What are you most excited about in the digital marketing space at the moment?
The coming together of paid and earned media – traditional PR and communication agencies are having to up their game and their skillset in order to best take advantage of this opportunity. It’s all about knowing what content to amplify and where, finding the right balance of the credibility of earned media but amplifying and achieving broad reach through paid media.
What’s your favourite example of innovative digital marketing?
I think Barr/Irn Bru’s social media activation around the Commonwealth Games is a perfect example of how to do it right. I always say to clients ‘be selective in the moments in time you choose to leverage a brand message’ and they certainly picked the right time. With the Commonwealth Games taking place in Scotland at the same time as the Scottish Referendum, Irn Bru delivered a campaign built around its Scottish heritage and which dialed up the media interest and the passion and pride of the Scots all at the same time.
What’s next for digital content? Personalisation at scale.
Brands need to find a way to have an increasing number of 1 to 1 relationships with their customers in order to keep relevance and engagement high. But the challenge will be how can you tailor content to every individual? The focus for brands will be to look at how they can stay true to their brand narrative whilst adapting their story to meet the needs of different audience profiles and groups and understanding where they should personalise and where they should automate engagement.
What defines good content?
Good content talks to the needs of the audience more than it does the needs of the brands. Brands need to stop talking about themselves and use data and insight to understand what really matters most to their audience (their interests, passions etc.) and design their content around this.
What is the biggest myth about content marketing?
That you can make any piece content viral if you throw enough money at it. Content needs to have an inherent value to the audience otherwise they will simply not engage with it and all the money in the world won’t convince them otherwise.
How are you amplifying and maximising your content?
We are using a combination of programmatic advertising, native advertising, social media advertising and third party advocates.
Where do you go for great content?
There’s no one place I go to for great content – Forbes, Business Insider and Mashable publish great insight and articles on social media, digital marketing and brands, I always look to see what’s trending on Twitter (usually for a laugh) and as a massive geek I still peruse the blogs daily.
Please provide a link to great content you have #discovered recently and tell us why you think it¹s great?
I love data and how you can use it to better inform your creativity and strategies so this really got my attention.
How do you work with Outbrain and what has been your experience thus far?
I’ve been working with Outbrain for more than 18 months – they’ve proven to be an invaluable partner. From consulting on great content to the level of account management support, Outbrain are an excellent partner.
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