This is one of the weirder useful tools we just discovered: answerthepublic.com   Have you noticed that, when you search for something in Google, like "how to build a beehouse" or some such, you now get helpful snippets that answer that question, right up top? Wouldn't you love it if your website got that much traction? Well, it can.

What is AnswerThePublic.com?
It's something that a public relations consultancy came up with to generate questions on just about anything. It features an impatient-looking old coot who is waiting for you to put a keyword in the box. Go ahead, do it, and come right back. We'll tell you why it matters.

Pretty fancy, no? The graphic made up of questions is hard to look at, so there's a button to download the questions to a CSV file. How does it work? Looks like someone wrote a pretty cool program to scrape questions out of Google. But why?

For You -- Generating engaging content is, to say the least, a job. So is ranking high in a Google search. We'll take all the help we can get. Answering questions is a good way to affect both.
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For Them -- The folks at coveragebook.com wanted eyeballs on their product, and traffic to their website, so they gave us a brillliant example of content marketing. Not just "Ha! Made you look! marketing but truly useful content, presented in an engaging way.

So, the next time you ask yourself, "How can I rank in Google snippets?" you may start by answering questions on your website, questions generated by answerthepublic.com.

More marketing tools here.

Let's work on it together.

​Kim Phillips is an artist, marketer, writer, graphic designer and gardener living in Cowan, Tennessee. She works from her studio, Tiny Creative House.

© 2018 Kim Phillips | Tiny Creative House

We've all seen it, advertised several times a day: the big corporation telling us how great they are. Or, the mom-and-pop shop with the tagline like "Excellence For Over 20 Years." Or, the full page of photos of realtors who sold over $1 million last year. Who cares?

Make Me a Promise
Branding -- and all the communications that come from the brand -- is a promise. You, the seller, will give me, the buyer, something that matters to me. What matters to me? Something that makes my life just a teeny bit better, makes me feel good about myself, makes me faster, taller, stronger, sexier, richer. Something that brings a tear to my eye or makes me laugh out loud. Something that shows me that you get me.

Make Me Feel Something
Look at the brands below. What feeling does each one give? Happy? Serious? Industrial? Playful? Which one(s) could you imagine doing business with? The answer to that, of course, depends on who you are. Each of these companies has a different audience, with different wants and needs. 

Advertising That Drives Emotion
Chill bumps: this ad for Audi delivers them. Watching it, you think it's going to be just a sweet story about how girls can drive as well as guys. Give it a look.
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If ever a company wanted to let ladies know that "we get you," Audi did it right.

Your Brand's Promise
Right now, you may be thinking, "Oh, sure, with a marketing budget like Audi's, I can send a great message, too." Guess what? You're already sending a message; the question is, which one?

Look at your logo, your website, your social media. Does it look like it all came from the same place? What does it promise the person you want to reach? What is your relationship to that person? Is it current? More importantly, is it relevant?

Let's work on it together.