I think, it won’t be quite a strong statement if I disagree with the people who think that the future will be about an increased amount of content aimed at marketing. A content specialist in my team was discussing with me the value of long and elaborate content. She was in the middle of her preparation to start a marathon with a long piece.
The problem is, resource is valuable and not even the biggest of brands would like to waste it in the process of creating large content. It is rather a better idea using the same resource in other processes of the business. So, the failure of content does not lie in the execution of it, but in the process of content marketing itself.
Many renowned brands have failed miserably in the process of chasing the content marketing process with the longer form of it. or just by producing huge number of contents. So, quantity is never advisable, especially at the cost of quality. For most brands, quantity has proved to be the wrong goal. With the fast changing scenario, content might have taken different shapes and forms like infographics, AVs, etc. Yet that does not mean the overall quantity has decreased.
Strong reasons behind “less content is more” approach
In an age of ever-increasing content, it may seem counterintuitive to suggest that less content is the future. However, there are a number of reasons why this is likely to be the case.
For one thing, with so much content available online, it has become increasingly difficult for businesses to get noticed. As a result, many companies are turning to content marketing strategies that focus on quality over quantity.
Watch out this video to understand how brands should focus into customer centric content:
In addition, research has shown that people are more likely to engage with shorter pieces of content that are easy to digest.
As we move into an age of shorter attention spans, it is clear that businesses will need to adapt their content strategies accordingly. While there will always be a place for long-form content, it is likely that the future belongs to those who can say more with less.
Why do news feeds produce too much content?
Journalists will argue on the matter that if a newsroom is bound to churn out numerous copies everyday and every individual writer created dozens of them, what is the big issue about creating them at the marketing company? Multiple copy editors, line editors, senior writers are on their toes throughout the day (and on night shift too).
So, there are high level quality control measures to ensure quality of all copies. The environment of work in a newsroom is completely adverse to the creation of low quality products. On the contrary, the owners of digital marketing companies try to get their required service done by junior writers and often content mills that cannot offer anything but low-quality posts. However, it is difficult to say whether walking on the path of the newspaper can be helpful in this case or not.
Following other’s content strategy is not a wise idea:
Different brands have widely different ways of performing in the market. So, the same content strategy cannot work for all of them in the same way. According to research, Google’s indexing of the number of pages has increased from 1 trillion to 30 trillion within the period from 2008 to 2014. A 29 trillion increase of page indexing within 7 years might look like a huge figure. But like I said, the same strategy cannot work for all types of products.
The effectiveness of a large number of content always depends on a number of other parameters. High volume can never work well without maintaining quality consistency. It is important to check the frequency of posts apart from its length, type, etc. The perfect cadence is nailing fewer of the posts created with optimum level of quality.
Strategy should reflect goal:
BuzzFeed is among the sites that can afford posting numerous feeds, videos every day. However, every brand should not try to become a media house. Like goals, their strategy also might not match that of your business. It is absolutely okay to adopt the business or content strategy of one business running successfully. Before adopting it, make sure that the process actually fits the goals and overall process of your business.
Ideal size of content? Whatever is sharable:
It has been noticed that shorter content (below the size worth 1000 words) are found to be shared more often. So, it would be a good trick to fit the strategy of shorter content into your process and purpose of brand marketing. Owing to less time available at the disposal of readers these days, shorter content can create magic. They can be created centring just one single chart, graph or image. There is no doubt that shorter content has big potential to help your product reaching out to numerous target consumers.
Related reading: How to make your content sharable
Content marketing is a long-drawn process that involves many iterative games including the game of content. There is no formula to include this or that, no necessity to have one strategy or the other. All can go on simultaneously, while one can keep coming again and again. Big brands can ruin their own product or marketing strategy by taking wrong steps. So, careful and judicious steps can save you in the big game.
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