Content marketing: Are you in the game?

In the old days, everything was content — every image, piece of copy, social media post, video clip, the lot — one big pile of stuff that was created, amplified, and sometimes even measured. Marketing managers, coordinators, social media teams, and every available intern was charged with creating content ad infinitum, with the hope of attracting whatever dirty clicks or roving eyeballs a brand could get.

While marketers have toiled to feed this hungry content monster, content itself has been having its own quiet revolution.

Slowly but surely, the short and sharp tactics of viral videos and click-bait advertising have given way to rich, enduring, editorial-led information.
Companies have come to realise that the quality of the content is actually far more important than we may previously have considered. Gone are the days when brands would construct the perfect ‘accidental’ viral video, with marketers desperate to hear from brands who cracked the viral video nut. These days, the viral video is a fun high if you can get it, but it’s not the panacea of brand salience, and it’s certainly not going to give you the long-term, deep engagement of sustainable content that builds quality customers for your business. Brands are now looking beyond the Facebook likes, the Twitter followers, and website hits for signs of deeper engagement with their audience.
The reason for this shift is an evolution in the media-consumption habits of consumers who are increasingly demanding more authentic communications and conversations from brands, due to growing cynicism about thinly veiled media tactics and, importantly, a recognisable power shift back to the consumer with an expectation of exchange in every brand interaction. Quite rightly, customers are now saying to brands, ‘If I give you my attention, what are you giving me?’

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