NV#4 | Swearing. Catholic Nuns. Hashtags.

Adding personality to content, early entrepreneurial lessons, AI prompting, LinkedIn growth & marketing and more.

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New Vertical
May 21, 2024

It’s a packed newsletter this time around. Lots of contributed content to feast your eyes on, plus - a few changes!

Thank you to everyone who sent us feedback and suggestions for the newsletter.

We were really happy to discuss how the content is formatted and how we can best deliver the strategies, tips and tricks in a more meaningful way for our readers. After all, New Vertical is 100% community-led, and we’re only building what our readers want.

With this in mind, we’re changing a few things in NV!

Condensed content: We will now feature a smaller number of sections in the newsletter to keep things brief and punchy. Nobody wants to read War & Peace with their coffee.

Better table of contents: To keep things brief, we’ll just be including the meat of the general newsletter content, and will only name the featured sections such as Share Value, 5 Minute Tactics etc.

More editions: We’re aiming for 2 or more editions per month. With the new format, this should be much easier and more digestible for our readers.

We hope these changes improve New Vertical in the way you want, and if you have any further suggestions, you can find out how to get in touch at the end of each edition!

Stay Vertical!

Table of Contents

Featured Editorial by Heidi and James - Ripples Wellbeing

New Me! How many times have we seen or heard that recently? The corny cliché that we often latch onto. But… are we being authentic?

Featured Interview: Craig Dean - BrandIn Marketing

If you follow me or Dan Trindade on LinkedIn, you’ll often see us reposting or commenting Craig’s content, because it’s always helpful stuff. If you have a brand on LinkedIn and you want reach, exposure and increased revenue, then Craig’s advice will be incredibly good value for you (considering he gives a lot of his best stuff away for free!).

Featured Strategy: TripAdvisor Marketing

Sachin Parmar is the founder of Graphic Kitchen, a digital agency specializing in enhancing online visibility for hospitality businesses, driving engagement and revenue. This is his TripAdvisor strategy that, when deployed correctly, quickly elevates businesses in search rankings, with previous case studies experiencing up to a 20% revenue increase within six months.

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Shit

It struck me as odd that I had been pulling punches and not creating content the way I normally do. I had lost my edge a little, and “softened”. That doesn’t just consist of using a swear word either.

I wasn’t sure how or why this had happened, but felt I needed to address it. I saw a couple of pieces by content creators that I follow (because of similarities to my own writing style) on LinkedIn and compared it to my own - and it was enlightening to say the least.

In the last newsletters and LinkedIn posts, I had strayed a little from my normal style and tone. To ensure I brought my content back up to my own standards, I tested myself and published an article about lead gen on LinkedIn.

Whilst writing this article, I managed to get back into my old rhythm, with a few hints of humor, and a healthy dose of straightforward information. The change was simple: I started writing like I was having a conversation with someone I like.

The subtle art of not giving a shit when you’re writing posts on your website, LinkedIn or any other social platform is actually a good marketing strategy. It positions you with personality, and drives away anyone who you wouldn’t align with in real life. It also ensures you get the right kind of customer contacting you.

It’s not just about using rude words (yes, I know, this article has three swear words in it 😱), but they sometimes help. As humans, we swear and curse all day long, or use substitutions like “frick” or “fudge” to get our point across.

A study by Preply found the following: -

“We wanted to know which U.S. cities use the foulest language, so we surveyed 1,500 residents of the 30 largest metropolitan areas on their swearing habits.”
- Preply

  • The average respondent swears 21 times per day.

  • The U.S. city that swears the most frequently is Columbus, Ohio, at 36 times per day.

  • The average age Americans start using swear words is 11.

  • “Taboo” situations Americans are most likely to swear in include work (69%), in front of strangers (67%), and at the dinner table (63%).

  • Over half of Americans use swear word substitutions — favorites include “fudge,” “shoot” and “frick.”

Wheras in the UK, “A typical Brit uses foul language around ten times a day. UK men swear more often (12 times per day) than women (8 times per day). The British are much more likely to swear at home (40.50%) than when out with friends (15.99%). UK residents swear at themselves more than anyone else.”

There’s some meaningful data in here somewhere, I’m sure of it. I think the point is - swearing isn’t as taboo as you might think.

Here’s some examples of people who think the same way: -

And the inimitable Alice Rowan - whose bio tells you exactly what you’re going to get: -

Here’s an advert for a copywriter position at Offended, a UK Manchester-based marketing company who are well known for not taking the road most travelled: -

This article isn’t just about swearing, though.

I’m just trying to say add personality to your marketing and content, and see what happens. I would wager that you will begin to attract the kind of customer you want to work with for years.

Mainstream content has its place, don’t get me wrong. Not all brands or companies need an idea out of left field to make them pop, or to make them fresh. A manufacturer who makes high tensile cables for trains is unlikely to paint a hippo pink and march it around their town to get new business. They are also unlikely to put out content that is a break from the norm, and will probably need to put some important specifications in there to hit their ICP.

But… for those of you who are lucky enough to have customers and clients that have personality, it might be worth injecting some of it into your copy and marketing.

Try it, you might like it.

In the very least, you’ll have fun.

If you are looking for SEO copy, content or a marketing campaign that is a real break from the norm, then I can heartily recommend the following people: -

A Catholic Nun Helped Me Become an Entrepreneur

I have a lot to thank my Roman Catholic upbringing for. It wasn’t until I was old enough that I could see this, but it’s true.

I was an entrepreneur from an early age, and when I wasn’t selling my wares to my classmates, I was enduring a punishment. I sold chocolate, lunch tickets to greedy kids, soccer trading cards, computer games and more. This sort of capitalist behavior was not looked on favorably, apparently. The most popular punishment among primary schools in the eighties in England - writing lines. Writing hundreds of lines of the same sentence during your lunch break whilst your friends mocked you, playing soccer in the sunshine.

Another punishment favored by our headmistress - a fearsome four-foot tall nun - was something we referred to as “The Crucifix”. This involved standing with your arms out in a T-pose, with bibles placed on your hands. It felt like fifty, but in reality, might have been two or three on each hand.

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