The big buzzword of the year regarding marketing is: Content Marketing. IDG:s event Reality Check in collaboration with Dataföreningen where all about that and nine speakers attacked the matter from different perspectives. Here´s three of them!
Content marketing is a marketing technique of creating and distributing relevant and valuable content to attract, acquire, and engage a clearly defined and understood target audience – with the objective of driving profitable customer action.
Myself I love content marketing. Its top of mind for most marketeers in every different field right now. Recently more and more brands are adapting to this form of marketing displaying great emotional stories. In my world, with a soft eye for action sports, Red Bull equals engaging content marketing.
With in all this lies an aspect that people seldom talk about that Lukasz Lindell, speaker at the event, lifted during a conversation we had. He went out with a mic to interview everyday (but awesome) people with the simple question: Do you know was content marketing is? The answer to that was as simple as the question – no!
But will this bubble burst? Stuff that we are aware of doesn’t tend to be as interesting and will content marketing work when the consumers know the trick? But then again, who cares, everyone is just consumers and everyone just wanna buy everything, right! No, no and no again. We care, we are emotional and most of us are willing to pay for more value, do conscious decisions, tell people about it, join tribes and we want value!
Content marketing is one way of giving value to your target group as well as producing better products, progressing your service, making production more environmental and so forth to name a few. But let us shed light on some of the things that happened on stage!
Tom Beckman and mutual value
Tom Beckman from PrimePR on stage. Thanks www.christerhedberg.se for leting me use the picture CC!
Tom beckman, Creative Director and partner at PrimePr took us all on a journey of content marketing with different cases, quotes, thesis, slides and some films which all ended up in an apple tree of mutual value.
When talking to Tom he was in a way surprised with the fact that he unconsciously been striving during he´s years in marketing to bring value to the end customer and retail. It became a split second revelation some time ago. An aspect that to many marketeers seem to forget but that Tom strives for in every marketing decision he’s involved in. Mutual value for both brand and customer.
One of the cases he showed us was Spotless Comeback powered by ACO – an acne agent that wanted to give something in return to their young users. The campaign gave the kids comebacks through gameification (yes already 2008). In the game they all got to experience different situation that might occur but always having an arsenal of replies with them when bullied or similar. I can’t agree more to fact that we need to add value in what we do when communicating and targeting end consumers.
My favorite case that Tom presented was The Cove. A documentary about dolphin slaughter that won an Oscar where content marketing in its best raises up to the level of the best entertainment. A documentary worth your time! It´s on netflix 
!
Lukasz Lindell and film in content marketing
Lukasz Lindell, head of film production at Appelberg Content Agency gave us all a very visual and charismatic keynote with some simple but still very important key takeaways. Productions don’t need to be boombastic. You can do fine with an phone and a good mic. Its better to do trial and errors than doing nothing.
Last but not least he even gave the audience some homework. We all where challenged to make a movie tomorrow at the coffee machine in the office. I sure hope they all do it because we need better content out there!
Movies without sound are nothing. Any sound is better than no sound so buy a mic, Lukasz Lindell
Sara Öhman, freelance marketeer and content creator
Sara Öhman concretized how to start with content marketing in a very delicate way and for sure reaching out to everyone in an understandable way. Unfortunately all presentations are in swedish. But if you read swedish the link on her name leads to a article that are the seed of her keynote.
Sara was one of the speakers that, in a way, gave the most to the audience in key takeaways that can be implemented tomorrow. Seven distinct steps resulting in a simple content strategy. I live by the belief – the simpler the better (in most aspects). The more complicated you make your content tactics (strategy) the less you probably produce.
Following Saras advices can give you a head start if you never dug deep in to the swamp of content marketing.
Outro
IDG always delivers. I really liked the intimacy of the event and that we all got to sit around tables instead like going to the movies. In this fashion it becomes so more natural to speak and interact with more people which I’m a big fan of. The nine speakers all brought their angle to the table which made the event dynamical even though some tended to get a little bit to much like a sale presentation only lifting their own cases.
I very much enjoyed the day and I´m really looking forward to IDG:s event Webbdagarna in march. The production of Reality Check (#reacheck) was professional, food and coffee breaks all good but most of all they managed to gather a lot of interesting people under the same roof. Great work Magnus Höij, Yasmin Tilles & the crew.
One thing puzzles me though. All nine speakers never even mentioned the hard work getting the word out. Creating content is easier than promoting it. Synchronizing content promotion and executing it successfully takes way much more work if you don´t have the luxury of well established channels and good presences both digitally and physically. One person even replied me on Twitter that good content spreads by itself. That is true to a certain extension. Even the most brilliant campaign need to be planted and distributed is such fashion that the end customer responds to it. I would say there is where the real work begins. Here´s a good article about this in a Buzzstream.
Cred for header picture www.christerhedberg.se
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