How do you define great marketing content?

Great content is content that blows its goals out of the water. Whatever the goals are.

To do that, it's most likely going to be:

Magnetic – people want to get it and eat it
Hypnotic – they don't want to put it down till it's done
Eccentric – stands out from the blah blah blah
Toxic – makes somebody out there nervous (ideally competitors)
Charismatic – has some personality
Elastic – contains ideas that can be stretched and morphed to new places
Magic – has that intanglible something that makes people lean forward

Good question Craig. From my perspective - great content can be defined as providing the right content to the right customer at the right time.

I believe that marketing content is being redefined as we speak. What buyers are seeking is what I have referred to as Intelligent Engagement. Marketing content void of push messaging and void of irrelevancy. Marketing is so conditioned to "message" that it is finding it hard to break the habit of one directional conversation.

Existing customers and prospective buyers alike are seeking to further their intelligence about how they may tackle a certain challenge and accomplish specific goals. The true test is whether buyers decide to engage, not only in some of the ways Loren mentions, but also in ways that leads to engagement as well as relationships.

Knowing how to further intelligence takes a dedicated effort to gathering deep insights about organizations and buyers. The two go hand-in-hand - that is first understanding the intelligence buyers and organizations seek and second providing information that furthers their intelligence. If you succeed at these - then you have the knowledge necessary to produce the right content for the right customer at the right time.

If the intended audience applauds it, shares it, requests more of it, creates content about it, links to it, incorporates it in their content, or engages with my company because of it ... then it's great. The audience is the judge and jury.

Joe Chernov / Eloqua / @jchernov

I love Loren's answer. If I had to shorten it to two things, I'd say that great content makes you 1) think and 2) act.

Too often as marketers, we think about that action in a self-serving way. We want a registration, a demo request, a purchase behavior. But that only really works if the reader or audience is organically moved and compelled to action.

With every piece of content, consider three things:

1) What is it you're trying to say
2) What is it you want the audience to think
3) What is it you want the audience to do

All content should have answers to these questions to be successful.

Two things I think are not mentioned- since I don't like to repeat what is already been said..and I do agree with everything previously said.
This is my favorite topic these days about content because it is so important for so many reasons. Brevity. Keep it short. Our lifestyles demand it and our attention spans yearn for it. Your content will get so much more face time just by it being visually appealing. When I come across a long page of text I sigh and skip it and so does 99 percent of the population. Don't let this fool you into thinking it's easy either. I find it impossible to write short blurbs...Good Luck!

And the last thing...Target your content. Without a target its pretty hard to write a compelling piece. If we just start writing to the general market our message lacks the ingredients it needs to provoke action. Since it "sort of appeals" to everyone. You want it to HIT HOME! REALLY STIR UP THE AUDIENCE!

Loren gave such a great answer that I considered leaving a thumbs up and just moving on. But Jennifer brings up a critical point -- how in the world marketers are supposed to accomplish all of those objectives while keeping it brief.

Marketers find this difficult to accomplish because they are just guessing, making stuff up, about what content complies with these goals. Someone else in the company reviews the doc, sees some points that were not included, and now there are too many words.

Per Loren's reply, people seem to know that personas are the right tool, but they're also making up stuff about their buyer personas.

We're not going to make any progress on this topic until marketers can convince their bosses, and gain the skills they need, to conduct unscripted interviews with recent buyers. It takes good questions, developed from the buyer's earlier responses, to learn what worked and what didn't from the buyers' perspective. The marketer still has a lot of work to do to build great content, but at least they've listened to real buyers talk and know what is meaningful to them.

For Jennifer, that's how it becomes possible to write short blurbs. I'm watching people do it on a regular basis, because they really, really know what matters most to their buyers before they sit down to write. But there are still far too few . . .

Great question and I will sum my answer in 3 words.

A great marketing content should:
1. Educate
2. Entertain
and 3. Engage

Another key ingredient to add to the 3E's of killer content would be: relevance.
You should write content that your target audience will want to read. That's it!

It attracts your target market and moves them to purchase.

You define Great Marketing Content by the results it produces a the proper time frame for the company. When all is said and done this is the only criteria that matters. Did it do the job it was intended to do.

Great marketing content is content which says not just 'what' but also 'why it matters'.

Great content speaks to the recipient and moves them to action.

Joe's answer is precisely correct - the audience is the judge and jury. And I'd add it's not about what they say, it's about what they DO.

HI Mike,

In premise I agree with your point. Let me revise my statement. Good marketing content leads people to want to do business with a company.

I can recall popular and memorable advertisements that never translated to sales, in fact, some proceeded a decrease in sales.

Great content is something which moves people.

It moves...
1. their thinking forward.
2. them to take positive action.
3. them to trust, respect and engage with you.
4. them to dig deeper, learn more and investigate further.
3. people to support them, building momentum and breaking down barriers.

That is more often done with a single word, image, phrase or sentence than a complex, fully argued document or presentation.

Often it cuts through the complexity, rather than adding more.

Content which is able to connect with the audience at any or all levels-functional, emotional, intellectual, spiritual etc.

It is not the quantity of words, always the manner in which phrased and the context in which used. It need not provoke an immediate action. Even if it is registered in memory and one is able to recall the content or atleast is able to absorb the meaning of it, the content must have done something right.

It can be a tagline, body copy or a seperate article. One is always able to register a 'Impossible is nothing', 'Think Different', 'Just Do It' which are more motivational in nature
or even a simple one like 'I'm lovin it'.

Content which is able to:

- Connect with readers right away (ask them about their problems or challenges)
- Answer reader’s questions and educate
- Provide choices without confusion
and ultimately serve business purpose
- Compel readers to take one action

can be termed as 'great' marketing content.

Great marketing does one very fundamental thing: it DIFFERENTIATES you...

It clearly and compellingly conveys what makes your product/service different from the other guys. It puts you in a class of one. It makes you not just memorable but also understood and preferred.

Very little of today's marketing passes this test, because differentiation marketing is hard to do and not very many marketers seem to know how. But that's what it takes.

Al Shultz
www.alshultz.com