image courtesy of stuart miles/freedigitalphotos.net
The Content Marketing Institute (CMI) enlisted the opinions of thought leaders and just published their 60 Content Predictions for 2015.
Let’s keep these in mind as we think about our content development strategies for next year. We’ll start with the CMI’s founder, Joe Pulizzi, with a prediction that I had some experience with when I started out as a copywriter:
1) Surge in Custom Magazines Delivered by Mail
Joe says that 2015 will see a surge in custom magazines from brands. (A custom magazine is published by a company as a marketing tool. It contains interesting articles and images about the company and is distributed to its audience by mail.) You won’t believe it, but he suggests that print will “cut through the clutter by leveraging ‘the post’ [that’s post office]—without much competition at all.”
So, since companies are so focused on digital marketing, a printed custom magazine will get noticed by your prospects and customers. Why? Because they received it in the mail!
I love it, direct marketing through the post office making a come-back. Plus, I got my start in copywriting by organizing and writing custom magazines for various businesses: big construction crane operator, medical clinic, and general contractor among others.
2) Switch From Search Driven (SEO) to Context-Aware Content
Julie Fleischer, Director, Data/Content/Media at Kraft Foods predicts that we’ll see a shift from search driven content (SEO) to context-aware, or event driven, content. So marketers should, “…create and distribute content triggered by weather, location, or news events. The bar will be raised on hyper-relevance.”
This reminds me of a blog I write for an insurance agency where I post the articles to social media every week. I wrote the posts ahead of time, so we’ve got a 6 month inventory pre-written. I try to be “context aware” when I choose the post for each week.
For example, I frequently choose posts relevant to the season. Starting in late fall, we posted tips on safe snowmobiling, fireplace safety, and preventing slips and falls at a business. We’ve posted on Halloween safety and Christmas giving.
The key here is to be up on current events. (Something that comes naturally to me as an addicted newspaper reader.) Then, see how you can tie weather, location, and news into your posts. Remember, relevancy is a key to connecting with your readers.
3) Brands Becoming Publishers Instead of Advertisers
Robert Rose of CMI looks at “…2015 as the year of content-as-process. Brands will stop looking at content marketing as ‘campaigns’ and instead will look to create smart processes.”
What I get out of this is that your company will start thinking more like a publisher than an advertiser. Your generosity in sharing what you know with your audience means you’ll be constantly publishing valuable information.
This is what will establish your authority in the marketplace and attract prospects to you over the competition. But it will take a consistent, well planned process to pull it off.
4) New Sources of Content Right Under Your Nose
Jay Baer, President of Convince & Convert, talks about the problem companies face who want to create and publish lots of content. How will they do it efficiently and affordably? Jay says, “The best source of content in most companies may be right under your nose: your employees and customers.”
So companies will decentralize their content creation programs looking to customers and employees as sources. This is what I tell my clients, too. Ask your customers what questions they have about your product or service. Get your employees to report about problems that come up time and again.
Then write blog posts about these problems restating what your customers are telling you and then offering solutions. Upshot: there are sources of content all around you, every day…tap into them through your customers and employees.
Ok, here’s one more, then I’ll give you the link to all 60 of these sage marketing predictions…
5) Long Form Content is the Ticket Next Year
Jesse Noyes, Senior Director of Content Marketing at Kapost sees longer form content becoming the focus for marketers next year. I like this one because clients often need help with what can be a time consuming and difficult task.
He says, “As marketers see the limited returns of merely creating bite-sized social content, ‘fat’ content will become the focus of marketers everywhere. This includes types like white papers, videos, eBooks, infographics…content that can be broken up and used as the fuel for multi-channel campaigns.”
Not only is long form content more useful for your audience because of the in-depth info you provide, but it can be re-purposed for other mediums. For example, that 30 minute speech you had written for a conference can be republished as multiple blog posts. Each section of the speech can be a separate post.
And Google is also encouraging longer Web pages because they prove your knowledge and offer more valuable information for your website visitors.
So there’s five of the sixty predictions. Take a look at them all here. Use them as you develop your marketing strategy for next year. Remember, when you come up with a winning strategy, it’s a lot easier to write the content that will get you leads and customers in 2015.
Until next time,
Nick
Nick Burns is an SEO web writer specializing in persuasive copywriting and content marketing. He provides clients a winning content strategy plus the special web writing to make it work. You can contact Nick here.
