The Secret Sauce to Creating Content that Sizzles

Jim James (00:00)
Now, does your content sizzle? Does it get people on your website and across your social media channels excited to talk to you? I mean, do they wanna come and reach out to you? Because if you are struggling to make content exciting enough, and you're maybe dabbling with AI to make it a little bit more exciting, but it's falling a bit flat, then my guest today is gonna be someone that you wanna listen to. Her name is Wendy Lieber, and she's the co-founder and CEO of a company

Wendy Lieber (00:03)
Hehehe

Jim James (00:29)
called ContentBacon. She's actually joining us from Florida where they've got some storms. We're hoping she'll be able to stay with us the whole way through. Wendy, welcome to the show.

Wendy Lieber (00:39)
Thank you, Jim. Pleasure to be here.

Jim James (00:41)
Well, it's a pleasure to have you. I know that you've got some challenges in Florida now with the weather. So thank you for making the effort to dial in. And we're going to talk about content because there's the old saying content is king and context is queen. What about AI and how is ContentBacon, your agency, helping clients, entrepreneurs and business owners to, to create content that really sizzles

and gets people interested in their brands.

Wendy Lieber (01:12)
Yeah, it's a great question. I think one of the first things is this word content, right? A lot of people, they don't even really know what that is because it's all encompassing. And so, we help companies tell their story through different types of mediums that their audience is using. content is just all the different ways we communicate with

our audiences, both internal and external. And how do you make it sizzle? How do you make it have an impact? Well, it starts with you have to have a good story and a story that's constantly evolving and a story that has depth and breadth to it. It's not like a one and done, here's our story, let's tell it the same way 50 different times. It's an evolving thing and

the way to have it evolve and get better is to actually do it because otherwise you are just saying the same thing and there's nothing better than putting it out there to see what resonates, what doesn't, and even just getting aligned internally. How do we talk about ourselves in a way that's interesting and

Jim James (02:28)
Wendy, later on, we're going to talk about some of the mistakes that you've made as a CEO and leader of a company when it comes to content. But first of all, we're going to talk about how you're doing it right. You've talked about content as being a story. And interestingly enough, you said that the content or the story needs to change. How does an entrepreneur, if you like, retain consistency, which is essential for brand building and reassurance, with evolving

the story. How do you reconcile that dynamic, Wendy?



Wendy Lieber (03:02)
I think it's being willing to go a layer deeper than others are willing to go and have a point of view, have a stance, almost be willing to make mistakes and say things that might be provocative. So it's the opposite of playing it safe, right, which so many companies and brands want to do because, God forbid, we stir the pot and we live in a culture right now that definitely doesn't reward.

But I think in order to stand out and get noticed, you have to have some passion behind you. You gotta have a point of view. And so I think that's how you do it, is be willing to say what others aren't willing to say, be willing to show your audience, a little bit behind the scenes. So it's not just like keeping it safe, keeping guarded. It's very similar to having a relationship with someone, right? It's like, if you don't go deep.

The relationship doesn't go deep.

Jim James (04:01)
And I guess, Wendy, if you see it in the context of having a relationship, if you're with your children or your parents, your family, your friends, you have some consistent values, don't you? Those don't change honesty, integrity, and so on, humor. But how you interpret the situations may change. Wendy, how does an entrepreneur not look as though they're being opportunistic? Because it's quite easy then to jump on something, AI is a good example, where people have

Wendy Lieber (04:13)
100%.

Jim James (04:31)
but doesn't have a lot of depth to it. How do you help people to not look as though they're just kind of paper thin on taking positions?

Wendy Lieber (04:42)
Yeah, I mean, don't be opportunistic. Don't be paper thin. You know, it is like, don't just jump on bandwagons. I mean, I'm seeing it left and right, and I can get really riled up about it because there's so many companies out there, they're experts in AI, and they know how to do all these things, and it's like, bullshit, there are no experts right now. You know, like, we're all figuring it out. So I think, you know, one,

don't do it, like be authentic. And as an audience, don't reward those companies, like don't jump on those bandwagons and reward them. So I think, you know, it's having that discernment and that feeling of like, oh, I'm missing out. So let me, you know, everyone's talking about it. So let me do this. I mean, it's like, you know, just think of Bitcoin and not that AI is that, I think AI is here to stay and it's a great tool, but only

to the degree that it serves us. You know, I always say, AI serves us, we don't serve

Jim James (05:46)
Yeah, and I think that's a really good way of looking at the tool and the technology, but it is that within ContentBacon, Wendy, you have multiple content formats. Can you just, you know, that you deliver for clients, can you just tell us the approach, like what comes first? What's most important? You know, is it important for a client or an entrepreneur to have content across all formats, audio, video, text,

et cetera? 

How do you help people to navigate the volume of content they need to create and decide on priorities?

Wendy Lieber (06:22)
Yeah, I mean, it's really that, helping them decide on priorities. We start with strategy first, which is really defining the set of problems that we're being hired to solve and determining a very focused way to solve those. So to your point, it's not let's do everything. Let's figure out the key things we're trying to solve and then put together

a very strategic approach to solve those particular issues or to capture those opportunities. So that's from a content strategy perspective where we start and then determining the formats, we'd rather do less, way better, more depth, more quality than try to be on everything and just like, to use your word, be paper thin. That's not to say that over time

utilizing multiple formats is certainly, you know, there's lots of tools that we can use in our toolbox. Where it makes sense, we want to use as many as possible because people do consume differently. Some people love visual, some people love the written word. Depending on where you're at, you may like all of them. But if you're, you know, on the subway, you know, you may want to read versus, you know, listen to a video. So just factoring all that in and,

you know, adding on versus trying to do it all at once.

Jim James (07:49)
So from reading that, then what you're saying is also about the customer journey as well, isn't it? Where they're going to access the content. Wendy, have you got a case study at the ContentBacon where you can just walk us through something that you've done that'll give an indication of what does work for a company? Maybe you can tell us what kind of company it was because I understand the different industries maybe require different kind of content and different kind of distribution.

Wendy Lieber (08:17)
Yeah, so we work with a lot of technology companies, one in particular that we've been working with for a couple years. So really getting to know their story, they've expanded rapidly and initially their focus was on new, generating awareness. And we certainly had a great

success in doing that for them, but what we realized is that they were neglecting the leads that they had. So they had developed a very robust database and their CRM, but we weren't working on that for them. So we did some discovery with them on goals for the year and where some of their pain points were, and it was like, yeah, we're just not converting leads. So we really went to town on

finding the gold in their CRM and really nurturing those leads and providing content that helped those leads determine like, hey, we're just here for the information. We're not going to do business versus the ones that were looking for that more in-depth information which then queued up the sales team to be a little bit more

So unengaged contacts in their CRM and re-engage them because we were really dripping on them way more, I hate that term by the way, I can't believe I just used it, emailing them more pertinent information. So re-engaging them and then really looking at kind of that middle of the funnel, middle of the flywheel and giving them more in-depth information that had them ready to take the next decision.

Jim James (09:56)
Hehehe

Wendy Lieber (10:14)
Able to reinvigorate their database and deliver a more steady stream of ready contacts for their sales team.

Jim James (10:23)
That's really interesting that actually there's a lot of gold in the CRM that most people have got. There's a hallmark, Wendy, of that content that you can use to engage people in the middle of the funnel and move them to the, would it be the bottom of the funnel, I guess, where they fall out the funnel into the customer database. Is there a hallmark of that content? Does it have music? Does it have a short call to action? Does it have a picture of



somebody or something, is there a hallmark that people can think about or is there some other determinant?

Wendy Lieber (10:58)
It's not really one thing, you know, because people need multiple touch points. It's, in some instances, it's meatier content. It's very resource-driven content. It's really, again, in this particular instance, the target audience was a more sophisticated buyer on the other end. So having meaty content that really had

a lot of technological expertise and went deeper. So for this particular customer, it was more of that. It was identifying some of the key issues that this audience was having and going deep and telling them how to solve it. And so that was really the hallmark for this particular customer. It may be different, it may be shorter, wittier, funnier

type content depending on the audience. And so I think that's a really important thing to uncover is what's important to your audience, not what you think important. Like what are they dealing with? I mean, I like to really remind my entire team all the time that the person on the other end that we're talking to, in many instances, they have a real problem that they need to solve. And like that's what we're interested in is how can we help you solve it? And so...

It's really important. It's not just creating content for the sake of content. It's really how is what we're doing truly adding value, truly helping solve a problem so that we leave the other person on the other end better than we found

Jim James (12:45)
Yeah. And I think that's a wonderful point, Wendy, that almost in this day and age where we're not seeing people in certain circumstances, you'd have had a conversation with a customer that would have covered off information that they still needed after they've had the brochure. And sometimes maybe the content's not getting to the next level of complexities, you say, answering the detailed questions about, for example, legacy implementation, for example, if it's in tech. Wendy, is there a

that's being generated by AI. We're going to have one question about AI, because this is your area. Is there content being generated by AI that you think is better than content generated by humans? What's your view on that?

Wendy Lieber (13:27)
Yeah, I think AI is a great tool. I think where we have found a lot of use for it is, and some of the brainstorming aspects of the project, it's like an assistant, right? It kind of helps get the juices flowing. We've also found that we have, every single one of our customers has a style guide, and do's and don'ts, right? We have

certain customers who there's just certain words that they don't want to use, you know, that might be part of their industry, but they've made, you know, like, for us, like, we use the word customer, not client. So if we were working with a content company that kept putting the word client, like, you know, eventually we would fire them because it's like, listen, you know, like, hear what we're saying. So we've used AI from like an editor standpoint on those type of things that,

Yes, a human should be able to find that, but humans make mistakes. So where there's very specific right and wrong, black and white, we found AI to be a great tool to help us find those versus always relying on the human. And so it's things like that we're constantly uncovering where AI can do a better job because it can take direction for the most part do it correctly,

you know, 100% of the time, which I can't, but you know.

Jim James (14:56)
Yeah, well,

I guess an AI doesn't lose concentration, right? It might hallucinate sometimes, but maybe that's it. So Wendy, which tool are you using for that checking, for example, against brand guidelines that's useful?

Wendy Lieber (15:02)
There you go.

Yeah, our team has created quite a few. We use quite a few. You know, we've created our own custom GPTs. We've used, honestly, I don't even know all the software we're using because our team is constantly testing and creating new ones. So if someone is more interested in that, reach out to me and I'll find out exactly what we're using because we are constantly testing and trying to find the best of the best. And we're also developing some of our own stuff.

Jim James (15:30)
Yeah.

But I think, yeah, and I think one of my guests earlier on runs a kind of brand watch, for example, which is tracking across all the brand creators for a company to make sure that they're on message. So, but interesting to say using ChatGPT and creating custom ChatGPTs as well, Wendy. So I think as you say, we're all innovating, no one's quite at the other side yet. Wendy, you've had ContentBacon and you

Wendy Lieber (15:57)
Yes.

Jim James (16:05)
co-founded this business, you're in Florida, and you're serving clients certainly all over America, I think also all over the world. As an entrepreneur, how have you been getting ContentBacon notice? Because you know, you do things for clients, but love to hear whether you're, can I say eating your own bacon? Because... Ha ha ha.

Wendy Lieber (16:25)
Yeah. Yes. I mean, not as consistently as we would like. But yes, we do. We do eat our own bacon. So we do quite a few things. I mean, we do the basics, right? So there is kind of like this mastering the basics that I'm a big proponent of, and that's creating consistent content in the form of articles, social media, email content,

you know, on a consistent basis. So it's like, you know, the foundational content that every company needs to look alive, stay relevant. So we absolutely do that. We, we've also used, you know, webinars, speaking engagement, where really, our, our focus is education, you know, we have always been big believers that we want to give, you know, a lot of information we, you know, we want to be an educational resource. We, we truly want to help

companies understand how to use content to grow. And so that's really been an effective strategy. It's not been a manipulative strategy. It's truly been how we feel. So doing webinars, doing speaking engagements has always been an important part of our strategy. Yep, see our blogs. So again, the give before you get, we've got tremendous resources

on our website for any company that wants to do it yourself. We're big believers that an educated customer is the best customer. So we certainly, we provide that information.

Jim James (18:07)
Wendy, I have to ask you because it's all, you know, branded pink and you've got the pig. I would have to ask you why the ContentBacon as a name.

Wendy Lieber (18:16)
Hehehe

Yes, so first we're going through a rebranding. So stay tuned. We have like our next level branding that we're gonna be launching soon that I'm super excited about. But ContentBacon, which is a great brand. It's one of probably the best decisions my partner and I made. We just went through a branding exercise. We came up with a lot of different names and listen, bacon makes everything better and you can put bacon in almost anything and it's better as a result. It's sizzling,

you know, from our perspective, it made perfect sense. And it is a memorable name that tells a micro story. So it's got the elements of a good brand. So yeah, that's how we came up with it. And we have a lot of fun with that. Maybe we've gone too far, had too much fun with it. So when you see the new branding, you'll see, you know, maybe an elevated, you know, look and feel, which again, you know, all companies, I think, it's, you know, constantly evolving

is super

Jim James (19:23)
Yeah, but I love that you've taken a position, as you say, with the brand in the same way you're suggesting people should take a position with their content. So I think that's really inspirational. I want to ask you that because it stands out, right? It really does. Wendy, as an entrepreneur, you've had Content Baker now for a number of years, it's successful, but would there be something that you could share that maybe hasn't gone quite as planned?

A mistake maybe that you made? And I don't mean to embarrass you in any way, but...

Wendy Lieber (19:48)
Sure.

Jim James (19:52)
Always useful to hear what we shouldn't try at home.

Wendy Lieber (19:55)
Yeah, where do I start? So I think one of the mistakes, missteps I made recently was as we grew and as our team grew, and I really developed my leadership team, and to the most part, really wanted my leadership team to kind of have the reins, I made a decision to step back from our

storytelling, if you will, and being out there and being the voice to really let ContentBacon be the brand and be at the forefront and sounded good in theory, right? You know, not to be so attached. But what I found was that, you know, I am the co-founder, I am the CEO, the vision of ContentBacon, you know, was my, is my responsibility. And so not being

at least one of the voices out there talking, sharing, was a real misstep for not only the world, our audience, but also even internally. Because what I say to externally, my team hears and that all works with our culture. So it was really, I saw the impact, kind of the dilution of the brand, it not being

as interesting and innovative. And so more recently, as I've stepped back into the forefront and started creating more content and started sharing our story, I've seen the impact again, both internally and externally. So it's just a lesson. I don't know that I could have learned it any other way than actually making the mistake. So I'm grateful for the lesson, but I can at least share it because other entrepreneurs that maybe

Jim James (21:43)
Yeah.

Wendy Lieber (21:48)
aren't the forefront of their brand and maybe aren't spending the time sharing, it could be and probably is a missed opportunity to have that leadership position and really be at the forefront because it's humans, right? At the end of the day, we're humans connecting with humans and if your brand doesn't have that human voice, that human connection, I think you're missing a big opportunity.

Jim James (22:16)
I think it's a wonderful point. And thanks for the honesty there. And I think that, you know, we all, me included, go through some fatigue, right? I certainly had this with one of my companies in the, you know, after about 10 years, you just sort of feel a little bit of fatigue and rather walking away, we need to find a way to recharge and then come back in, which is plainly what you've done. Wendy, you are plainly charged and coming back in and running ContentBacon.

If there's a tip, you know, you remember also the Entrepreneurs Network, the Global EO, and that's a wonderful, a wonderful group. And I was involved in that in Beijing and starting that chapter there with Rich Robinson. So you've got a huge amount of experience and you must be successful to be in that chapter. So what would be a tip that you'd give to my fellow Unnoticed Entrepreneurs?

Wendy Lieber (22:51)
Yeah.

Yeah, I think it's never stop telling your story and never stop evolving your story. And being passionate and having a burning desire for what you're up to. And again, that may wane at times. And so figuring out a way to tap back into that. And for me, one of the ways was being the voice again, starting to create my own content, starting to think about what's interesting, what do people

You know, want to hear about what, what am I passionate about? You know, why do I have this company still? What, what is next? And so tying all that together has really like reinvigorated me. We've created new offerings as a result. And that's where, you know, my passion is, and then that overflows into my team. So I really do believe, you know, storytelling, telling your story, figuring out what your story is, refreshing your story, evolving your story.

All of those things go hand in hand to build a company that wins. And, you know, I'm all about winning. I'm all about attracting, you know, winning team members, winning companies. And I think it starts with, you know, you winning and what does it look like to win and just making sure that you're able to tap into the why and that all, you know, bleeds into your story. So never stop telling your story when you feel stuck.

That's a really good indicator that you need to go

Jim James (24:39)
Wendy, Wendy Lieber, well, if we want to go deeper into what you're also learning, how you learn, is there a podcast or a book that you've used on that journey? As you say, you've dropped out of the business, come back in, recharged, leading that. So any particular book or podcast that you've been reading that's given you some inspiration or some guidance or reassurance?



Wendy Lieber (25:00)
Yes, I am obsessed with Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara So it's a book, you can listen to it on audio. It's amazing. And it's really about Will Gadar owned 11 Madison Park, which was one of the top, the top restaurant in the world. And this book is really all about

how to provide unreasonable hospitality, service to others. And I am so passionate about that. And this book, like to me, I was just reading it, I would get too excited. I would have to stop because I wanted to implement so many of the things. I made my whole team read it. But to me, the reason why is it's really about serving your guests, serving your customers,

providing something that's out of the ordinary. And I think in this day and age where we're trying to automate everything or use AI for everything or hide behind email and technology for everything, the human experience, the human connection, it's why we're alive. It's where the magic is. And so I just believe that the more service is part of our businesses and really serving, which means you have to really listen,

really be curious, and empower your team to provide that service and go the extra mile. I'm obsessed with it. So I guarantee if you read this book or listen to it, you'll be thanking me because it's amazing.

Jim James (26:44)
So it's called

Unreasonable Hospitality, is there a... Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara. Wendy Lieber, if people want to find, Will Goudar, sorry, if people want to find out more about your unreasonably good content, which is sizzling, ContentBacon how can they do that?

Wendy Lieber (26:45)
and yes.

Well, good-bye.

Yes, it is. Yeah, so you can email me, Wendy, with the Y, old school Wendy@ContentBacon.com. You can go on LinkedIn. You can go to our website. Yeah, I'd love to hear from you. I love having conversations with other business owners, entrepreneurs, and I'd really love to hear from you. So those are some of the ways that you can reach me.

Jim James (27:28)
Great, and on contentbacon.com, there's also a website grader. So you can also get your website checked, which I shall be doing to get mine done. Wendy Lieber, thanks for braving the Florida storms and joining me on the UnNoticed Entrepreneur today.

Wendy Lieber (27:34)
Yes, yes.

No, crazy. Thank you, Jim.

Jim James (27:46)
Well, it's been a pleasure. So Wendy, an impassioned conversation, really about the benefit really of staying human and staying involved in your business. And in this day of AI, what I love as well about Wendy's approach is that it's, actually she can't even remember the AI she's using because it's actually not the most important part of her business, which is great because it's about the human touch and about the passion and the leadership and about the innovation and ultimately about the customer service. And that's something that

AI will never understand because it doesn't have a heart and a soul, but you and I do. Thank you to Wendy for joining us on today's episode of The Unnoticed Entrepreneur. Hope you've enjoyed it. If you have, please do review it and share it with a fellow unnoticed entrepreneur because we don't want to leave anyone behind on this journey. And until we meet again, I just encourage you to keep on communicating.