By Chuck Leddy
Boston Content Group Executive Director Sarah Dudley, in her role as host, explored what 2020 had brought to the realm of marketing and what might be in store for marketing in 2021. During the free, on-demand event, change and the need to remain flexible were identified as keys to success. Dudley’s two guests were Theodora Berenson, Director of Content Development and Marketing at CBS Boston, and Dan Shure, SEO consultant and co-founder of Evolving SEO. Dudley began the conversation by noting that “2020 has prepared us to expect anything,” from global pandemics to social justice tumults to remote work and learning.
Major Changes 2020 Witnessed
Berenson noted that the content she focuses on developing at CBS Boston relates mostly to sports and lifestyle trends (and the lifestyle brand partnerships CBS Boston has forged). “Well, sports just didn’t exist for a while in 2020, which made it challenging to develop content in that vacuum.” Lifestyle content also had to change in order to adapt to the “new normal” of people wearing masks and social distancing, making video content production problematic.
For Shure and his SEO work, “my clients switched their content to reflect pandemic realities like food delivery instead of eating in restaurants.” As he noted, the pandemic “changed nearly everything about content in 2020 -- it needed to be COVID-friendly” in order to be relevant for consumers and SEO purposes alike. As people changed how they lived, Google’s approach to SEO also changed. Topics that were relevant pre-pandemic became suddenly less relevant (cruise ships, anyone?), and vice versa (“best sourdough recipes” was a booming topic after March).
Approaches to Content Creation in 2020
Berenson said that nobody could have planned relevant content for what 2020 had in store. The idea that you can predict everything that will happen in a year is “just hilarious,” she said. “I’d like to sound more scientific, but a ;ot of what we did in 2020 revolved around experimentation -- throwing things against the wall and seeing what would stick. There’s no algorithm for content development, especially in 2020, so you have to be ready to keep testing and learning.” Of course, you “need to start with a basic understanding of your audience and what they want, but the tactics of how to engage them are always going to change,” she said.
For Shure, he advocated “creating content the way a comedian does.” He noted that comedians draft their jokes, then refine them over many performances based on audience feedback (i.e., laughter or silence). “Most of the benefits I provide to my clients come from refining content this same way over time, based on feedback from the audience for the content.” Most important for Shure is using SEO for content planning and topic selection. “SEO works best when it’s considered from the planning process onward,” not as an afterthought.
Content Creation Advice for 2021
Berenson develops a lot of video content, and she advises content creators to consider various storylines and generate content in ways that allow for versatility in light of different content formats and platforms. “Think strategically about all the angles you might cover in a piece of content,” she says. “By planning ahead, you can ensure that you’ll have different storylines available.” Dudley noted that such “versatile” content assets are especially useful when times change and it becomes harder to shoot “net new” content. At IBM, where Dudley works, “we’ve learned to be creative with existing assets, repurposing what we have instead of producing net new content.”
Shure advises content creators to “start using Google Discover as a way to see what’s trending” and generate ideas.He said that Discover has enabled his clients to take advantage of trends and see what content topics are most ripe for tackling by brands looking to differentiate and get attention in a landscape flooded with “me-too” content.
Watch the full event (32 minutes) on-demand now:
About the Author:
Chuck Leddy
B2B Brand Storyteller