Since the invention of marketing, there have always been buzzwords that generally elicit groans shortly after they are introduced. In 2016, ones that come to mind are storytelling, disruptor, pain points, transparency, and thought leader. Perhaps that one that trumps them all is “content is king.”
In today’s give first economy, people are craving content gives them insight to their specific business challenges. Take this publication for example: the CentralZone has a monthly reach of a bit over 31,000 and an average open rate of 34%. While I’m not mathematician, that adds up to about 10,500 people who read it every single month. Given those numbers, maybe I should put a little more effort into my articles…but I digress.
The point is that while the phrase “content is king” is annoying, it’s very true. Even if you don’t feel confident in your writing enough to start a blog, don’t want to record a podcast, or find the thought of recording small videos abhorrent, you can engage with your clients by sharing content. To ensure that the content you share makes the desired connection, you have to make sure that it’s meaningful, relatable, and sharable.
Make it meaningful – For content to be willingly consumed, it has to have meaning. When content marketing is shared, the sender is essentially asking the recipient to spend their most valuable commodity – time. If the content you share is meaningless and the recipient consumes it, you not only have wasted their time, but have effectively killed any future opportunity to engage them with content that does have meaning.
Make it relatable – On the surface, relatable and meaningful may appear to be one in the same. However, meaningful content is not always relatable. For example, no one would argue that a podcast about the lessons learned by an entrepreneur starting a business doesn’t have meaning. However, that same podcast would likely not be relatable to someone just starting their first job out of college. By ensuring that the content is as relatable as it is sharable, you will increase both your open and connection rates.
Make it sharable – No matter how meaningful and relatable the content is, people will not consume it if it appears daunting. Sad as it may be, the human attention span has shrunk to the point that a goldfish has a longer focus. It’s true, you can look it up. The point is that for content to be sharable, it has to be in easily consumed nuggets: 500 word blogs, 20 minute podcasts, or five minute videos. Anything longer than that and you run the risk of people not consuming it simply because it “feels” like too much of a time commitment.
By ensuring the content you provide relevant, you can truly engage your target audience. Remember, you don’t have to create content to share it – it just needs to be meaningful, relatable, and sharable.
(For those counting the words, this blog post is exactly 500 words long)
Written by:
Bill Petrie // PromoCorner President
Bill is president of PromoCorner, the leading digital marketing service provider to the promotional products industry, and has over 17 years working in executive leadership positions at leading promotional products distributorships. A featured speaker at numerous industry events, a serial creator of content marketing, immediate past president of the Promotional Products Association of the Mid-South (PPAMS), vice president of the Regional Association Council (RAC) board, and PromoKitchen chef, Bill has extensive experience coaching sales teams, creating successful marketing campaigns, and developing branding that resonates with a target audience. He can be reached at bill@PromoCorner.com.
