What exactly is content? Let's deconstruct: It's something people read, listen to or watch. To be effective for marketing purposes (and for the news business, for that matter), it must be coherent, compelling and concise. It should offer your target audience something insightful and unique, make them better-informed, and, ideally, motivated to spend money on your product or service (or at least learn more).
My friends at T3 Custom, one of the leading content marketing agencies, puts it well: words matter. Increasingly, business leaders across industries recognize that a sound editorial strategy and professionally produced content are vital to serve their customers and employees.
Read a few articles illustrating how the content discussion has evolved:
Content Marketing Terms You Need to Know in 2021 (Charles Samuel, T3 Custom)
Content Creation is for Humans - the Robots Can Wait (Kevin Lund, T3 Custom)
What Does Content Marketing Mean Today? (Charles Samuel, T3 Custom)
8 reasons to hire a journalist as your next marketer (Ragan Communications)
Four Reasons Why B2B Content Marketing is Hard to Get Right (Salesforce.com blog)
The Art and Science of Storytelling (Jonathan Becher, CMO at SAP via LinkedIn)
Four Steps to Building Your Content Marketing Dream Team (MarketingProfs)
You’re Explaining Content Marketing Wrong (EnVeritas Group)
Five Steps to Feed the Content Beast (Oracle Modern Marketing Blog)
Do This to Succeed with Content Marketing (Dave Kerpen, Likeable Local via LinkedIn
Increase Content Marketing Success With Helpful Headline Tips & Tools (Content Marketing Institute)
Prove Content Marketing ROI to Your CEO: 4 Values to Communicate (Content Marketing Institute)
Prove Content Marketing ROI to Your CEO: 4 Values to Communicate (Content Marketing Institute)
The Three Rs of Real-Time Marketing (Fred Rose, LinkedIn)
7 Reasons Why Your Business Needs a Blog (Velocitize)
6 Common Reasons Why Business Blogs Fail (Circle S Studio)
5 Ways to Improve the ROI of Your Content Marketing (Marketing Insider Group)