Right?
Because the 10 people here are this, like, I hear you talk about zero click
content. If I'm never putting
my website anywhere, how are people going to find it? That's absolutely not
what I'm saying. I am
saying be strategic, understand how these things work and understand how to use
these algorithms
in your favor. If you go to like my LinkedIn profile, you'll see that I
actually do post a combination
of posts with links or just posts. Mostly it's just posts. Part of the reason I
even still do links
is so I can have updated examples to tell people like see it told you it doesn
't work. Right? And I'm
going to like in my own separate browser, I'm going to pull up some recent
posts I have on LinkedIn
where I posted, I was promoting a recent blog post. It was my smarter, not
harder content content
marketing guide. So first I might publish this. It was zero click content.
Right? Like SEO isn't dead.
It's our classic content marketing approach that's dead. Here's why. And so I
outlined a couple of
examples and the way forward. How did this perform? This got over 900 likes. So
it performed pretty well.
It got over 86,000 impressions. And by the way, my CTA there, I, I did, by the
way, to find this post
Google smarter, not harder content marketing guide. And it's going to be the
first result that you see.
Right? I don't know what the drop off was. I don't know. People actually read
it. I should actually go
to Google Analytics and find this out. But and I'm going to cut that in and see
if I can share it here.
Anyway, it over this LinkedIn post got over 86,000 impressions. And then
several days later,
I did another post that I thought was pretty good keyword research, handshake
audience research.
You're familiar with keyword research tools like HREF's, Mah's, summation more,
but there's
something else you need to create that your audience will actually care about.
And then I linked to my
post. How many likes of this get 56 likes? Wamp, Wamp. How many impressions?
Over 3000 impressions.
86,000 plus impressions versus 3000 plus impressions. So when I say I'm not
saying never link,
I'm saying go into this with your eyes wide open, right? Optimize your content
to get seen. Try out some
links. And then one executive say, but how can I get attribution? Like, but I
need to get attribution
for these links. I need people to go in the blog. How am I going to how else am
I going to get ROI on my
social media strategy? You're not going to get ROI if no one sees your shit.
Right? You're dropping links
in here. Because I need to track the fine. I need to get my attribution. I need
to see. Well, good luck
with that. You're going to get like if you have an audience of over 45,000
people like I do one
LinkedIn, you're going to be lucky if you get 3000 impressions. Do you want
that? Or do you want to get
50,000, 60,000, 80,000, 100,000 impressions? At the end of the day, do you want
two people to go to your
shitty blog post? Or do you want thousands of people to see that you wrote a
shitty blog post?
Kitting about the shitty. But what do you mean? Like I went in this very long
rant. Sorry, but I'm also
kind of not sorry. I'm going to just say like, do you want people to see your
shit or not? Well,
then this begs the question though, because we talked about this during the
podcast episode. How much
then is zero click content about optimizing for the algorithm or optimizing or
writing for a person?
It's going to be both. Right? Because what I'm saying, like, like when I'm
reading my examples,
I am writing my content in a way that is, can I get business leaders and
marketing leaders to stop
scrolling and pay attention to what I have to say? And I'm going to push on the
, can I get the right
people to read this? Not just because if I'm going to say like, can I get
anybody to stop the scroll
and read this? Yeah, I can do that. But what does that do for me in my business
? I work for a B2B
SaaS startup that serves marketers. What good does it do me for any random
average Joe to see all
my posts? Not a whole lot, right? But how can I get smart entrepreneurs,
executives, marketing leaders,
content marketers? How can I get them to stop scrolling and see? And that's
going to be when I write
something that I think is succinct, concise, punchy, a little bit salacious
that scratches at a
pain point or that scratches at the status quo that pokes at it, but isn't
saying like all of your
content marketing sucks. Here's why because it's not, I don't think that and I
don't think that about
anybody, right? I'm not going to say that would it stop the scroll if I use it
lead with something like
your content marketing sucks. Here's why probably would, but that's not how I
want to talk to my audience.
Right? That's not how I want anyone to talk to me. That's the people first
thing. Right? The algorithm
stuff is okay, like I got to drop in some truly valuable insights here. I'm
going to be strategic about
the whole link in the comments below thing. That's for the algorithm. What do
you find are like the top
five things that make, doesn't matter if it's LinkedIn, X, Facebook, whatever,
make for great zero-click
content. One, I'm going to kind of expound on the date of to platform thing. So
what I mean by that is
you know, the text, right? That has the context that's needed. It's uploading
the video,
native to that platform. It's adding the carousel where people can just swipe
through all the graphics
that essentially have the text or have the content that's needed to convey the
full idea. Right?
That's standalone idea. That's one. Next, I would say having a really strong
hook. Right? Like
how can you get people to stop scrolling? That's the hook. How do you get them
to stay? That's kind of
your line in sinker. Right? It's sort of your hook line in sinker. How do you
get them to stop? How do
you get them to stay? Third, I'm going to say like it's the call to action is
clear. Right? Like,
are you asking a question that you want people to answer? Maybe, because maybe
that's what you're
optimizing for in that given moment. It's actually before let's stop here.
Before a clear call to action,
it's going to be what is your goal with this content that you are publishing?
What do you want out
of this? Do you want theoretically? Do you want people to sign up for your
newsletter? So your
email list or do you want them to go to your blog post or do you want them to
state their opinion?
Right? You can't choose all three. You just can't. You have to choose one
because it's too
hard for people. Right? You can't ask them for too much stuff. And it also is
going if you have all
these goals in mind, it's going to muddy up what comes next, which is your call
to action. Right? Do
you want them to go to the link in comments? Is it going to be, hey, Google my
ebook or is it going
to be tell me your opinion below? Because I want to hear your thoughts because
maybe you'll get
quoted in my next piece. Like, it needs to be very clear what that is. So have
a very clear goal
so that it's very clear what you're going to ask for. Wow. Ties it all back
together. I'd love,
this is good. This is good. Okay. Okay. I have found the idea of zero click
content applies to even
channels that you own. So like email. I have, you know, Nick and I, you
probably have a newsletter.
Like, it's about delivering value so people don't have to always click. I find
that your whole concept
and framework can be applied in almost kind of any channel. Would you agree?
And then I'll have
Nick ask you the last question. But what do you think about that? It's not just
social networks.
Do you think so or no? For zero click content. For zero click content. Yeah.
You can be applied to any channel. It could be applied to any channel. Yeah.
Because I mean,
if you think about how it applies to like YouTube, for instance, it's how do
you give that value
right away up front? Even if you, you can apply it to even like Google search,
for instance. I mean,
it can't work with all of your content. But if you think about like, how can I
get placements
in any of these serve features? Maybe you're trying to go over a featured snipp
et one day. Maybe you're
trying to be shown as one of the popular products, right? Like like an e-
commerce play. Maybe you're
trying to show up in the image packs or the video. So your YouTube strategy,
right there? You could
think about your non-social media content in that way. How do I get featured on
the cert? I like that.
That's, you know, it's interesting. Yeah. Because I feel like I've been trying
to leverage more of that too.
But I know we're almost up on time. I've got one final question for you. What's
that piece of advice
you would give to leadership who really wants to up their game around zero
click content? Like if you
could say like, listen, CEO, founder, entrepreneur, whatever, like, here is
some advice that I want to
leave you with. And hopefully you take this advice and do something with it. I
'm going to say,
as you create content, think about see if you can write that content or create
that content for one
person. So maybe it's just invent an audience persona in your mind, right? Like
because it might help
rather than thinking about like, how can I reach as many people as target
audience as possible?
It's maybe just think of one imaginary or one real person, right? Like think of
a person in your target
audience who you respect. And how can you write for them? How can you reach
them? Because that alone
might elevate your thinking behind it. It might make you think twice about even
just playing
certain algorithmic games. Because if it's someone you admire, you might be
thinking like, oh,
I'll be kind of embarrassing if they saw me like getting too broy about my
hooks, right? So for
me a couple years ago, the person that I was writing for was Rand Fishkin. And
I say that and I'm
going to use this example very strategically in my exploitation, which is I am
an experienced
content marketer and marketing generalist. I am not the best. I am not the most
experienced. I am
not the expert, right? I have a lot of experience. I believe I have a unique
perspective, right? And
a lot of people can believe that about themselves. However, Rand Fishkin is
also an experienced
marketer, right? He is objectively a better content marketer than I am. So when
I say I'm writing
for him or when I say I was writing for him, it wasn't how can I write the most
informational,
like most comprehensive stuff and content marketing? It was no, it was how can
I write in such a way
that I am conveying my unique perspective on this area for which he doesn't
have my experience.
Right? I'm not going to write about SEO in that if I'm writing for Rand Fishkin
, I'm not writing
about here's how much of an SEO expert I am. It's more of like here's what I
did that actually worked
in this business that I was employed at. You know, here's what I did that
actually brought in
a thousand customers. Right? These are all things that come from my experience.
They're proven
to Rand Fishkin. They were interesting, right? Because he was like, oh, I haven
't heard this story yet.
I don't know how this works. I haven't done that specific thing. Right? And
then it also helped
me think about my values as an individual. My values and my hobbies, what's
interesting to me personally,
because then I also started sharing things that like I'm interested in. I
started sharing more of like
the recipes that I make at home for my family because I think I think it's fun
and it's nice and
these are things that I'm doing anyway. So going back to write for one person,
it's that. Right? What is
your version of that? This is not I'm going to be the best. I'm the most expert
. I have the thing
that's going to solve all your problems. It's how can I be the best version of
myself, the version
of myself that I would put forward when I meet somebody I admire and somebody
who's in my target
audience. I love that. It's great advice. I'm actually going to take that
advice because I feel like
that's something that I don't do as well. So fantastic. Mark, any final
thoughts before I wrap things
up? Nothing for my aunt. Very, very important conversation here today.
Folks listening, you really have to think through what Amanda was saying
because the future of how
you connect with your audience and then build a community is going to depend on
a lot of the things
we talked about here today. So it's not just you know about the social networks
and getting the
reach and all this other stuff. It's about creating a genuine connection with
someone because that's
one of the ultimate things when it comes down to you know the the success of a
product a brand.
It's the depthness of the connection and how much trust you can create. I call
it a chain of trust.
Amanda, like how many more links in that chain of trust can you establish over
time and that
connection. So thank you for your time. Very insightful. Yeah. No, thank you.
Thank you for having me.
Yeah. If you want to go find Amanda, you know check her out. She's on most
social platforms,
but LinkedIn, X, go check out SparkTour. We'll make sure to link everything in
the show notes as well.
But thank you again and we'll catch you on the next episode.
Thank you for joining us for this exclusive edition of GTM News Desk. If people
first content like
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until next time,
keep it people first everybody.