While not all businesses need to leverage the expertise of an SME, many brands can utilize their knowledge to full effect. With marketing, SMEs can help generate more insightful content that will resonate with customers far better than anything else out there. All too often, content just gets repurposed and repackaged, where it all remains surface-level. However, incorporating SME insights makes it easier for your company to dive deeper to deliver more meaningful marketing materials.
What Makes Someone an SME
There are two primary ways for someone to become an expert in a topic: research or experience. Ideally, a subject-matter expert will Whatsapp Database have both, giving them a well-rounded perspective on a specific field.
However, if you had to choose between one or the other, we believe that SMEs with experience are far more valuable than those who have just researched a topic. Because research doesn’t always provide a comprehensive understanding of something, experience tends to offer more knowledge overall.
For example, someone could research and learn everything there is to know about the stock market. They know all the various terms and processes that happen with trading, and they can even provide models for companies or individuals to use to pick good stocks.
Compare that person to someone who has been working in the stock exchange and trading every day for years. They’re on the ground and see what happens in real time from a personal perspective. They may not know all the terminology or the theories around the stock market, but they know how it works inside and out.
Now, which person would you trust to pick stocks on your behalf?
The same method applies to subject-matter experts. It’s not necessarily enough to know everything about a subject. Instead, it’s often better to know how that information applies to the subject in the real world. So, a high-quality SME is someone actively involved in their respective field and has learned as much about it through research and experience as possible.
The “actively involved” part is also crucial, although it depends on the topic or industry. It’s best to rely on someone up-to-date on current trends and practices. Even better is if they can predict which trends will pop up in the future to give your brand a competitive edge.
Benefits of Leveraging Subject-Matter Experts
If you’re going to post content about a particular subject, you need to make sure it’s accurate and factual. While the internet can be a great resource, not all the content surrounding a subject is correct. In some cases, pieces may be misleading, inaccurate, or downright false.
Thankfully, when you have an SME on your marketing team, you can have them Database USA analyze posts and articles about their subject. Then, they can point out and correct any mistakes before the piece gets published.