Content marketing not marketing with content

I spend a lot of time (and have spent a lot of time) thinking about content marketing. I think it’s in a rough patch, maybe the so-called trough of disillusionment. Looking back, it’s easy to see how we got here.

It hit the big time in a period of massive transformation. But as with many ideas growing into adolescence around that time, it was widely adopted before a solid foundation was laid. And suddenly content marketing became anything anyone wanted it to be.

Brand publishing? Sure. A “content site” instead of a blog? Okay. Any marketing activity vaguely related to the use of content? Hmm.

At the same time, the pressure to “find the value” of content marketing pushed many down the path of trying to turn it into a profit center instead of a cost center. (I remember. I’ve tried that too.) After all, the mantras of content marketing from the beginning have always been “content is a product” and “think like a publisher.” Unfortunately, both those statements are susceptible to a variety of interpretations. I can’t tell how many different articles I’ve read with wildly different takes on what it means to think like a publisher.

And as we were all trying to get our sea legs, the staggering transformation ushered in by the twin titans of mobile and so-called Big Data carried with it a whole panoply of shiny new toys that distracted attention and left us where we are — a place where a lot of people say content marketing, mostly because it’s easier than saying “using content in our marketing efforts.” And because it still has a little sheen of its former glory.

But I think we have an opportunity to climb out of that trough. The birth of the experience era has opened a door that I think content marketing is uniquely suited to step through.

The opportunity is huge, but it starts small as these things so often do. And as these things so often do, it starts with a shift in the way we think.

Imagine a time you went to a really bad movie. You manage to get a free night, maybe a sitter. Then you pay 15 bucks — 30 if you get popcorn — only to feel like you’ve flushed your money down the toilet. As you walk to your car, you shake your head and wonder how such garbage gets made. The average Hollywood movie costs more than $100 million to make and often twice as much to market. So why would anyone spend that much money to make a terrible movie?

Now think about a movie you loved, a movie that really made you feel something. Made you think. Maybe it had you thinking for days after. Maybe you’re still thinking about it. You can probably remember the first time you saw it. You probably saw it a bunch of times. Maybe you own it. And you probably told everyone who would listen all about it.

The differences that separate these two movies seem obvious. This director versus that actor. That plot hole versus this character development. But in reality, these are just symptoms. The real difference between the worst story and the Oscar winner comes in much, much earlier.

“It’s a step-by-step process of decisions that Hollywood makes that may seem reasonable when examined individually, but when you add them all together are completely insane,” says professional nerd Rob Bricken when asked how really bad movies get made. Bricken is the managing editor of the science and geek culture site io9 and he’s been writing about comics, movies, anime, and such for more than 15 years. (The actual question was, “How does such an obvious bomb like Gods of Egypt get made?” If you don’t remember Gods of Egypt, don’t worry, that’s the whole point.)

“Say a Hollywood exec wants to make a huge summer movie,” Bricken says, “and doesn’t have the rights to superheroes or any name brands. He decides to look at past summer movies that have made money — not if they’re good, just if they’re profitable — on the assumption that if he makes a similar movie, it will also be profitable. This is reasonable.

“This particular exec chances upon the 2010 Clash of the Titans, which made nearly $500 million worldwide. The exec wants to make money! Whether people liked Clash of the Titans is completely irrelevant to him. Making films that people like is not his job; making money is. So he decides to make a movie like Clash of the Titans. This is, superficially, also reasonable.

“At no point does he, or anyone else in authority of making the film, look at the bigger picture and wonder [if this] is a bad idea. Nor did anyone wonder if anyone actually wanted to see an Egyptian version of Clash of the Titans in the first place. At no point did anyone stop and really think about what they were making, and suddenly realize ‘This is a terrible idea.’” (The emphases are all mine. You should read his full response.)

Making films that people like is not his job. Making money is. Contrast this with the attitude of a studio that’s name has become virtually synonymous with great movies: Pixar. John Lasseter is widely quoted for Pixar’s driving philosophy —quality is the best business plan.

You can say what you want that a lot of bad movies have made tons of money (like Clash of the Titans), but the difference here is both objectively and subjectively clear. Objectively, Gods of Egypt cost about $140 million to make and ultimately grossed about that same amount. It sits with 15 percent on Rotten Tomatoes (the viewer rating is 36 percent).

In contrast, the worst-ranked Pixar movie — which is Cars, if you don’t count the sequels, which nobody, including Pixar, ever does — sits at 74 percent (79 for viewers). It cost $120 million and ultimately grossed $463 million.

Subjectively, the difference is even more stark. Most people don’t even remember that Gods of Egypt exists (though it cost more to make than Cars), but Pixar is, well, Pixar. They have twelve movies above 95 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, including three at 100 percent. And beyond that, they have incredible (pun intended) cultural cachet. They are the masters of storytelling, masters of emotion. Everyone knows who they are. Everyone knows which is their favorite. We all share in a larger cultural phenomenon that centers on Buzz, Woody, that cute little bouncy light, and all the rest. At Pixar, making films that people like is their job. Making money is just a means to an end.

And for me, that’s it. The core of what makes content marketing something still to be reckoned with. The heart of what makes content a product and what it means to think like a publisher. Obviously there’s a lot more to it, but this is the start. This change of attitude is the first step on the path that leads to the future.

Marketing with content is making and using content to achieve some business goal — to get leads, to meet a quota of social posts, to make money. Or my favorite, to check that box on a PowerPoint slide that says you made content. In this scenario, content is a byproduct. Its value is incidental so long as it feeds the machine. And so quality is irrelevant.

In fact, when marketing with content, the levers of distribution are far more important than the content shoved through them. It doesn’t matter if people like it or need it or want it. All that matters is getting people to fill out that form or see it on Facebook. So marketers spend more time optimizing these meaningless transactions than investing in the content that will regrettably exchange hands through them. As Bricken would say, marketers make all sorts of micro decisions that seem reasonable in the moment, but when considered in the context of building customer relationships are totally bonkers.

In content marketing, on the other hand, we make and build content because we believe it has intrinsic value to our customers. Certainly, we want to make money, but we know the way to do that is to build real relationships with our customers, to capture their hearts and minds because we have given them something real. Making content that people like is our job. Everything else follows.

And it doesn’t have to be that Audi Daughter commercial or whatever crazy thing Red Bull is doing next. The intrinsic value of content is easy to see in cases like those, but it can come in any form — an email, a product brief, a tweet, even product UI. As long as the people making it start with the idea that they’re going to make something their customers love — instead of something that simply pays the bills — everyone wins.