Your Content Can Be Valuable and Still Be Completely Irrelevant

Why does your best content get ignored?

You've put real thought into it. You know it’s good. But you post and then nothing. A few likes. No comments. No leads.

The explanation most founders give themselves: wrong time, wrong algorithm, not enough followers. 

The more common explanation: your content was valuable AND completely irrelevant to the person it reached. Both things can be true at the same time.

In this episode, I break down the three-layer language gap that explains why expert content sometime misses, and give you a practical framework to close it.

What is covered: 

• What the language gap actually is: the distance between how you understand a problem and how your audience experiences it
• Layer 1: The vocabulary gap: your language vs. their language (with real examples)
• Layer 2: The urgency gap: awareness vs. recognition vs. decision-stage content
• Layer 3: The stage gap: why most founder content is pitched three steps ahead of where the audience actually is
• The practical framework: how to close each layer starting with your next piece of content

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

I know that creating content and putting a lot of thought into it, making sure that it's of great value and designing it, posting it, putting so much time into it only to get nothing or at least almost nothing in return. No DMs, maybe few likes and comments, but basically no leads. This is a very frustrating experience for experts and founders. And I know that because I was there myself. And what was really frustrating for me the most was the reasons that were circulating online about this experience. It could be either the posting time or an algorithm change, or if you have a lower follower count, then it's a logical reason to have low engagement. I'm not going to debate whether these reasons are real or not because I really believe that before we jump into assumptions, we need to look at things that we can control and find out what we can do to fix this kind of gap that is happening from our effort to actually the results. This happens when we look inside, looking more closely to the content itself, to the messaging itself. Could there be another more accurate reason for low engagement? Now, through my line of work with my clients, we sometimes discover that the real explanation is actually much simpler than everything that is out there. But it's a little bit hard to hear or to accept. It could be that your content is valuable, but it is also completely irrelevant for your audience. Both things can be true at the same time. This is called a language gap. And this is what we're going to unpack today. Now I want to start by defining the language gap. It is basically the distance or the gap between how you understand your audience's problem and how your audience actually experiences that same problem and how do they describe it. If your understanding is different, or there's a distance between it and between how your audience describes and experience that problem, that happens in content. And if you're putting content out there that has that gap, that is content with language gap. As an expert, you have the expertise, you have the experience, you have the knowledge, and you have a solution that you offer to help your clients solve that challenge. You do that because you understand and you know the root cause of why your clients or your potential uh customer, your audience is experiencing that challenge. You know the root reason behind that experience. So you know what they are facing in terms of these challenges, you have a name for that pain point, you have a solution for that pain point, you could have a product, a framework for that, for that pain point. But what happens is that when you're creating content, you are speaking on the diagnosis, you're talking about the diagnosis, the core reason why there this challenge exists for your clients. The reason why your audience are having this pain point. But on the other hand, your audience are not living, or at least they're not communicating on that diagnosis level. They are living on the symptoms level of that pain point. They speak about the symptoms, they speak about a frustration, their experience and their challenge is felt differently because they are sensing the symptoms as a result of the core diagnosis of that problem. So when your content speaks on a diagnosis language to someone who only recognizes the symptoms language, your audience will simply scroll past your post because that content that you've created, it doesn't speak to them. They simply don't recognize themselves in the content that you've created. And it sounds simple, I know, but remember, not every problem in communication is complex. Sometimes there is actually a simple reason with a simple solution that is actually much more effective for you as an expert. So you're able to understand where exactly is the gap, knowing that you know that your your content is actually really, really valuable. So, my what I want to talk about today is talk about that language gap and help you know how to diagnose. If you're experiencing really low engagement when you're really putting out valuable content, it's important that you are able to diagnose what exactly is wrong with this with this content and where is the gap. And in communication, there are different types of language gaps. It could happen when you're creating content, especially if you are creating a lot of educational type of content. So let me take you through a couple of those gaps that are the most common when it comes to content creation, especially for educational type of content. The first one is the vocabulary gap. This is the most common one. It's a very um easy one to miss because it seems minor, but it's actually not. The vocabulary gap is when you are using certain terminologies that is extremely different from what your audience use. So you're using a vocabulary that describes the cause-reason of the pain point, which is the diagnosis, while your audience use emotional and experiential vocabulary for that same pain point, which is the symptom. Let me give you an example to make it really um visual and clear for you. And I'm gonna give you an example from my line of work, okay? If I put if I put out a piece of content about how brand and audience misalignment is the reason why marketing campaigns fail, but my audience's vocabulary on the same problem, on the same experience, the same pain point, they use vocabulary like my marketing isn't working. My content is not going to attract them. I'm gonna lose them when I put out that piece of content. The the words are accurate. When there is a misalignment between the brand and the audience, the marketing will not will not work. But for them, they see it differently because they're experiencing it from a different perspective, they look at it just in terms of the result. My marketing is not working. Their words is basically how they actually feel about the problem. But when my content uses a different language than what the audience is using, they cannot immediately recognize themselves in it, they cannot immediately recognize that I'm actually speaking to their problem. They see my expertise for sure, but they don't see themselves in my solution, in my content. And to be clear, the fix is not to dumb down your expertise. So unless it's very technical jargon, the point it's not to solve the vocabulary gap with dumbing down your expertise. It isn't. The best way to solve a vocabulary gap is to tell your client or to start your content from the audience's vocabulary, but you end it with your framework. So if you're writing an article or if you're filming a video or if you're doing a carousel, start with the symptom that they have named, start with what they have described as a problem, and then end the piece of content with the diagnosis that you know that they need to understand. End it with your framework, with your solution, with your product, and explain the reason why they are experiencing this challenge in your content, in the body of your content. That's how you don't sacrifice your vocabulary or you dumb down your expertise, but at the same time, you attract them by kind of showing them that you understand their experience and their um their pain point. You understand it as a start to your content in the beginning. That's how you do the content creation from the beginning to the end. That's the journey. The second type of language gap that I would like to also talk about is the urgency gap. Now, being relevant doesn't only happen when you fix the vocabulary gap. In this online space, relevance can also happen if your audience have reached to a point where their problem is urgent enough for them to actually do something about it, to take action on it. Because the truth of the matter is, most of your audience, they have a problem, they know they have a problem that you solve. But so many of them, they haven't felt the pain, the urgency hard enough for them to do something about it. They're aware of the gap, but it's not yet on fire. So, content that speaks to a ready buyer, someone who knows and is ready to look into solutions and take action, that type of content is going to speak to a very specific group of people. It's not everyone in your audience. And the reality of the online space is that your content needs to work at different urgency levels. It cannot work only on one particular level. There is awareness content, and this is for the person who suspects that they have a problem. They haven't really figured it out yet, they haven't really named that problem yet. There is a qualifying type of content or recognition content, and this is for the person who has named the problem, they know they have a problem. Now they're starting to look around for solutions and for support and better understanding of that problem. And of course, there is the converting type of content or the decision content, and this is for the person who knows, identified that problem, and they are ready to act on it. And to be really honest, most experts they create decision or converting type of content because it's really comfortable to speak to someone who is ready to buy or who understands the problem and ready to take an action. But the reality, again, on the online space is that a ready buyer, someone who's ready to take action, is a very small fraction of your total audience at any given moment. The larger opportunity is to make actually an unurgent problem feel urgent for someone who is not there yet at the decision making, because they don't see the problem as urgent. So it is a better opportunity to change that from an unurgent to an urgent problem because you know that it is actually something important for them to fix. So this is called in communication, the language when in the content, when there's an urgency gap, it is part of the language gap because it helps you to identify the type of content that you create the most and understand what kind of variety that you need to have in your content strategy. This is really important because your audience's journey, this buyer journey, it is very important for you to have very good knowledge on. Because there are different milestones in the buyer journey. When your content is being pitched to them on social media, it is being pitched to them at different times in their journey. So we all know that the buyer journey has different touch points, different milestones. They could be discovering you at the moment online, or they could be at a place where they've been following you for a while, but they still need a little bit of convincing and building that trust. So this urgency gap or this stage gap, where is your audience at what stage in their journey, this helps you when you know how to diagnose, if you have an urgency gap, it will help you figure out the type of content and the topics that you need in your content strategy. Because imagine this if you mostly create content about how to choose a solution. This is a decision stage content, it's conversion content. But let's say most of your audience is still in the awareness stage, they're still trying to understand, you know, about the problem and the reasons behind it and if there is, if there are any solutions out there. In that particular case, your content is basically two to three steps ahead of them. They can't follow it, they don't see themselves in it. Not because your audience are not, you know, that they're not smart, they can't recognize it, but because they haven't experienced those steps that would lead to the point that you are speaking to. They're two, three steps behind. So it's really important that you are able to diagnose what exactly in your content and in your messaging, where exactly are the gaps so that you are able to change and do the right tweaks to your content for it to perform better? Now, for the urgency gap, look at the last 10 pieces of content that you've posted out there. At what stage in each of those pieces of content have you pitched at? At what stage, if your audience were reading it, what stage would they be? Are they in the awareness, the decision, the consideration? If most of your content clusters in the decision stage, which is actually very, very common, there is your gap. The work is not to post more, but it's actually to post different types of content for different stages of that customer journey. But here's an important caveat, and I want to make sure that I mention it. Even if you have a very specific niche client in mind, so let's say you have someone really specific in my line of work. Let's say you work with a six-figure coaches who have been at least in business for two years in this particular market, okay, or in this particular industry. Even if your audience, your target audience is that specific and niche, your content should cater to the different stages. So even for a niche audience, there are stages in the buyer journey or in their in the audience's journey. There is an awareness, there is a consideration, and there is a decision types of milestones. And your content should cater to these different stages so that it is relevant even in your niche. Before I end, I really want to help you better recognize which gap you're experiencing in your content to start to help you to fix it and then for your content to start performing the way that you intended for it to perform or you wanted for it to perform. Again, for the vocabulary gap, when you write the next piece of content, just ask yourself, what would my client Google this problem? How would they describe this problem if they wanted to Google something about it? What would be the question? That is your opening line. Don't start with your framework, don't start with your methodology or product or the solution. Start with the symptom that they name. For the urgency gap or the stage gap, think about what could happen if your audience ignore this problem over a long period of time. What could be the worst thing that they would experience if they ignore that problem? Your content should show them the cost of ignoring that problem. The urgency is already there. Your job is basically to surface it clear enough for the person who has been sitting with the problem to finally feel the weight of them not addressing it and the consequences of them not addressing this. You can also look at a piece of content that has worked for you before, it performed well in the past that you've published, and look at which stage that piece of content was. If it was in a decision stage category, rewrite it. Rewrite the idea of that piece of content from the awareness stage or from the consideration stage. What would you say to someone who doesn't really understand that this is the problem that's gonna cause this? Because once you take a piece of content and you look at it and you redo it from another stage, it becomes a different post altogether. Because awareness content speaks to a larger portion of the audience than a decision type of content. So when you speak to a larger portion of the audience, you also get uh higher engagement because you're speaking to a larger group of people. In the end, it's important to know that valuable and irrelevant can happen at the same time. It's just basically a gap in translation. And what I try to do today is to help you better understand how to diagnose your content so that it can perform the way that you want it to perform. It can translate into DMs, it can translate into leads into your business. If you want to work more on relevance in your content and your personal brand, the tips that I shared with you today are part of the worksheets in the relevance pillar of my trust method framework. If you want to get your hands on all five worksheets of the trust method, I will leave a link in the show notes. And this is a free resource for you that can help you build trust, create a personal brand that leverages trust to have a positive impact on your business and your career. And I really hope that you share the results of your work. If you tried the tips in this episode, I really hope that you can share it with me. Please connect with me on LinkedIn or Instagram. I'd love to hear from you. As always, keep making waves. Bye for now.