Why original quotes from internal experts are crucial for building trust
Why internal experts?
When I talk about the Expertise Ecosystem, there are almost always a few misunderstandings. Several people thought that I would be collecting quotes from experts in the field, unrelated to the companies I’d be writing for. Others thought that I’d be collecting quotes from past customers to use for case studies.
Those kinds of databases are useful and certainly have a place in marketing. The question that always follows when I explain that I’m aiming to interview internal experts is: Why? Why would a marketing team want quotes from the people who work there?
There are quite a few reasons, but here are a few:
Complexity and trust
The organizations that are most likely to benefit from having a database of quotes from internal experts are those that do complex work. I’m interested in herbalism, and have found a deep distrust of pharmaceuticals in herbalist communities. The work that scientists and drug developers do requires years of training and deep expertise, but the general public doesn’t see that. What they see are slick marketing campaigns, and occasional scary news stories. The result among some groups of people is a deep lack of trust.
When the voices of the experts themselves are featured, especially when they are featured alongside voices of customers, it’s easier to build trust. People can see that Bob the Researcher isn’t an evil scientist carrying out the orders of the vast, money-hungry, deceptive corporation but that he’s a person who has dedicated years of his life to learning how to cure diseases and make life better for people.
Complex industries require a particularly difficult-to-achieve level of trust and people trust people. Including the voice of the experts who do the work is an efficient and effective way to build trust.
Originality
As a writer and a marketer, I’ve got a front-row seat to lots of conversations about what sounds like AI, how to “prove” something is written by humans, and the necessity of originality. And now, we have Anthropic inserting invisible watermarks to show content was processed (whatever that means) by AI.
An important point to keep in mind, though, is that AI writing is the way it is because it was trained using the writing of humans. It’s a pattern-recognition machine, and it recognizes the patterns of words that appear again and again. (This is how the invisible watermark thing works: it inserts words that don’t fit the pattern every so often—invisible to humans, obvious to pattern-recognizing machines.)
Originality, both of thought and expression, is the antidote to all of this. I’ve thought of about 100 different comparisons to describe how important originality is at this moment in time in B2B marketing, but I’m not sure it’s necessary. Everyone knows what it’s like to crave something different.
My dad tells a story about when he and my mom first married. She cooked an excellent meatloaf; he complimented it. She cooked it every night for weeks. (Not because of the compliment, but because it was the only thing she really knew how to cook.)
He complained; it hurt her feelings. They made up, and laughed about it. But she never cooked meatloaf again. AI is making meatloaf over and over. If you serve up a gorgeous ratatouille instead, it’s going to be appreciated.
Value
For years, I wrote content about data and how data is like the “Crown Jewels” of any organization. Data can, indeed, provide information about your customers, and that’s really important.
But, really, the most valuable asset in an organization is much more likely to be the people doing the work—especially in a complicated industry.
A healthcare network gains useful insights through the patient data it collects, but could the healthcare network exist without the clinicians and researchers and other staff members who work there?
By featuring the thoughts and opinions of the experts within your organization, you showcase your greatest strength.
The problem
It’s not simple to amplify the thoughts and opinions of your internal experts. Scheduling can be difficult. Approvals are another barrier. Keeping track of what was used, when, and where is a whole issue.
The Expertise Ecosystem is a framework that solves those problems. I’d love to show you how it works. Schedule a chat!