“If your business has a smart content strategy, you never have to worry about what Facebook does. Sleep well.” – Brian Clark – @copyblogger
I think we’d probably all like to sleep well at night. I know I do. And we’d probably like to end each day with the feeling that the actions we took that day have staying power, that we’re not tilting at windmills. And I would take Brian’s statement a bit further, since I’m not limited to 140 characters. If your business has a smart content strategy, you never have to worry about anything controlled by someone else. You’ll be able to leverage your content where and how you see fit.
And this is where my head is at right now.
Ken Yeung wrote an excellent review of recent Altimeter Group report titled, Content: The New Marketing Equation.
“No longer is the message about “me, the company”. It’s now about about storytelling and attracting, entertaining, and informing your customers,” Yeung writes. And I couldn’t agree more.
I have failed at this in the recent past. So that’s where my focus is returning in 2012. And it’s not a simple task, not for me personally and not for the companies I’m involved with either. “Companies will need to do, what Altimeter Group calls, rebalancing,” Yeung continuted, “which is realigning your resources, budgets, staff, company culture, and agency/service providers to help make the marketing more effective and able to meet the digital challenges. In order to do this, the Altimeter Group report recommends four major and fundamental steps to grow your content marketing strategy:”
- Understand that content marketing is not free – you’re going to need to invest to make your content initiatives more effective.
- Implement broad cultural integration around content marketing –improve education, training, and new digital skill sets for staff and beyond the marketing team.
- Integrate content marketing with advertising – reevaluate spend on advertising and focus budgets on content production and distribution.
- Avoid bright, shiny objects – pay no attention to the flavor of the week.
I sleep best when I’m not worrying.
I’m sure you do as well. And, frankly, I grew tired of “chasing the new” a long time ago. Still, that last one is the hardest for me to follow. I think Brian nailed it. At the end of the day, creating content is the strategy that is going to have the greatest shelf life. And whatever comes along, those who have a clear content strategy are going to be able to leverage it to the extent warranted.
Read Ken Yeung’s excellent review here >> Altimeter Group Research Confirms That Content Is Still King
View the full Altimeter report on slideshare here >> Content: The New Marketing Equation
Hey Jeff — I love these two sentences: “At the end of the day, creating content is the strategy that is going to have the greatest shelf life. And whatever comes along, those who have a clear content strategy are going to be able to leverage it to the extent warranted.”
Warning: I’m entering the smart-ass zone. 🙂
We’ve talked about this before, both in person and online. The second sentence in the Brian Clark ‘paraphrase’ above, cracks me up. It’s not that, like you, I don’t agree with it 100%, cuz I do. But to me it’s like a pitcher in the ninth inning. The score is 2-1 for the home team with the bases loaded and two outs. The pitcher induces a weak pop fly for the last out, clinching the win.
During the inevitable post game interview he’s asked what his ‘approach’ was when ‘Killer Kowalski’ was up with the game on the line. “Well chucks, Tommy, my strategy was to get him out with my best pitch.”
Duh. Who knew?
The reason you’ve kicked so much booty for so long, Jeff, is cuz your content is golden — and your so-called competition’s is, um, not.
It just tickles my funny-bone when others call writing great content, showing vastly superior skills, talent, and experience, a ‘strategy’.
Compared to what, makin’ stuff up?
Am I being to harsh? Thanks, love your stuff.
LOL… well, I’m going to soak in the compliment for a second. Because you get content strategy as much as anyone. Bad content, no matter where you put it, is not a very good “strategy.” And I may be reading into what Brian was saying, but I took his off the cuff, before I head to bed tweet to mean this… worry about creating content that you own and everything else will take care of itself. People, including myself at times, are spending way too much time looking for the “next thing” that they forget that the one thing they’ll need whatever the next thing is, is content. Good content. Hopefully, great content.
Thanks for stopping by my place. 🙂
You have come full circle. It is great to see you producing content, blogging even,
It feels good. Thanks, Teresa.