I’ve been writing about content marketing for roughly a decade. Along with blogging and the general democratization of content creation on the web, content marketing emerged as the latest trend in digital marketing. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry began to embrace the idea that creating content your customers want to consume — and solves their problems — is a more rewarding and effective marketing tactic than spamming them with discount offers or creepy ads that follow them around the web.

To be clear, it isn’t a new tactic. John Deere is famous for being the grandfather of content marketing, having started its magazine, “The Furrow” — a monthly magazine covering a wide variety of topics centered around people and their connection to the land — long before the web was even a twinkle in Al Gore’s eye. Back when Jell-O was trying to convince housewives that this strange, food-like blob was edible, it started by making a cookbook. And then Red Bull came along and took content marketing to new heights (literally) with feature-length movies, magazines, television shows, and a space jump  — all of which push an experience rather than a product and put the targeted audience first.

Audience-first marketing 

To some degree, brands embracing content marketing felt reactionary. As banner blindness took hold of marketers’ psyches and then ad blocking became all the rage, the idea of inbound marketing — yet another term for content marketing — was a great alternative. Creating content that audiences voluntarily consume, and even seek out, seemed like the only way to reach them. In other words, marketers were thinking about putting their audiences first, rather than pushing products.

I think the easiest way to break this idea down is by dissecting an example: 

Don’t watch this video if you love dogs and are at work. You will sob. 

Outdoor brands know something about their audiences — they tend to love dogs. Frankly, there is nothing that will get me to stop and look at your ad faster than an image of a woman and her dog. Think about every Subaru commercial you’ve ever seen that was basically saying, “There’s room for your dog.” It’s not a coincidence. 

The first five or so times I watched “Denali” (and sobbed), I didn’t even notice that it was sponsored. But eventually, I saw that Patagonia, First Descents, Snow Peak, Ruffwear, and Clif Bar all sponsored the video. The next five or so times that I watched it (and continued crying), I started noticing the Patagonia jacket that Denali was napping in beside the fire and the Ruffwear harness he had on during a hike. These images were obviously candid and taken long before this video was in the works, so they come across as authentic — no more like advertising than when I post a picture of my dog in his harness on Instagram. 

At first glance, it seems counterintuitive that you would want to create content that your audience can’t get through without crying. It’s kind of a bummer, right? But when was the last time you watched a commercial over and over — and had an emotional reaction so strong that you wept every single time you watched it? At best, there might be a Super Bowl commercial you like to watch once in a while and get a bit of a chuckle out of. Shortly after “Denali” came out and I’d already seen it a few times, I started seeing my friends posting it online and warning people that it was a tear-jerker. 

Do people share your ads online? Probably not — no matter how good or effective they may be.

Nothing about this video is selling you anything — other than a lifestyle. The kind of life most of us only imagine — surfing while our trusty old dog watches from the beach or hiking a canyon with the dog slung over our shoulders. It’s a story about loyalty and love, and building a life that prioritizes relationships and experiences. These are all messages that these brands want to get across, and in this format, it feels far more authentic than even the catchiest slogan in an ad.

To me, this is the essence of content marketing:

• People seek it out, consume it, and share it

• It evokes an emotion

• It doesn’t “sell”

• It’s all about building a relationship with the audience

Content marketing and the sales funnel

There is a reason brands like John Deere, Red Bull, and REI do such a great job with content marketing. They have well-defined audiences with obvious interests (farming, extreme sports, the outdoors) and a big pool of stories to pull from. But the reality is, especially in the B2B world, not every brand has such an obvious story to tell — and it’s harder to understand how content marketing fits into the sales funnel. 

Most B2B content marketing is generally less sexy, no matter how hard a brand tries. Instead of space jumps and beautiful short films, we get case studies, white papers, and research. Once in a while, we even get a magazine!

While it’s important to make sure you have a plan for turning interest in your content into conversions, I think it’s important to resist spoiling the spirit of content marketing by including too many product mentions or CTAs. The real trick to turning content marketing success into a sale is understanding your funnel. This is actually pretty easy if your content is behind a registration wall. If someone downloads your content and gives you their contact information, you should have a plan in place to follow up.

However, if your content is freely available on the web you may need to have a retargeting plan in place. If someone stops by your blog to read a post on a topic that interests them, make sure you are ready to suggest more content to them, ask them to sign up for a newsletter, or are ready to retarget them with ads. (Combine all of these to really make a difference.)

Content-focused marketing

As content marketing has grown in popularity it has also morphed and many companies seem to think any content you create is content marketing, but that just isn’t the case. However, I do think there is something to be said for taking a more content-centric approach to your email marketing or social media marketing. 

You can take the lessons learned through content marketing and make every arm of your strategy more focused on your audience’s needs and wants. If your audience isn’t opening your emails or responding to 10% discounts, try writing emails and subject lines that put content at the heart of it all. Refocus every channel to be sure you are giving your customers what they want to see rather than what you want to show them and you just may find their interest in what you have to say is reinvigorated.