Latest Content Strategy News & Articles

As the content landscape appears to be shifting toward mobile and social channels, websites are still considered by customers to be the most trustworthy of content sources. 

One of the biggest names in IT, Oracle, has announced it plans to purchase Eloqua, a cloud based Marketing Automation provider that had been positioning itself as a revenue performance management company.

Many companies and organizations are making a significant investment in content management in terms of technical resources (including Web CMS and analytics) as well as in time and human resources (such as IT, Communications and Marketing departments). But are they investing the same time and effort in their content strategy?

Content discovery platform provider Outbrain is acquiring content curation specialist Scribit.

There is a growing need for a much more professional and scientific approach to the management of information. 

A new platform will enable brands to take those glowing blog posts and turn them into ads. The company behind that platform, OneSpot, has just raised US$ 1.5 million in support of that mission. 

Have you ever read a product description and still knew nothing about the product?

Good news, folks. Last year, I wrote this about my predictions for 2012: “My crystal ball is cloudy, my tea leaves are clumped together and my tarot cards are ripped.” I just wasn’t sure what would happen.

This year, I’m absolutely certain about what 2013 will bring.

Content optimization software provider InboundWriter today released an enterprise version of their online application. The software, which initially catered to individual writers, has been updated so it will appeal to larger organizations that publish online content. 

More enterprise IT buyers than ever before expect e-commerce to be more consumer like, a new hybris study reveals, and nearly all large companies surveyed said their suppliers needed to make their websites easier and more compelling to use. 

Smart people use behavior-based data. They make decisions based on what people actually do.

Today, more than ever before, the customer controls the majority of the decision process: they are overall more savvy and more critical of marketing messaging.

Woe unto you, content strategists, who have been unlucky enough to end up in a niche discipline that most enterprises look at as a luxury (if they even recognize it as a separate and unique discipline at all). Jumping from one freelance gig to another like a traveling jongleur, simultaneously hoping to find a home, and dreading the thought that you'll end up as a common minstrel in a corporate communications job writing the dreaded corporate-speak content pieces that employees ignore at best and hold in contemptuous disdain at worst.

"Your life is the sum of a remainder of an unbalanced equation inherent to the programming of the matrix. You are the eventuality of an anomaly, which despite my sincerest efforts I have been unable to eliminate from what is otherwise a harmony of mathematical precision. While it remains a burden to sedulously avoid it, it is not unexpected, and thus not beyond a measure of control. Which has led you, inexorably, here." — The Architect, The Matrix Triliogy

Yes, The Matrix Reloaded was indeed a horrible movie with little to no redeeming value. One of the few interesting spots was the curious dialogue between Neo and the architect to answer Neo's question "Why am I here?" 

If you’re involved in the business of digital content, then you know you contend with distracted consumers, multi-screened attention and multi-threaded conversations. You probably have thousands of post-its on your desk reminding you to use odd numbers in your headlines, refer to pop culture, tell stories, use video, don’t use video, etc. to make your content stand out.

E-commerce retailers face the constant challenge of standing apart in a vast, churning sea of online competition. It’s not enough to simply stay afloat; the real goal is to own the waters. In other words, while you’d like to stand out enough to grab online visitors’ attention, what you really want is to ferry them through to their final destination: making a purchase.

There is a scientific method that can be applied to monitoring social media. Businesses must first learn about their efforts and then fine tune them to prove their time and money is well spent.

Many companies say they are different because they are a true media company on the Internet or that they aspire to be a true media company. But what does that really mean?