8 Checklists to Help Your Buyers Eliminate Risk, Doubt, and Costly Mistakes

Deb Monfette

Do you use checklists in your toolbox of content to connect with your audience and accelerate your marketing? 
Let’s face it. Checklists can be your virtual assistants and best friends. They can save you time while you become organized and free up more avenues for creativity. This article shares 8 types of checklists to help your buyers eliminate risk, doubt, and costly mistakes.

A checklist is a popular tool to aid people in successfully getting things done without relying on memory alone. But checklists are also used to create a system that helps people eliminate risk, doubt, and costly mistakes. They are considered to be high attention-grabbing content.  

Who Uses Checklists and Why?

There are checklists for surgery, time management, pilots, sailors, the ER, uncluttering your life, simple solutions, organization, financial planning, library building design, KPI’s, camping, system engineering, wardrobe checklists, and even apps, sticky notes, and planners​.

As of today, there are about 621,000,000 search results on Google for the keyword checklist. People from all walks of life and industries use checklists. But it’s more than that. Humans have an innate need to know and discover things. A checklist can streamline the "need to know" information.

Many people and businesses want to grow, but need a safety net to minimize risk. A well-tested list gives you the ability to discover and apply the tips you learn correctly, consistently, and repeatedly. Using a checklist is a proven way to complete a process without making mistakes or forgetting details along the way. And move people to take action.

Some people call it a checklist, others a blueprint, and still others a cheat sheet, a handbook, or a simple recipe. Regardless of what you call it, they can help you complete a series of tasks to get the job done effectively, quicker, and with greater success.

Sharing a useful and accurate checklist can help your audience to eliminate costly errors and make their lives a little easier. It's another valuable way to build credibility and trust with them. And it's a tool they can use repeatedly.

Checklists are also a handy tool for your content marketing. They enable you to repurpose and introduce strategic content, like white papers, in a visually appealing way. More on repurposing later in the article.

3 Ways to be Strategic

For best results, decide on your target audience. Research what they need or what interests them. Then pick a strategy to focus your checklist on. Here are three ideas for picking a strategy.

3 Strategy Ideas:

1. Process: Design a process that is easy to follow. Make sure it's repeatable and creates a result your target audience wants. Another tip is to make it easier to recall by designing a visual with graphics and color. People remember visuals more than text alone. 
   
   
2. Pattern: Discover patterns of successes, mistakes, or failures people are encountering. Then take that list and create a checklist of "To Do" or "Don’t Do" tips. Once again, add graphics to make it visually engaging.
   
   
3. Repurpose: Plan your long-form content, such as a white paper, to include a list of useful tips, processes, or patterns. Create a checklist of these tips which can be used to promote the white paper for more detailed information.
   
   Or, take your existing content such as white papers, reports, or training materials and look for tips, processes, and patterns. Extract those ideas and repurpose them into a checklist. Then share it to capture interest and curiosity. Remember to link it to your white paper as a call to action.

A Quick Review

So, you’ve done your research on your audience and your strategy is in place. Now it’s time to use your expertise and create a list of valuable tips, processes, or patterns that your readers need to know.

A checklist can produce a variety of results. Keep these in mind when defining your list:

• Inspire a need, curiosity, or a desire.
• Melt away the mental stress of getting things done and calm the mind.
• Erase fear, uncertainty, and doubt.
• Eliminate errors by guiding you to check off the small stuff. 
• Provide peace of mind by freeing up their brain for bigger tasks.
• Enable the ability to learn new things.
• Take a complex process and make it easier to apply.

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In all cases, a checklist should inspire your audience to take action. 

Next, pick a strategy and build out your checklist using one of the following types of checklists.

8 Types of Checklists

1. The Uncertainty List: Let’s say your audience is having challenges and they are uncertain about how to solve them. Help them identify areas that are commonly missed with a “what to do” or “what to check” list. It inspires them to take proven action and to turn their uncertainty into confidence to solve their challenge and move ahead.

Examples:

Checklist for Success: A Pilot’s Guide to a Successful Airline Interview, by Cheryl A. Cage

Moving For Busy Women: How to Get From Overwhelmed to Organized in 5 Simple Steps, by Sheila Lindsay Martin

2. The Need To Know List: People “need to know” and understand things. It’s an innate cognitive need. Create lists to share "need to know" ideas. Spark the imagination and discover possibilities they haven’t thought about. The idea of the “unknown” and “missing out” can spark your audience’s internal curiosity and their need to know something.

The Best Damn Web Marketing Checklist PERIOD!, by Stoney deGeyter

What CEOs Need To Know About Design, by Audrey Crane

3. The To-Do List: Take your mind off of remembering everyday tasks. This list eliminates stress and builds confidence in getting things done. On the other hand, it can enhance your thinking throughout the day on how to complete things on your list.

​Examples:

The Awesome Blog Checklist – Step-by-Step Guide to Creating a Successful Blog, by Robert Ronson

Do It! Marketing: 77 Instant-Action Ideas to Boost Sales, Maximize Profits, and Crush Your Competition, by David Newman

4. The What NOT To-Do List: Take the opposite approach and list things you shouldn’t be doing. This tugs on a person’s uncertainty strings and makes them curious. “Am I doing something I shouldn’t be doing?"

​Examples:

The 106 Common Mistakes Homeowners Make (and How to Avoid Them), by Gary W. Eldred

The Decision Checklist: A Practical Guide to Avoiding Problems, by Sam Kyle

5. The Time Savings List: People are swamped as they multitask from their job to their personal life. Saving time on tasks enables people to concentrate on more important things.

Simply Clean: The Proven Method for Keeping Your Home Organized, Clean, and Beautiful in Just 10 Minutes a Day, by Becky Rapinchuk

It's Not All About "Me": The Top Ten Techniques for Building Quick Rapport with Anyone, by Robin Dreeke

6. The Insider's Secrets List:​ ​People love feeling important, being one of a select few, and getting tips and advice from successful experts, also known as insiders, in an industry. Create secret lists and tips that are exclusive to your audience, right from the experts, and that most people don’t know about.

Examples: 

10 Insider Secrets to Grow Your Twitter Account Fast, by Julia Doherty, Green Umbrella – A Webinar

Triathalon Insider Secrets: Tips From the Pros to Help You Shave Time Off Your Next Triathalon, by Cyle Sage and Brad Williams

7. The KISS List:​​ One acronym for KISS is “keep it simple and straightforward”. Create a list that simplifies a complex process. This enlightens people to release their fears, uncertainty, and doubt and gives them the confidence to repeatedly do tasks ​successful.

"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler." ~ Albert Einstein

Example:

The Creativity Checklist: The 11 Step System That Instantly Pulls Million Dollar Ideas Out Of Your Head, by Tim Castleman

8 Tips to Simplify Your Social Media Marketing, by Neil Patel | Social Media Examiner

8. The Urgent, Cleared for Takeoff List:​​ Are you in an industry where risks can contribute to failures leading to the loss of life, a disastrous business decision, and even financial ruin? Checklists, sharing your expertise and proven results can be urgent and critical to eliminating risks for your audience.

Check out the book, The Checklist Manifesto, How To Get Things Right, by Atul Gawande. This book can open your eyes to all facets of checklists. Why they can be critical to success with consistent use, why some people don’t follow them, and the best way to create, test, and track useful ones. Gawande covers many industries, from medical professionals to pilots, and even finance officers. He shares the results of using checklists, including many lifesaving stories.

The Checklist Manifesto, How To Get Things Right, by Atul Gawande

The right type of checklist used appropriately can help professionals control or possibly eliminate the risk if followed.

When Technology Fails: A Manual for Self-Reliance, Sustainability, and Surviving the Long Emergency, 2nd Edition, by Matthew Stein

Here's a Bonus Checklist.

BONUS: The Resource Checklist: Do a roundup of resources and tools you and your company uses and create a checklist. Then repurpose that checklist into other types of content.

Example:

54 Content Writing Examples, Tools, Tips, and Resources, by Mike Murray | Content Marketing Institute

Repurpose Your Checklists

Remember your content should build trust with your audience. They should feel confident that your checklist will guide them to the success they're expecting. So, be accurate with your list and make sure it works.

Then take your checklist and incorporate it into your content marketing plan. Always be thinking about repurposing your content. So, after you gather the information for your checklist, expand the details into other content such as a how-to-do guide, a comparison data sheet, a white paper, and even a customer success story. Then create a SlideShare and craft articles and blog posts to spread these ideas.

A checklist can be repurposed into many pieces of content. Let’s look at a few of the options. 

A Video Checklist

Take your checklist and create a video from it, like the one Easel.ly created below. ​Then embed it into your website and on YouTube. You can create a SlideShare, too.

YouTube Video | the Complete Infographic Checklist | by Easel.ly

This leads to the next topic...

Create an Infographic Checklist

​An infographic is a great medium for a visual checklist. Create an infographic for a quick list to visually grab attention on social media. Then roll it out into a series of blog posts and articles linking to each other.

A Checklist for More Persuasive Presentations by Dorie Clark

What About a Guide?

Go deeper than just a checklist. Take your list and turn it into a complete guide as Kristina Leigh Wiggins did. 

Building Your Home: A Simple Guide to Making Good Decisions by Kristina Leigh Wiggins

Summary 
​​Do you use checklists in your toolbox of content to connect with your audience and accelerate your marketing?

Checklists have many uses for your prospects, customers, vendors, and colleagues. They can:

• Save time while you become organized and free up more avenues for creativity. 
• Aid people in successfully getting things done without relying on memory alone.
• Serve as an introduction and attract people to more in-depth content.
• Add visual interest and inspire people to interact with your content.
• Be used to create a system that helps people eliminate risk, doubt, and costly mistakes.
  
  

To start, research your target audience to find out what their needs are. Then, pick a strategy. It could be a process of doing something. It could also be a pattern of successes, mistakes, or failures your audience is encountering that they need to know and that you have expertise in. Next, pick a type of checklist that fits your strategy.

Here are 8 types of checklists you can use:

1. The Uncertainty List
2. The Need To Know List
3. The To-Do List
4. The What NOT To-Do List
5. The Time Savings List
6. The Insider’s Secrets List
7. The KISS List
8. The Urgent, Cleared for Takeoff List

​​ BONUS: Resource Checklist

And last, plan to repurpose the checklist into other types of content. Some ideas are an infographic, an eBook, a white paper, articles, blog posts, success stories, a webinar, a detailed guide, and more.

 In the end, your content should build trust so your audience will feel confident that your checklist will guide them to the success they’re expecting.

What types of checklists have you used and how have they helped you?
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