Remember the first time you got hooked on a band or musician that was way outside what you normally listen to?
Or when that friend said, “No, you HAVE to watch this movie” and you were blown away, even though it never would have crossed your radar?
That’s the exact reason I hate the idea that so many people believe “Quality” is subjective.
There’s “content” out there that, even if it doesn’t suit your preferences, is objectively good.
“Alien” and “Forrest Gump” are often considered objectively good movies.
Eminem and Notorious B.I.G are widely considered objectively good musicians.
Why is that?
Why is it that some “content,” even when it doesn’t suit your tastes, you can’t deny its quality?
In today’s email we’ll be covering Challenge #2: Not knowing what makes content “Quality”:
- What happens when a content marketer doesn’t know how to generate truly creative ideas.
- The (harsh) truth about why so many content marketers make this mistake.
- How to apply market research to find universal truths.
Let’s go.
From The State of (Dis)Content Report:
What are your top content creation challenges?
In The State of (Dis)Content Report the top 3 content creation challenges – Differentiating Content, creating the content for our audience, and creating “Quality content” - indicate to me an uncertainty about our ability to create things that connect.
This is further validated by the sheer number of people who are unsure or unconfident their content stands out on voice and tone.
Now, I’m going to give you a pass dear Studio Insider and say you know what good content looks like when you see it.
But if you’re unsure or unconfident if you're creating it, know you’re not alone.
I’ve seen and helped people overcome this challenge at high-growth startups and Fortune 100 companies.
Like most things, it starts with mentality.
These are the three primary mistakes I’ve seen in nearly 20 years as a content marketing professional:
1. Thinking “Quality” is subjective.
2. Not researching the audience.
3. Neglecting technique.
Let’s break these down one by one.
Mistake #1: Thinking “Quality” is subjective.
Your taste is probably different from your boss’s (or client’s) taste which is different from their bosses’ taste, and because of that, when multiple people need to sign off on the work – written, audio, video, or otherwise – the feedback often boils down to “I don’t like this” or “this feels wrong.”
Endure this kind of ego-bruising feedback long enough, and your definition of “quality” inevitably deteriorates to “passable,” so leadership stays off your back and you can get stuff done.
Sure, you know deep down the body of work isn’t your best, but hey, at least you still have a job.
In this economy, sometimes that’s the most you can ask for.
I can’t remember the person or exact quote, but it went something like:
“If you had 100 people in a room and asked them to come to a consensus on the perfect pizza, all you’d end up with is cheese.”
Unfortunately, your cheese pizza of a content program breeds nothing but apathy from leadership, and you're left producing unfulfilling work, sucking your creative reserves dry and leaving nothing left for yourself.
“I just don't think I'll ever be truly creatively fulfilled. It's just a huge void. Certainly work will never fully do it, but when I'm not working I don't feel like working on passion projects. le shrug.”
What’s worse, creativity is a muscle.
If you’re spending 40, 50, 60 hours a week not exercising it, you leave yourself vulnerable to outside forces like the economy, AI, and are subject to the whims of people who don’t share your taste.
Not a good spot to be in.
Mistake #2: Not researching the audience.
Now there is the very real argument to be made that the company doesn’t allow talking to customers, or that people are so overworked there isn’t enough time. I’m empathetic, but still…
…I really wished this wasn't validated.
The majority of content marketers aren’t doing their audience research nearly enough.
The downstream effect of this lack of audience research is as follows:
- Not having an appropriate framework to present defensible strategies to get buy-in.
- Not knowing how to create the “right” content for the audience. (seen above)
- Not understanding what motivates people to take action.
Dear Insider, please don’t shoot the messenger.
I think part of this infrequency is also because “audience research” is such an amorphous term.
In all my time doing this, most of the advice I’ve seen is packaged in vague generalities like “do surveys” or “interview customers” and don’t go far beyond that.
“I'm not sure [what audience research means to us]. It's not a phrase thrown around or a concept leveraged strategically though I understand what it is and am sure that we do conduct a version of audience research without any sort of structure."
These are skills unto themselves and when you’re hamstrung by the business, you can end up in a situation where you simply don’t know what you don’t know.
Alright, but let’s say you can do audience research…
Then what?
Applied research is also its own skill and one where, in my experience, valuable information is left on the table because we don’t know what to do with it.
Unfortunately lack of audience research has negative correlations across every aspect of this work; including, but not limited to career satisfaction, creative fulfillment, and leadership buy-in, so it becomes a never ending cycle of creating work that you’re unsure of its distinctness and efficacy.
Mistake #3: Neglecting technique.
You may not like this one – but not learning the craft deeply enough to dissect what “quality” actually means.
In almost 20 years, I’ve only met a handful of people who’ve gone outside of content marketing to study things like film or sociology or behavioral psych or rap or video game design and apply it to their daily work in content marketing.
Without the ability to meaningfully critique the work, you lack the language to educate colleagues on how to provide constructive feedback on your own work.
But more importantly, you are stuck with “I like it” or “I don’t like it” without knowing why.
- Is it the structure?
- Pacing?
- How conflict is used?
Remember how I mentioned Eminem in the intro?
Here’s a look at color coded look at the lyrics from the first verse Rap God, where each color represents words that rhyme with each other. (language warning)
While his rhyme schemes alone are impressive, it’s the double entendres, tempo changes, tone variation, style switches, setups, punchlines, and cultural references in just 204 words that allow him to get away with calling himself the Rap God.
Love him or hate him, it’s his dedication to technique that makes his work objectively “Quality”.
How we solve the “Quality” problem.
I’ll get to the actionable stuff in a minute, but first… a soft pitch (hey, I’m a marketer too. We all gotta eat.)
At its core, this is the idea behind Content Theory.
It’s about conducting and applying audience research to:
- Create a content distribution network.
- Set standards for how to make your work distinct from others like it.
- Develop differentiated content that stands out on premise alone.
- Using psychological principles to understand what motivates people.
- Make invisible micro-decisions that drive people toward action.
If you enjoyed The State of (Dis)Content Report, that was on purpose, and this is exactly why it’s done as well as it has so far:
Survey completion data
Email signups:
Social media feedback:
This report was a direct result of me running through the Content Theory process from end-to-end.
If you feel like the report and this email have resonated I’ll be teaching how I’ve done this for The Content Studio, Shopify Plus in the early days, and QuickBooks in a week-long intensive starting November 11th - November 15th.
If you’d like to learn more about it, reply to this email and we can set up a time to discuss the program in more detail.
Ok, back to it…
Content Theory 101: Three basic steps to creating objectively better work.
1. Use The 8 Layer Market Research Process.
I know, I know, I sound like a broken record, but I’m serious.
The 8 Layer Market Research Process is designed to give you a comprehensive view of your business, your place in the market, and the industry at large.
Beyond that, when you start getting into your 4 Core Brand Narratives you have a built in excuse to form alliances within your company.
(Service providers like freelancers, agencies, and consultants, include this in your service offerings, make it standard to your contracts, thank me in the morning.)
It also helps you apply pressure to and validate your ideas
Another benefit of this process is to find potential distribution points so you can algorithm-proof your content.
2. Use the “Find the Gap” technique.
We talked about this in the last email, but the idea behind this technique is to:
- See what everyone is doing.
- See what nobody is doing.
- Evaluate your time & resources to determine what you can produce.
This is your starting point for developing distinct and differentiated content.
3. Create your Code.
This is not a set of brand guidelines, it’s a manifesto that sets the standard for everything you work on, and aligns anyone who might be involved in content in any capacity.
Here’s The Code for my company, The Content Studio.
The good part is, this is created as a direct response to your market research, and is partly informed by the connections you make within the company, that way everyone feels like they have ownership (in a good way) and can be proud of the content your team produces.
Of course…
There’s a lot more to it than that, and I go into waaaaay more detail in the Content Theory program, but ought to get you started.
Alright, I hope this newsletter gave you a little burst of inspiration and hope that YES, you can develop ideas that’ll get support from leadership and clients.
Next week, we’ll be covering in more detail how to communicate those ideas, be seen as an authoritative marketing leader, and get more buy-in.
Until then,
- Tommy
P.S. If you are considering joining the next Content Theory cohort, you should know I’m only accepting 25 people.
This isn’t artificial FOMO, but because I wholeheartedly believe in the power of small groups and the sessions are very interactive.
Here’s just a sample of what former students have to say.
If you've made it this far, and you like what you've seen from The Content Studio, I genuinely would love to chat with you about joining us for Round 3.
