As General Manager of CMI, Stephanie leads the brand’s event, digital, print, and e-learning operations. Previously, Stephanie served as VP of Content Marketing for UBM’s Technology portfolio, providing strategic guidance on content development, content optimization, audience engagement, and go-to-market platforms for technology clients. Stephanie also spent many years as Editor in Chief of InformationWeek. Find Stephanie on Twitter @editorstahl and LinkedIn.
One guiding star shines brightly for both the brand and its customers – the optimal customer experience across the engagement journey.
After all, no customer (or prospect) wants a disappointing encounter at any touchpoint in their interactions with a brand. And every brand wants contented customers who buy its products or services again and again.
But what role does content marketing play in delivering that optimal experience across the buyer journey?
During his rousing keynote presentation at Content Marketing World 2019, Henry Rollins offered this take on the future:
We are not going back to anything. We’re not going back to dial-up phones; we’re not going back to anything ancient … The old must give way to the new. The new must come in with intensity, with innovation, with great fury and speed.
How do we evolve our programs for changes rushing in? That’s the question we put to Content Marketing World and ContentTECH speakers, award winners, and other industry thinkers.
Most B2B marketers use content marketing effectively to achieve top-of-the-funnel goals like brand awareness and audience education. But they are missing out on opportunities deeper in the funnel.
This is just one of the key findings from the newly released 2020 B2B Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends – North America from Content Marketing Institute and MarketingProfs, and sponsored by Sitecore.
Let’s face it. There’s no shortage of content to consume these days. Content for content’s sake has become a bit of a problem for some brands as their content marketing efforts and teams have grown and matured.
But consumers, customers, and prospects don’t necessarily need more content. They need content that is meaningful, actionable, fun, amazing … anything but excessive and mediocre.
As content marketers, everything we do should serve the needs of our customers and target audience. And from what I’ve seen this week at Content Marketing World 2019, we, as an industry, are making amazing strides.
I’ve seen impressively creative content that makes our businesses more relatable, trustworthy, and responsive. I’ve heard about innovative tools and techniques to distribute our messages and analyze our results. I’ve observed marketers’ willingness to embrace change and pursue new strategic paths when a situation calls for it.
Better. It’s a deceptively simple word. Everyone always wants better. The next draft should be better; the next project should be better; the next reviews; and so on. Better indicates progress.
But the path to better isn’t always clear.
We know teams set out to create, distribute, and promote amazing content – content that matters, that’s fresh, innovative, and relevant. We also know these teams can get in a rut and become risk averse or, worse, stagnant. And that conundrum sets up leadership challenges that even the best managers and most effective executives might not be prepared to handle.
Todd Henry knows all about these potential team crises. He’s written books about them, including The Accidental Creative, Die Empty, Louder Than Words, and, his latest, Herding Tigers: Be the Leader That Creative People Need.
If you want to succeed, it never hurts to dream big.
Ask any entrepreneur what their goals are, and their responses likely boil down to one thing: Growing bigger. They want to make a name for their business, increase marketplace visibility, close more sales, earn more revenue, expand the teams to do the work, and secure a spot in the annals of industry success.
In other words, they want to build an enterprise. And there’s a good chance they’ll rely on techniques like content marketing to help them reach that goal.
It’s the season when lots of well-meaning people set resolutions for the new year. Eat healthier, work out more, spend more time with family, lessen the screen time, connect with friends, be more mindful…
But we know most of those declarations fail before it’s time to eat lots of chocolate (or bacon) on Valentine’s Day while binge-watching 10 seasons of a hot show on Netflix. I mentioned bacon for a reason, but I’ll get to that later.
I’m not judging anyone who doesn’t keep a resolution. I’m not urging you to set lofty goals for the new year. Rather, I’m providing a dose of pragmatic and inspirational advice from a handful of our community members who presented on some of CMI’s most popular webinars in 2018. All of our webinars are available on demand and are free to watch (with registration).
Have you ever wished you could see a year into the future?
I can’t think of any superpower that would be more useful for content marketers than to have a sneak preview of all the important developments, trends, technologies, and key disruptors that will impact our strategic and creative decisions over the next 12 months. (Although the ability to fly might be nice as well – it would sure cut down on all my business travel time and stress!)
With the speed of big shifts happening across our industry lately – businesses merging, algorithms shifting, new tech capabilities emerging, audiences growing ever more fragmented and distracted, and the like – it’s hard enough for practitioners to keep up with what’s happening now, let alone keep our eyes firmly fixed on the horizon.
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