Content Marketing and, Oh Yeah, We’re Looking for Writers

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I promised a content marketer’s diary.

Now I can promise it’s about to get really, really good.

You might have noticed that our “project garden” went largely unwatered this last week. This was not without good reason.

Ghostwriter Dad has started doing some work with a remarkable marketing firm, keeping Dave and I crushingly busy and in eager anticipation. For now we’ve gotta keep the kitty rubbing it’s nose against the burlap of the bag, but we’re flying out to meet the team on Monday, so we’ll have tons more to tell you by this time next week.

After working with these awesome and endlessly energetic people for the last 10 days, it’s safe to say that we’re in for an amazing roller coaster ride.

We can’t wait to share.

I started Writer Dad this last week with “At Least She’ll Never Outgrow Me,” a melancholy reflection on a Saturday evening spent with my daughter. It was our third year going to the Valentine’s Ball, though this year was little like the Father Daughter Dance from the two years before.

The post wasn’t an attempt to bond with the audience (though that was a nice side benefit) so much as it was an honest reflection of the way I was feeling in the aftermath of the dance. I wrote it shortly after we returned home, and thought Writer Dad was a great place to post it, seeing as how the site is in constant need of content and it doesn’t write itself.

I followed the post with Mac ‘N Cheese, another entry from Syllable Soup, my children’s classic waiting for ink. Though I was too occupied to play in the comments on this post, I did get a lot of emails on this one.

Emails for Syllable Soup always make me happy, possibly more than any other content I write.

I enjoyed both of these comments posted on the site:

This has a Shel Silverstein feel to it ~ love it! I could totally see some cute little illustrations with it.

And

This one has the makings of a great children’s book. It needs some illustrations, and it needs to be sitting on my kids’ shelf. :)

I concluded the week at Writer Dad with a reflection on writing. Publishing thousands of words per week apparently means that I don’t have the mental faculties to possibly remember everything I’ve written. This selective amnesia is nothing I ever saw coming.

While gathering some of my previous material for a gift I’m planning to give to the readers of Writer Dad, I came face to face with the truth, then wrote about it in “Moments Captured on the Page.” This post was both an honest reflection and a teaser for the gift I’d planned to have ready this coming week, although it is looking as if I may have to push it to next week or even the week after.

Better late than sloppy!

The post garnered a rather long and touching email from a reader I’d never heard from before. That type of response is one of the reasons I keep Writer Dad flowing with as much content as I do. It seems as though there is a large, yet mostly silent audience who reach out every now and then to let me know I’ve touched them in some way.

What can I say, I’m a writer. I love to know my when my words have touched someone in some way. It’s like my friend Roberto smiling when he sees someone’s eyes roll back in their head as his morsels melt on the tips of their tongues.

Here is an excerpt from the email:

I’ve been following your blog for quite some time now.  You are the master of metaphors…love how your mind works…love how you love your family in words…Today I’ve quoted you in my personal quote book.  I don’t know exactly why this particular comment jumped off your page onto mine: “Written or not, our human moments are soft, and subject to fading memory as the sun will bleach the ink in a photograph.”

Fortunately, I still have quite a bit of content in the Writer Dad bank, so though David and I were occupied all week, I was able to schedule all three on Sunday afternoon.

David, however, has always opted to publish Blogger Dad posts live. Though his time was extremely scarce, I think this post on noisy neighbors practically wrote itself.

Collective Inkwell fell a post short of its scheduled three posts per week, but the two posts we did publish were banked ahead of time and in no way fell short in quality. Again, better late than sloppy.

We started Monday with the Beck Guide to Writing, then followed on Wednesday with a post about dealing with author rejection, a particularly poignant piece that I happen to personally like quite a lot.

The post had this little tidbit, among others:

Dr. Seuss, Theodor Seuss Geisel, who I consider to be the finest children’s author ever, had his first book, “And to Think I Saw it on Mulberry Street” rejected 27 times before finally being deemed worthy for ink. An excerpt from just one of his many rejection letters reads, “This is too different from other juveniles on the market to warrant its selling.”

The bad news…

Our workload kept us from a few things this week.

Production paused at Children Write the Future.

We were unable to post anything at Things My Child Says.

Available Darkness lay dormant for the second week in a row (thank you to everyone who emailed asking what was going on. We appreciate your concern and promise that we’ll return to our normal schedule shortly. We are in the midst of a transition).

Potty Training Power had a post published, but it was something pulled from the bank and only done as a half an afterthought.

We mostly ignored both the Creative Copy Challenge #17 and Creative Copy Challenge #18, though the community seemed to do just fine without us since there were more than 200 comments between them.

Penny to a Million, saw some modest gains in it’s second week of release, which is terrific really, considering there were no tweets, posts or promotional activity of any kind. In fact, I was too occupied to even respond to any of the requests that “Kelly” received asking for guest posts or interviews.

This week promises to be every bit as crazy as the last. However, we will soon return to balance and when we do we’ll have a lot to share. There are some unbelievable projects on the horizon and Dave and I are thrilled to be a part of the team that will bring them to fruition.

As soon as we have a firm understanding of what we can and can’t discuss under the terms of our non-disclosure, we will be back to regale you with some awesome stories.

Though I’m not sure exactly what those stories will be, I’m fairly confident that they will in some way include Hollywood Royalty, Regis and Kelly, and the Travelocity of Health Care (of all things).

Oh, and we’ll probably be looking to hire a writer or two really soon, so please stay tuned for that.

See you next time.