Principle 1: Content Is the New Currency
There has always been a basic human need for power through information. Each of us wants the best, the coolest, at the best price. We want to be smart about what's important to us. Whether it's a new car or the inside scoop on search engine marketing, knowledge is power — that fact will never change.
What's changed is the technology that delivers knowledge. Today's audiences are in control, selecting what they want to see and when. They are generating their own content, viewing 75,000 YouTube videos a day, monitoring millions of blogs and user reviews. Your challenge: Identify the content your audiences value and deliver the information and experiences they can't get anywhere else. Content is currency — you can bank on it.
Principle 2: Content Builds Brand
Strong brands are powerfully linked to a promise: Volvo and safety. Disney and family fun. Apple and individuality. Content is the information and shared experiences that bring a brand promise to life for audiences. For example, Volvo created a club for customers who survived a crash in their Volvo. Owners tell their inspirational stories of survival and build a community, further reinforcing an already powerful brand.
The right content creates the perfect context for brand messages. Here's an example: Interior designers value information about color, so Sherwin-Williams developed a free magazine and Web site devoted to the subject of color, confident that designers will specify more Sherwin-Williams paint as a result. The in-depth editorial content about color is the perfect context for Sherwin-Williams brand messages of innovation and quality. At the end of the day, designers are smarter about color and the Sherwin-Williams brand shines.
Principle 3: Content Delivers ROI
Do you have systems in place that make it easy to update content for your sales force or dealers, as well as your customers? Can you alert them to new content or customize the content they want through RSS feeds? Is it easy for customers to find the content they are looking for — or is it buried and scattered throughout your Web site? Putting content where it matters pays dividends.
FedEx is a perfect example of efficient content management. It saves money and improves sales efficiency by making hundreds of sales leave-behinds, presentations, videos, proposals and letters available on a central portal called CMM (Customer Message Manager). It's easy to update and access. Sales representatives can download presentations to laptops and print leave-behinds on preprinted color shells day or night. E-mail alerts go out whenever new content is loaded or updated. Sales representatives can configure their own home page to reflect their needs and commonly used materials.
Principle 4. Content Is Systematic
Content that builds brand and delivers ROI happens on purpose. Developing it is a systematic and rigorous process that adds value with each step.
- Insight. Start by digging deep into the way your audiences think. What is their most pressing need? What is the trigger that will open their mind to your message? When you discover what they value, examine their work styles and lifestyle habits to determine how they want to consume your content and when.
- Ideas. Content that moves the needle is much more than information. It's actionable, empowering, uplifting, entertaining — whatever is most relevant to your audiences. By transforming information into ideas, you can position your brand as a thought leader and change perception in your industry or new marketplaces.
RSM McGladrey, a business consulting company, broke through to the C-suite by delivering a digest of must-read, actionable intelligence that executives came to depend on. The results: a dramatic increase in leads and more than 50 percent increase in brand awareness in the first year.
- Inspiration. Nothing really great happens if your audience isn't motivated — to pick up the phone, log on, change their behavior or think differently. Inspiration can be the catalyst that turns a good idea into a wow experience.
How did FedEx motivate more than 250,000 employees worldwide to live their brand? An inspirational film shot on location using employees' own words and stories.
- Interaction. The highest level of audience engagement is interaction. Are you having conversations with your customers to understand their thinking? Are you getting feedback from employee audiences about communications issues?
Sometimes you just have to be there. When Lufthansa wanted to promote their new first-class reclining seat to travel agents, they didn't send a mailing and call it a day. They invited agents to an event where they could sit in their first-class seat and experience it firsthand. The interaction gave travel agents a voice and helped Lufthansa develop a more meaningful relationship with a critical audience.
Principle 5. Content Is Strategic
A content strategy is the organizing principle behind three elements fundamental to any successful marketing campaign:
- Your brand and marketing messages
- Information your audience values
- The channels your audience prefers
Get these things right and your brand will speak in a powerful voice. Verizon needed to reach the construction industry with a new fiber-optics product that could make new homes and developments Internet-ready. The objective was clear, but the campaign needed a voice that spoke the language of builders and developers. The result was a series of highly creative ads that built awareness, an in-depth advertorial on the business-building benefits of the technology and a customized microsite.
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Content Best Practices for
Business Consultancies. 
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