The Coming Content Arms Race

Marketing strategist Mark Schaefer coined the dystopian term "content shock" to describe audiences' adverse reaction to content marketers' handiwork.

If you've felt a little content shock now and then, seek shelter now.

A "content arms race" is about to commence, Schaefer says.

By 2018, we'll be awash in content, as marketers' annual spend on web ads catches up with their $215 billion spend on TV ads.

Besides flooding the web with content, the spending shift will usher in an arms race, whose victors will be deep-pocket companies.

Small-time players, who until now have considered content their secret weapon against major advertisers, will be buried.

"Those with more money generally are in the best position to create more and better content, as well as pay to have it promoted and distributed," Schaefer says. "Will they always win? No. All things be equal, will they usually kill off the smaller guys? Yes. History bears this out."

Schaefer points to Chipotle's content marketing efforts as proof. "That kind of multi-million-dollar quality is not sustainable for most businesses and will hasten the exit of marginal content producers."

Meet the New Marketer

Most content marketers "live in a delusional bubble of branding hype," claims web designer Gerry McGovern.

He's proven his point with his delete key, boosting clients' sales by expunging 90% of the content on their websites.

"Organizations in general publish far too much of ego, vanity content that’s high on hyperbole and low on information," McGovern writes in his blog New Thinking.

Today's marketer crows about his inestimable edge over old-schoolers like Don Draper.

Today's marketer brings a data-driven, likable, personalized, "un-marketing" approach to the craft.

Yet fewer than 10% of B2B executives say they trust web content, according to a study by the CMO Council.

The revolution brought about by todays 's new marketer, so far, reminds me of lyrics by The Who: "Meet the new boss. Same as the old boss."

24 Things You Should Never Say to a Welsh Woman

Why do lists lure more readers than other narrative modes?

Human cognition craves lists, says web analytics guru Neil Patel, citing studies by neuropsychologists of the brain's structure.

Our hunger for specificity drives us to click headlines that promise a list. 

What's more, reader-survey and test results show:

1. Headlines promising a numbered list are 71% more popular than headlines merely promising a list.
2. People value the clarity of headlines that promise a list.
3. Women like lists more than men.
4. Longer lists deliver greater reader satisfaction than short ones.
5. Odd-numbered lists outperform even-numbered ones.
6. The optimal number of items in a list is 25.

These results make lists "a content marketer’s go-to technique," Patel says.

But lists have a dark side.

Lists advance human misery, according to Right Life Project, promoting clutter, instant gratification and thoughtlessness.

As Zig Ziglar once said, "The person who dumps garbage into your mind will do you considerably more harm than the person who dumps garbage on your floor, because each load of mind garbage negatively impacts your possibilities and lowers your expectations."

The Danger in Dangling

And this news just in from TheAnimalRescueSite.com...

While Shooting This Video, A Homeless Dog Comes On Set And Literally Adopts The Singer!

A clear case of the "dangling" modifier.

A modifier dangles when it isn't pinned to the noun it's supposed to describe.

When Groucho dangles a modifier, audiences laugh ("I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got in my pajamas, I'll never know.").

When an unwitting writer does it, audiences scratch their heads:

• Before rebooting the computer, the power should be turned off.

• The employees were told they had been fired by HR.

• By inserting keywords into the text, statistics show that SEO improves.

• Though only 14 years old, the company made Han a developer.

• Having driven 20 years without an accident, the CEO welcomed Ruth onto the stage to receive the award.

Beware of those doggone dangling modifiers!

All Hat, No Cattle

The world is filled with big, stupid companies.

When it comes to the customer experience, they're "all hat, no cattle."

A story to illustrate.

I encountered a bug in the software from one of today's top 10 providers. The bug is so serious, it prevents any use of the product. 

My first plea for help spawned this canned email:

Thank you for submitting your case. My name is Henjie from Support. I have taken ownership of your Case number 12483149. I understand that you need some assistance. I won't be able to call you. For now, I will need to have your case endorsed to a team to make sure that we will be able to assist you further with your concern. Thank you for choosing [name withheld].

Four weeks, hours of my time, and 31 comparably inane messages later, no remedial action has been taken.

Disney likes to say, "no employee ever 'owns the customer,' but one employee always 'owns the moment.'"

At stupid companies, employees own neither customers nor moments. The only "owners" are the legal ones, who spend all their moments minding the share price, while buzz-talking auto-responders are left minding the store.

Entrepreneurs can take heart.