Part One: What is Content Marketing?

Content marketing. I hear that phrase tossed around by marketing professionals more than a Frisbee during a Phish concert pregame (#BretBerman). Twitter headlines, Ad Age and Forbes articles, emails from creative directors and directors of digital strategy all proclaim that content is king!

Every time I read a tweet, an article from a prestigious business publication, or an insightful email from someone in a senior level position I nodded my head and agreed that content marketing is the future and as marketing professionals we need to become wizards (7^th year Hogwarts status) at content marketing to help our clients’ businesses succeed… Yet the question looms, “what exactly is content marketing?”

A quick Google search reveals Wikipedia's definition of content marketing, “Marketing with high-quality, engaging content that drives brand affinity and sales.” Holy Moly! Content marketing is the panacea to every client's needs and it's simple: content simply needs to be created, promoted and BOOM, brand equity and sales will come! Well not quite....my search for a better definition continued. After a few more wrong turns, I finally found some great content on content marketing at Content Marketing Institute. Their somewhat sales-y content marketing or bust definition sums up the all-mighty marketing technique.

“Basically, content marketing is the art of communicating with your customers and prospects without selling. It is non-interruption marketing. Instead of pitching your products or services, you are delivering information that makes your buyer more intelligent. The essence of this content strategy is the belief that if we, as businesses, deliver consistent, ongoing valuable information to buyers, they ultimately reward us with their business and loyalty.” 

 

So in short, and as the elementary infographic above suggests, consumers like brands and products, but they are becoming averse to traditional marketing communication tactics. As such, brands are now creating, engaging, relevant, exciting, informative and valuable content that consumers like, resulting in increased brand interaction, affinity, chatter and propensity to buy and recommend. Goodbye push, hello pull!

Up next in the series: A look at a few brands that have mastered content marketing. 

--Mickey Citarella

Assistant Account Manager

(Definitely not an Art Director or Studio Artist)

Buzz. Word of mouth. Viral.

These words, while enticing, are not typically used to describe paid media advertising. So how do you drive social chatter from an offline campaign?

One solution: #hastags. This trend in advertising allows for paid media to drive unpaid media. In addition to stretching your advertising dollars by including a relevant hashtag, you reach a broader audience, while at the same time narrowing your audience to those interested in the specific topic.

To ensure we learn from each other here are some fun examples as well as best practices to keep in mind when employing a hashtag in an advertising campaign.

#JustForFun:

   

• Audi’s #SoLongVampires – This TV spot promotes the automaker’s daylight-simulating LED headlights, which incinerate a vampire party upon the Audi owner’s arrival. The spot ran during the Super Bowl, a time when viewers are already highly engaged in the advertising and their social networks
• Edge Shave Gel’s #SoIrritating – Edge has ventured to make their brand about more than just grooming and broaden the conversation to “irritation”
• Domino’s Pizza’s #LetsDoLunch – In the UK from 9am to 11am on March 5^th for every tweet that included the hashtag #LetsDoLunch the price of pizza for that day lowered by one pence (original price £15.99; ending price £7.74)

Here are some general adverting hashtag best practices:

• Define your goal – determine what the objective is of adding the hashtag. Is it engagement? Information gathering? Is there an opportunity to add a promotional component or some other consumer benefit?
• Aggregate the conversation –  create a landing page or some other location to capture the chatter
• Know your audience – do your consumers even use Twitter? Or do you intend to reach a new audience with this tactic?
• Promote your hashtag – tweet about it, include it on advertisements and other brand communications
• The #hashtag itself – must be unique and relevant to the conversation, as the Audi and the Edge examples above demonstrate the hashtag does not need to include the company name or even the product name. Add the hashtag to TagDef so that people can look it up to find more info if they are interested. If there is already discussion around the topic there is less chance of the conversation getting hijacked and turning negative

As we all know there is risk in giving the mic to the audience. Marketers beware: The hashtag can encourage engagement but requires planning, strategic execution and continuous oversight.

--Alyssa Lundgren,

Assistant Account Manager