content marketing predictions

Social Media & Content Marketing Predictions For 2011

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Joe PulizziContent Marketing Institute

Our 2009 predictions saw more than 40 experts come to the table with their magic eight balls. Last year, over 70 of the leading social media and content marketing experts looked into the mirror. Some were right, while others were, let’s say, a bit off the mark.

This year, well over 100 thought leaders seek out the truth for 2011. My sincere thanks to each of them.

As you’ll see, Facebook, gamification, brands as media and content strategy all play their part. Even a few daredevils believe that print may, in fact, show its face again in 2011. Who knows where the real truth will rest?

Hats off to this year’s speediest sorcerer Paul Roetzer from PR 20/20 who submitted his prediction within minutes of my initial blog post.

Thanks for joining us on this ride into 2011 and beyond. Enjoy!

All the Best!

Joe PulizziFounder, Junta42 | Content Marketing Institute


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Paul RoetzerWe’ll start to see a more visible shift in the structure of corporate marketing teams and the allocation of resources, as more organizations recognize content’s ability to generate leads and build loyalty.

In addition, marketing services firms will need to evolve to meet growing demand for outsourced content creation (i.e. blogging, eBooks, white papers, case studies, etc.). This requires hiring and developing social-media savvy copywriters who have the ability to generate content that engages audiences and motivates them to take action.

pr2020.com

Clare McDermottIn the last few years, marketers jumped on content marketing simply because “everyone is doing it.”

With more experience under their belts, brand marketers will become more sophisticated in their use of content to reach customers. For example, matching content to the sales cycle, designing and distributing mobile content, and realizing that certain functions (ie. marketing automation) are best outsourced to experts.

And here’s the part that is less about prediction and more about dreamy hope: Let’s hope that 2011 gives us more examples of B2B marketers taking risks with content.

That means having uber-intelligent, fresh points of view about issues in your industry; publishing content that is smart and at times wickedly funny; hiring talented designers to infuse your content with personality and edge; using your employees as the face of your business in blogs and video; finally, thinking long and hard before adopting an e-newsletter.

Let me turn that last one into a prediction: hordes of businesses will abandon the e-newsletter format because no one is reading them.

soloportfolio.com

Doug KesslerContent will get shorter and shorter. Fewer 15-page white papers more 2-page Cheat Sheets.

More video, more mobile content and more, better-designed eBooks.

Some markets will approach content saturation. We’ll have to work harder to earn that download.

velocitypartners.co.uk

Jay Baer2011 will be the year that we begin to have a unified view of subscribers, fans, and followers. API-driven advances in CRM and databases will enable companies to better understand the full ar-ray of their digital marketing and social media relationships.

This will allow brands to communicate more coherently, and with context and relevance. Being able to send an email only to people that have clicked a particular bit.ly. Sending a Facebook status update only to people that have visited a particular product page on your website.

That’s the future, and it starts in 2011. We’ve been talking about ”one to one” marketing for 20 years. It’s finally here.

convinceandconvert.com


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Marty WeintraubMarketers will realize they don’t own and can’t fully leverage original content they post only on third part social sites including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and others. As a result, there will be more focus on strategies to better leverage the content to the benefit of permalinks the brand manager truly controls.

Savvy brand marketers will create “original” new public content by aggregating categorized interactions they’ve had with others, which took place in walled garden social networks Google and Bing do not index.

Content posted on sites like YouTube and Facebook will be serialized, incenting users to visit the brand’s home website to see the next installment or otherwise seek fulfillment.

Also marketers will learn better leverage rebroadcast engines, like Twitter feeds that rebroadcast categorized feeds, subscribed to and culled from PRWeb and other classic PR services, to expand the initial distribution blast.

At the moment, such distribution techniques are tactics usually practiced in the public relations world. Search and contextual marketers will begin to view press releases as another “paid” marketing channel, measured by impressions, CTR, CPC, conversion, etc..

Finally, there will be a greater emphasis on paid social, to seed viral activity and prove sentiment for specific content.

For instance, organic video promotion will start with 20K paid Stumbles, 5K users from highly targeted Facebook Ads and 30K users from YouTube promoted videos. The line between paid and organic will blur in social spaces.

aimclearblog.com

Sandra Zoratti Customers say, ”Know Me or NO Me” (and vote with their scant dollars and scarce attention)

Relevance will become the new standard for Content Marketing in 2011. Com-panies that have made smart investments in predictive, data-driven capabilities to produce relevant content based on customer knowledge will take share away from their traditional marketing-oriented competitors.

In our current economy, we all know that consumers are spending less. More interesting to me is the way they chose to spend their precious dollars -- and it is driven by the relevance factor of content. In an recent consumer pulse survey, more than 63 percent of consumers said they will stop doing business with companies who continue to spam irrelevant content into their email inboxes, Internet feeds and mailboxes.

2011 will be the year in which savvy marketers will walk away from the irrelevant content mass marketing push and begin to understand their customers’ next actions, relevant needs and communication preferences as the critical foundation on which to build customer engagement.

Marketers who continue to use 1995 interruption marketing techniques of slick ‘n quick, glitz ‘n glamour will not survive. Content Marketing is important. And becoming more important.

Marketers who have prepared to become Relevant Content Marketers and engage customers in interactive, relevant, two-way conversation will thrive in 2011.

profitwithloyalty.com


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Laurent FrançoisBrand marketers will get back in touch with the most forgotten content producers on Social Earth: journalists..

citizenl.net

John BottomVirtual libraries. If this word is not heard more in 2011 then it really should be. This is a long-overdue concept that will help to make sense of content marketing as marketers try to convince purse hold-ers to support what they are doing.

Whether or not the term itself appears, there will be increased acceptance of content marketing as the process of building a body of useful information, not the sporadic creation of articles that fit in with campaigns.

I think content marketers will see increasing value in building a repository of knowledge [and there-fore authority] that prospects can find when they need it, rather than when it suits the marketer and their budget cycles. [Why should customers follow your financial year and budget planning?] Market-ers are gradually coming round to the idea that this is the key part of content marketing.

Direct prompting – typically via automated email – will always be a factor, but 2011 will see a growing realisation that the underlying aim is to create a useful mine of information and advice, not a single campaign.

Good words: incremental, continual, libraries, repositories, resourcesBad words: Campaign, targeting, response

baseonegroup.co.uk

Russ HenneberryUnfortunately I think most brand marketers will attempt to replicate viral content like the (admittedly hilarious) Old Spice campaign. Of course the value provided with the Old Spice content is humor.

My prediction is that in 2011 and beyond it will be those that create content that educates, protects, makes people money or saves people time that will build the most loyal communities around their brands.

Communities are difficult to form and sustain around humorous content. For brands wanting more than a ”flash in the pan” success story, humorous content should take a back seat to content that provides lasting and meaningful value to members of the community.

tinyandmighty.com

David Meerman ScottMarketers will finally realize that social media are just tools -- true success comes from developing a real-time mindset.

webinknow.com

AlbertBeing part of blog networks where content is syndicated, will be a crucial part in marketers distributing their content through out the web.

mooladays.com


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Kirk CheyfitzThe current mechanistic obsession with media channels and “consumer channel preference” will go away, mercifully, and the ad world will come to understand that content (story) is what determines the audience’s channel choices, not some abstract preference for a one channel over another.

In other words, when it comes to messages, what it’s about is always more important than what channel it’s on. This has been verfified by both research and common sense. Think: If there’s a great argument going on in the next room, you will press your ear to the wall and strain to pick out interesting words, ignoring the 52” LCD screen and 5-way speakers in front of you.

That’s a channel choice dictated by content. It’s how we all make our choices. Plus, there’s the fact that any content worth our attention will find its way onto multiple channels and will become social as we share it with others. So the focus on channel preference, so popular today, will be discarded as not useful.

postadvertising.com

CJ Walker1. Localization will be on the radar screen for Americans too.

2. More companies will see the value of the journal-ist as content marketer.

3. The increase in outsourcing to expert publishers and content strategists will continue.

4. The conversation about augmented reality as the next big thing will begin in earnest.

firehead.net

Brian MasseyTwitter will begin to fade into the background as the public embraces a new social application that is built on Twitter. The largest social network on the planet, email, will once again out-perform Face-book and Twitter as an effective content marketing platform.

Google will purchase its first print publication, probably a newspaper. A woman in Sheboygan, WI will be the first person to be officially pronounced dead due to “complications from use of Facebook.”

ConversionScientist.com

Shelley RyanIn 2011 webinars will continue to proliferate as a content marketing vehicle -- the technology keeps getting cheaper and easier. However, I don’t think there are enough marketers yet who care about the quality of the content or its delivery, so most webinars will still be mediocre or just plain lousy.

Adding a webcam to the mix just because you CAN is another trend that will rise, even though the dorky-looking result ends up compromising your credibility. (Remember the early days of desktop publishing? Nuff said.)

My bet is that sometime in the latter half of next year, viewers won’t accept mediocrity anymore. We should start to see a small groundswell of well-produced webinars from smart content marketers out there, proving that ”webinar” isn’t a dirty word after all. Once that bar is raised, we’ll all have to work harder to attract and engage an audience.

Businesses that understand what’s at stake will leave their competitors wondering why so many of their webinar seats (and sales funnels) are growing empty!

killerwebinars.com


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Dennis M. PowellThe definition of brand will expand dramatically as advocacy organizations build brands around issues and market them to build constituencies and communities around specific issues using new media strategies.

masseypowell.com

Patsi KrakoffVideo on sites, blogs, and email marketing will increasingly focus attention on consumers, their needs and global issues.

writingontheweb.com

Sally FalkowRelevance is going to be the keyword for 2011. Marketers are realizing that simply creating and distributing content is not enough - the content has to be based on real intelligence and must speak to the interests and needs of the people they want to engage with.

Marketing in 2011 will be about how to listen, learn and then respond, so that the content really adds value and people will want to share it.

falkowinc.com

Billy MitchellMore content will be created for distribution via mobile and video will continue to grow as part of how a brand tells their stories, from positioning to instructional, demos, testimonials, case-studies and dynamic animations.

And print will become part of most digital cam-paigns. QR codes and various tags will become the norm on everything from print ads and sales collateral to business cards, billboards, hang tags, window stickers, displays and yard signs.

mltcreative.com

Leslie LindemanONE social media site will rise to the top and everyone will use that. I predict that Facebook will rule online marketing unless some unknown provider comes in with something better we can’t yet even imagine.

LeslieLindeman.com

Katie McCaskeyDispatches from the ”outposts” for 2011:

1) Outpost #1: Small is Big. Most content conversations pre-2011 focused on large companies and/or large city markets. I predict 2011 will see significant adoption and use of content marketing by independent businesses and organizations in smaller markets. Why? These people already understand they can outmaneuver larger, less agile competitors with quality content. No one understands the cost advantages of content marketing like a small business owner. Those living and working in ”creative micropolitans” know they must create to compete.

2) Outpost #2: ”Green” Content Marketing.I also predict we’ll see increased content adoption in unexpected organizations and industries, specifically, those with environmental focus. Organizations and non-profits understand content is easily disseminated to various stakeholders to create a cogent message. Likewise, consumer companies will move to leverage their ”green credentials” to the buying public.

So the big question: what prevents ”content green-washing”? That is, creating content to give an illusion of ”green credentials”?

katiemccaskey.com


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Natasha VincentThe continuation of the New Millennium Micro Movement - micro sites, micro blogs, micro niches - will see more publishers leveraging microformats.

An increasing comfort with coding as well as an increasing need to compete will make more online entrepreneurs grab the HTML by the tags to get better rankings for their reviews and/or more brand recognition for their own company.

elearning.sitesell.com

Mike VolpeThe trend of inbound marketing will continue, with marketers dedicating more resources to creating content as well as optimizing and promoting that content to generate more traffic, leads and customers.

In 2011 more advanced forms of content beyond just text will gain additional prominence, such as videos, ebooks, presentations, mobile apps, interactive web apps, and infographics.

HubSpot.com

Chris BrownI predict that the use of blogs will continue to grow. But the use of new tools, such as the QR code reader for smart phones, the battery-operated mini-billboard pin as waitress flair that shows a video, and all kinds of iPad/smart phone apps will be the tactic of choice to communicate the brand positioning and brand advantages to the target market.

brandandmarket.com

Joe KalinowskiI predict the renewal of dedication to print media. With smaller publishers on the rise, they know to strategically refine and reform their subscription lists so that the people receiving their publication are actually reading it and taking action. Using more traditional media once again in a content strategy may become hip!

contentmarketinginstitute.com

Lisa PetrilliI think 2011 will be the year that brand marketers – and C-Suites for that matter – will begin to finally “get,” and ultimately embrace, the idea that it is much better for their customers to tell their stories and share their stories than for them to continue to try to control the entire message.

I saw the inability to truly grasp this hold a number of companies back this year.

Relinquishing some of that control will be on the agenda in 2011 as content will begin to finally reflect, and respond to, the needs of the customer and the enthusiasm of brand ambassadors rather than a company’s “features and benefits.”

Beyond that, marketers will begin to budget for the ability to explore mobile opportunities and to create mobile websites – not mobile “optimized,” but real, strategic mobile websites.

lisapetrilli.com


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Christina PappasI don’t think things will change greatly in the opportunities available for how we go about distributing content but the quantity we use in each channel may.

I think there will be a larger focus on mobile and social or, even better, social mobile. Flipboard and apps like it may present better branding opportunities to marketers and ‘app envy’ where one app is on Droid and not on iPhone or iPad will go away and it will be easier to distribute content to everyone.

Maybe someone will figure how a benchmark formula for ROI on social media so that we can use it more effectively and provie to ourselves and our teams that our efforts paid off. I am also hoping that brands that continue to remain skeptical about producing content, especially vendor agnostic content, will join the conversation.

Too much great content available would be like sales having too many leads - a good problem!

Would be really cool to see the popularity of 3D effects hit the small screen. Maybe for 2012 though...

zmags.com

Andrew HanellyThe novelty of social media will begin to melt away and with it the undue animosity hurled at it on a daily basis. It will shift out of the spotlight and into the trenches to get the real work done. It won’t be lauded less as a “game-changer” and more as an obvious channel.

The amount of attention received will begin to more closely align with the amount of budget it receives. It will gain acceptance and lose glamor. It will walk off the main stage, away from the cheering and the jeering of the crowd, and quietly get to work.

The bandwagoners will jump off and head toward the next gold-rush. The flakes will flake out and what will be left are those who believe in doing things right. And they will quietly continue their work.

engage.tmgcustommedia.com

Sarah MitchellAs content marketing gains widespread acceptance, I believe business is going to begin to expect a return on their investment. My prediction for 2011 is pressure from business, both large corporations and SMEs, will motivate brand marketers to consider how their content directly affects the revenue stream of a company. Marketers will need to measure results and focus on content which be-comes an asset to the company, not just an expense line item on the budget. The great news is we’ve never been in a better position to prove the effec-tiveness of original content or to distribute it more widely in so many different formats.

globalcopywriting.com

Nate RiggsBecause of the rise of user generated content and the call for transparency in business, your company culture is what will drive your brand in 2011.

Smart marketers will leverage the teams of talented and interesting people already inside their organizations by giving them a voice on their company platforms like blogs, Facebook Pages and even the newest versions of Company LinkedIn profiles. Brand comes from all levels and depart-ments in organizations - not just from the marketing department...

nateriggs.com


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Michele CuthbertMobile marketing and various integrated touch points will be more prevalent in the next year. Increased ways to navigate, engage and interact with audiences to enrich experiences will be more in demand.

baker-creative.com

MattI think we’ll see a growth in online content marketing in general, and branded entertainment, specifically.

parthenonpub.com

Keith Thacker VLogs are what we will focus on in 2011.

Great way to connect and build rapor before events.

2 Megaevents & 12 virtual events.

PlumLife.com

Bernie BorgesContent as a strategic marketing weapon will become more widely understood. Brands that have tried and failed at social media marketing will produce more content around the interests of their target customer. The focus will be on creating quality content that addresses user’s interests.

Content marketing has arrived!

In 2011 brand marketers will increase their experimentation with mobile marketing. Retailers and other B2C marketers have been the leaders in mobile marketing. I believe we’ll start to see expanded use of mobile to include educational institutions, government (at all levels) and some innovative B2B mobile marketing visionaries.

The “Like” phenomenon, pioneered by Facebook, will continue to grow. More marketers will come to understand the value of getting their content liked as the Facebook social graph will continue to broaden its online footprint.

It has been said that Likes will become the new links in search marketing.

findandconvert.com

Rick LieblingI’m really excited by the opportunities with visual mobile search, i.e. Google Goggles. As Smartphones reach a critical mass, overtaking feature phones in America, instant, immersive content will no longer be limited to the desktop (or even the laptop).

Now, for many in the marketing industry that won’t seem like ”news,” but the fact is for the vast majority of consumers, this is still very new territory.

I think we’re going to see an increase in marketers using limited ”real estate” such as print ads, post cards, event the product itself, as a gateway to a richer, more detailed content experience via smartphones.

Now, I hope that we start to see these technologies used not just to highlight product features, promotions and sales drivers, but real content that provides value and has an emotional appeal.

That might be especially interesting for movies/television properties.

rickliebling.com


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Jason FallsUsing existing models like ManOfTheHouse.com, I think more brand marketers will seize the opportunity to become custom media publishers in 2011. It will likely only be the large bucket folks with budgets to spend, but the attentive communities they create are invaluable in today’s online environment.

socialmediaexplorer.com

Joe ChernovThe lines dividing content / social media marketing from “demand gen” will blur. Most organizations have moved beyond the “experimentation” phase, and as resources increase so too do expectations. Awareness, engagement and even sentiment objectives will give way to the higher goals of customer acquisition and retention.

In next year’s case studies, articles and speaking sessions, content marketing will begin to sound much more like demand gen marketing. Though less buzz-word friendly, this shift will be much more career friendly for those who help drive it.

eloqua.com

Josh GordonIn 2011 brand marketers will confront the issue of content commoditization. As brand marketers embrace the benefits and of creating and distributing their own content they will come to grips with relatively new, but huge problem professional publishers have been dealing with more directly for the past three years: as content creation and distribution volume increases dramatically worldwide, it becomes a commodity.

Proud of that great interview your brand website/newsletter/digital magazine just published?

Do a search and you will likely find similar content elsewhere on the web. I predict shift in the dialogue on content creation will occur: It will no longer be enough to create content, or even create high quality content.

The goal will be to create content that stands out and is unique.

SellingWithContent.com

ScLoHo(Scott Howard)Value will be the true measuring stick in 2011.

Questions consumers are asking themselves, ”Is there a value to me if I follow you on Twitter or Like you on Facebook?”

Business owners are asking themselves, ”Is mass discounting via Groupon (and similar sites) providing me with customers that I value, or am I just offering loss leaders without any true long term value to my business?”

Social Media skeptics will place little value on Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Twitter, etc because they haven’t grasped the social interaction value of the media.

Social Media users and believers will continue to grow and increase their value to their friends and followers because they understand that despite the trackability of the web, relationships are not as easily measured in simple R.O.I. terms.

Every decision made in 2011 will be based on the value each of us as individuals assign to the choices.

scloho.net


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Marko SaricCreating engaging and valuable content will just become even more important as traditional methods of push advertising lose the effect.

I see companies having content teams just there to create quality content, spread it out and attract customers that way.

Facebook pages, Youtube channels, blogs featuring a wide range of multimedia content that people want to read, watch, interact with, and share with their friends.

howtomakemyblog.com

Drew Davis2011 Will be the year of the authentic brand relationship. Brands will quickly learn that there are tremendous opportunities to embrace existing content creators in the new media world and help to elevate them using the brand’s power, reach and goals.

Bloggers and video producers will become authentic and open brand advocates engaged in long-term relationships that benefit both the brand advocate and the brand itself.

tippingpointlabs.com

Kristina HalvorsonIn 2010, I think companies really started to understand that content isn’t ”just copy”: it’s complicated, it’s a commitment (not a campaign), and it requires dedicated resources to get it right.

And so, I think that 2011 will see brand marketers begin to approach content planning much more strategically. They’ll recognize the need to work with experienced content strategists to create a viable plan to create/curate, share, and govern the content. Marketers will also start asking for the resources to invest in dedicated editorial staff to continually audit content, measure results, and iteratively improve the customer’s content experience.

In 2011, brand marketers are looking at an *unprecedented* opportunity to invite SEO, social media, user experience design, and content strategy experts to sit at the same table and ask, ”Why are we creating/curating this content? What will it do for our business? How will it help our users? What is the best way we can put this content to work for everyone? What needs to happen for that to work?” When those practitioners can begin to formally collaborate within the framework of content strategy--with the endgame being valuable content for our end users (i.e. content marketing)

--I think we’ll have...world peace!! Or, at least, awesome content.

braintraffic.com

Josh HealanWhat is old will be new again, only better! Digital and social will continue to grow but “old school” formats such as print and even direct mail will make a come back. Marketers have realized, and will finally accept that, just because you can measure something more effectively, does not make it more effective. We will see marketers that in recent years shifted entire budgets to online media, begin to reallocate parts of their budgets to offline media. We will also see much smarter approaches to integrated marketing, customer segmentation, and the use of variable data.

muttgroup.com

Gini DietrichIt’s hard to narrow it down to just one (I actually have nine), but I think the one that will be most prevalent is mobile. Mobile payments, mobile shopping, mobile commerce, mobile apps, geo-location, websites for phones...everything across every phone platform.

With AT&T introducing a basic phone with browsers, smartphones will be accessible to every pay grade, including the homeless, which provides some people to skip right over the computer.

spinsucks.com


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Trish JonesIf they have any sense, I think brand marketers will focus more on what can be done internally to engage their clients externally. In other words, there will be less outsourcing of SEO and more quality data gathering internally that can be turned into content and used to ease their clients pain. Customer services and sales will communicate and consolidate questions that both clients and prospects ask frequently and these questions will be answered in the form of published content and distributed via the social media sites. The era of “What can I sell you,” is going to be replaced with “seriously, what can I do to help you?”

trishjones.com

Robert Rose2011 will be the year of ”curation”.

It feels like 2010 was the year that content became truly important to brand marketing again. Content Strategy hit its stride, Content Marketing became a household (or at least cubicle-hold) word and the giant ”E” that seems to never go away from digital marketing, this year stood for either ‘engage-ment’ or ‘experience’.

So, it feels now that if brand marketers can produce content with ease - then the real value will be in curation of content.

So, look for:* outsourced curation services to provide editorial, writing and ”filtering” services for brand marketers. * an explosion of online services that allow bundling, packaging and curation of content for marketing.

Brands too will look for other engagement metrics to associate loyalty and engagement. So, look for loyalty programs for content consumption (e.g. badges or status in exchange for engagement).

And, finally, watch for the function of governance in social content and conversation management to finally get the attention at the management level.

adaptivemarketer.com

Kimberly McCabeBrand marketers will see that different audiences consume media differently and try to fine tune their distribution. They will stop trying to be all to every-one and target platforms that are working for them.

If they’re smart they will find ways to leverage their Content Management Systems to help them distribute content - that could mean some changes to what CMS delivers in functionality. Platforms like posterous are great - but I think marketers will try to take that kind of automated push to internal systems that they can schedule.

oshyn.com

Charlotte UlvrosCompanies become their own Media

Here are two examples of companies that have turned themselves into media houses.

Gatorade’s Social Media Mission ControlGatorade has the luxury of a seemingly unlimited budget. However, observing and taking inspiration from their tactics could help you translate their efforts to a smaller scale.

Cisco’s Social Media AccountsWith around 100 Twitter handles, 26 Facebook pages, 300 YouTube channels, 61 communities and 37 blogs, Cisco has really invested into the concept of Social Media. They based their social media strategy on the “Dandelion”, one of Jeremiah Owyang’s Frameworks for Social Business.

This model allows flexibility but sacrifices a bit of control. However, in this arena, control is fleeting and because technologies and people’s behavior change rapidly, it is adaptability that counts.

mynewsdesk.com


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Arnie KuennNot only big brands, but businesses everywhere will begin to embrace content as a key marketing strategy. This will occur as organizations begin to truly understand that providing the information their prospective customers need and seek actually leads to business.

Currently, too many businesses fear they are giving away valuable information for free. Marketers will learn to listen to their customers by watching what is happening online at sites like Facebook, Twitter, Yahoo Answers, Digg, etc., and through traditional market research.

They will then develop content that answers their customers questions. This content will come in many forms, but I do believe we will see more and more video content coming from organizations of all sizes. For example, we are already seeing e-commerce sites including a video of each product offered.

Brands will also work hard at developing user generated content as they begin to see the benefits of UGC. User generated content provides fresh content and can attract valuable inbound links. You will see more and more contests and even the development of more brand forums or communities.

In my opinion, distribution will not change a great deal. The major distribution points such as search, social and video sites are fairly well established and marketers will continue to target those.

The big question mark is how will marketers leverage mobile. Will this be the year for large scale mobile marketing adoption or will it be 2012?

verticalmeasures.com

Freddy J. NagerWith all those e-book readers stuffing stockings (make that large, rectangular stockings), consumers will need content to fill them. Free content, that is, ‘cause free is good.

But not just digitized versions of classic books that they didn’t read when they were in school. Rather, smart marketers will provide branded reference books: cook books, car care manuals, fashion tips, bartending handbooks, etc., all spon-sored by a relevant product or company. Since they’re reference books, consumers will turn to them again and again, creating more brand impressions and - ideally - a positive feeling toward the brand.

Some of these e-books will come with supplementary digital media, such as videos and music, for a complete experience.

The result: some consumers will devote e-readers to certain purposes alone: a kitchen Kindle (or would that be a cook Nook?) filled with recipes from various brands; an iPad for the bachelor pad filled with cocktail ideas and lounge music; a Corvette tablet containing guides on customization, repair and even performance driving, with tunes for the road.

Any interest or profession can be catered to by marketers through branded e-books, which can be updated readily (or even regularly, like e-magazines).

I’m personally hoping that Meow Mix or Fancy Feast publishes a guide on how to herd cats -- the sooner the better.

atomictango.com


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Ahava LeibtagThere is no doubt that the future of content is mobile delivery. Understanding what users want from traditional desktop delivered content vs. mobile content will be the next frontier for UX and content strategists to cross.

Studies geared toward accessing that information will be further refined and organizations will have to rethink content delivery in a whole new light. Defining a strategy will have to move towards understanding the different set of questions users come to mobile content with.

onlineitallmatters.blogspot.com

Paul GillinIn the B2B world, marketers are going to scramble to give away as much useful information as possible. Anecdotal evidence indicates that helpfulness translates into awareness which generates leads and sales. If you keep too much in-formation close to the vest, people just ignore you. Look for a lot of new white papers, ”how-to” guides, online courses and big info graphics. On the consumer side, it’ll be the year of the app. The Internet is going mobile in a big way and apps are the means of consumption. Every consumer brand is already thinking about how to create a mobile app that’s either useful or fun.

gillin.com

Jonathan KranzI suspect mobile will sustain its momentum throughout 2011 as handheld device and smart phone sales continue to rise.

As usual, marketers under intense pressure will panic, rushing out applications without pausing to think about strategy or relevance.

Expect lots of bizarre, “what were they thinking?” apps next year.

kranzcom.com

Andrew DaviesBrand marketers will grow increasingly sophisti-cated in their adoption of content marketing tools and techniques, and we are particularly expecting an uptick in the following elements:

Content Responsibilities:We expect to see brands to delineate roles and divisions that allow them to act more like media companies than brands, with editors/curators/mod-erators/journalists of various titles and descriptions.

Personalised Content Delivery:Content that is personalised or customised based on known audience taste, geography, or previous buying behaviour. Monitoring user-content interactions will be a method of insight reporting, and will feed back into the content delivery.

CRM Integration:Enterprise tools, particularly the brand CRM, will be integrated into the content production and analytics process, with insight on an individual user level logged back to CRM to inform future campaigns. This starts to close the feedback loop: content authoring, monitoring and insight generation, and the creation of better content using that insight.

Curated Content Tools:We are already seeing an increased adoption of tools that enable brands to quickly and easily curate external content to provide value for their customers.

idioplatform.com

Dianna HuffFacebook, Facebook, Facebook. Love it or hate it, Facebook is becoming more important to brand marketers with regard to distributing content.From posts announcing new products / services to those that link to new videos and other content, the Face-book ”Like” button and FB (Brand) Pages are now ubiquitous. (In fact, I keep wanting to hit the ”Like” button when reading people’s Tweets.) The danger, however, is using FB as simply another mass broadcast medium versus a very powerful and personal one-to-one marketing platform. Don’t like a brand’s posts? Just hit the ”unlike” link on their Page and no more messages.

dhcommunications.com


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Corinne SchmidGame Dynamics for Content. This will hit the circuit mid year as a mild rumbling as most companies aren’t close with social or collab yet. The digital/interactive/transmedia focused content creators will ramp quickly.

Gamification - what does this mean for content? It is the intersection of storytelling (creating the content narrative), leveraging the social infrastructure (safe to say, it’s universally adopted) and applying a game layer (dynamics & framework) that provides the content consumer with an immersive interaction where s/he can access, play, collaborate and interact with other content consumers.

twitter.com/itzCorinne

Heather Lloyd-Martin2011 should be a very exciting year for content marketing.

I see quite a few big-brand marketers embracing content marketing like never before. What’s interesting is that some of these big brand marketers ignored content marketing for the longest time - their Web copy was horrible, they had no search engine presence, their blog (if they had one) was more marketing speak than anything else.

Now, these ”we’re going to do it old school” companies are asking about video marketing. They want to write really good, engaging Web content. They’re using (and succeeding) with Twitter. Sure, many of them are still in DIY mode and doing what they can with the resources they have. But they’re doing it - and that’s the important thing.

Of course, some brand marketers will continue to ignore the opportunity - or go about it so horribly that they should back slowly away from their Twitter account and turn off their computer. Unless they have some other tried-and-true marketing trick up their sleeve, this ”head in the sand” approach is going to cost them (even more) market share.

What’s really fun is the opportunity that content marketing provides to the small/medium size business. Since these folks can implement on a dime, they can do some impressive things in a very short period of time. I know of one local traveling food cart owner who uses Twitter as his exclusive marketing channel. A Pilates studio drives new clients almost exclusively by maintaining a great blog. It’s great to see smaller businesses implement content marketing ideas and realize the financial benefit.

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Brian SolisIn 2011 the social media landscape will undergo an interesting transformation as it ushers in a genre of information commerce and the 3C’s of social content, creation, curation, and consumption. While blogging typically resides in the upper echelons of the social media hierarchy, new services further democratize the ability to publish and propagate information.

2011 is the year of information curation and the dawn of the curator. Curators introduce a new role into the pyramid of Information Commerce. The traditional definition of curator is someone who is the keep of a mu-seum or other collection.

In social media, a curator is the keeper of the interest graphs that are important to them. By discovering, organizing, and sharing relevant and interesting content from around the Web through their social streams of choice, curators invest in the integrity of their network as well as their relationships. Information becomes currency and the ability to recognize something of interest as well as package it in a compelling, consumable and also sharable format is an art.

Curators earn greater social capital for their role in qualifying, filtering, and refining the content introduced to the streams that connect their interest graphs.

Tools, networks and services that cater to the role of the curator will emerge, with several already leading the way. Storify, Curated.by, Pearltrees, and Paper.li are becoming the coveted services of choice amongst curators as they not only enable the repackaging and dissemination of information, they do so in captivating and engaging formats.

Like blog posts, curated content also represent social objects and curation services will spark conversations and reactions, while also breathing new life and extending the reach of existing content - wherever it may reside. Curators play an important role in the evolution of new media, the reach of information, and the social nicheworks that unite as a result.

briansolis.com

Richard BakerFacebook will continue to exert its influence on all things social but google will re-enter the game with their new product but fail to make significant headway.

Expect to see more social tie-in’s with tv as the two begin to converge. The ‘two screen consumer’ is here and brands will be keen to leverage existing customers through more product tie-ins. Common in the US, but less so in Europe and the UK.

conversational.ly

Pam KozelkaWhile I wholeheartedly agree that marketers are becoming publishers for their company, I see too that they understand that they may not be able to produce and distribute all the content necessary for positioning themselves as leaders. So in 2011 Iwe will continue to see brands looking to the experts for new ways to make their content stand out.

I hear a lot too that the marketers ‘get’ the need for content, but they are having a hard time convincing the upper management. So again, the marketers are going to look to the experts for how to ‘sell’ this to their boss.

junta42.com


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Adam Sherk1. In the publishing world the paid content trend will increase in 2011, with more content moving behind paywalls, metered models, subscriber archives, tablet and mobile apps, etc. Smart publishers will make sure this content is not completely excluded from discovery and sharing through search and social media.

2. Content will continue to be produced in volume on third-party (social) sites, but as a good percentage of it gets lost in the shuffle brand marketers will circle back a little and make sure they’re also producing ample content on their own sites (giving it greater potential for longevity).

adamsherk.com

Mark RobertsonBrand marketers will continue to leverage social media marketing in distributing content throughout 2011. BUT - Brands will turn more so to sight sound and motion in terms of creativeapproach - with social video.

reelseo.com

Mark McClureMagalogs for tablet devices (iPads) start to appear... both paywalled and free. Laid off print media journalists and designers who cross the digital divide begin to find their services in demand once again.

samuraiwriter.com

Ari HerzogTaking best practices from case studies in 2010 around mobile computing and location-based services, I think 2011 will reach new heights with cloud computing, virtualization, and open source tools.

ariwriter.com

Dan BlankContent creation and distribution in 2011 will all be about relationships, and establishing credibility and trust within communities.

Increasingly, brand marketers are working with their audience to create content that offers the perspective and insight of those they serve.

When the cost of distribution is often free, marketers will find unique value in communities, niches, and in building relationships with those they serve. These things cannot be purchased as a business may have done with advertising, and establishing these relationships can take time. What this means is that campaign-based marketing will not always work - trust must be earned over time, and the needs of the community must always be attended to.

Many brands will establish formal partnerships with willing members of their communities, some will recruit brand advocates, and others will work to become a trusted member of the community, not a brand whose goal is to pitch everyone with a marketing message.

The sooner brands begin building this trust, the sooner those relationships will form and begin showing them the world beyond ad spend and marketing campaigns.

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Marcus GrimmMore and more marketers will wish to bow before the altar of Apple, creating a slew of super-cool brand experiences in the way of Apps. That said, I’d actually expect that number to protract in 2012 when the marketers realize that ROI is still the ultimate cool kid at school.

Still, they’ll learn a lot and will be poised to create cool creative that’s also cost-conscious in the coming years.

nxtbookmedia.com

Keith WiegoldSmart marketers will shift the focus of their community building (through CRM efforts, Social Media, etc.) from transactional incentives to being centered around Engagement, lead by Content Marketing.

Imagine your CRM program segmented and led by how engaged your customers and prospects are with your brand, rather than how much they buy. A great content marketing program will create the ”reason why” behind more enterprise programs, building stronger brands and more valuable relationships.

nutlug.com

Debbie Williams Many of last year’s industry-wide predictions still haven’t played out, so hopefully those will really (finally) come to life!

I believe many businesses will merge their marketing, PR and communications teams into a cohesive content marketing group, integrating, managing and distributing content more effectively and consistently. Content practices including governance and measurement will also become standard and more tools for measuring and valuing content will be established.

More content-specific roles and companies will be developed as content expertise begins to grow and be further recognized (and hopefully appreciated). Brands will also value the importance of storytelling and recognize that storytelling, positioning, voice, and differentiation in content really matters. Content will be seen as an asset and necessity, not an expense or one-off.

sproutcontent.com

Geri StengelNonprofits are natural collaborators, by sharing tips and best practices, they move from dabblers to strategic users of social media in 2011, surpassing their for-profit counterparts in the effective use of social media. They do this by using measurement to improve their efforts.

Nonprofits may begin by using use social media to meet marketing objectives, but they will expand to using them for essential mission and business functions, such as advocacy, raising money, moblizing and coordinating people, and cause marketing.

ventureneer.com

WiseyNew media moves quickly and anything ‘same’ gets stale fast. So fast that brand marketers are going to have to find a new way to distribute content. They’re going to have to think outside the grid and find ways to connect with their audience that both surprise and delight.

But to be honest, content creation is starting to get stale in itself. If marketers don’t think beyond this and look at new ways to find connections with their audience, they will again get left behind.

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Heidi CohenContent marketing will continue to become more pervasive across brand marketers in 2011 due to its ability to convey useful information, engage prospects, and answer customer questions without feeling like promotional marketing speak.

It will become more effective as it moves beyond the marketing, PR and social media spheres of influence to be embraced throughout the organization. To this end, content marketing will require training, resources (human and budget) and senior management support.

HeidiCohen.com

Stephanie TiltonThe reality is that many marketers have yet to fully embrace the tenets of content marketing -- or ex-ecute on them effectively. So I don’t think we’ll see dramatic changes in content creation and distribution in 2011; rather, we’ll see a growing number of companies finally getting on board with best practices.

That said, we will likely see an evolution in the tools that marketers use, namely convergence of marketing automation and CRM systems. While marketing automation systems enable one-to-one engagement with prospects, CRM systems help manage prospects at the account level -- in other words, the committee of buyers that B2B organiza-tions must engage to make a sale. With these two systems merged, marketers will be empowered to correlate how their initiatives and activities ulti-mately contribute to revenues. A growing number of companies will create the role of Director of Content Marketing or the like.

The person in this position will be charged with devising and executing on a strategy that is in line with the company’s overall business objectives.At the same time, the systems used for marketing automation, inbound marketing, and CRM will converge to a greater degree. As a result, marketers will be empowered to track content consumption throughout the buying cycle -- and across buying committees in a single account -- and ultimately correlate this to revenue contribution.

tentonmarketing.com

Marc LaplanteVideo will be the most significant development of 2011. More industries will rely on video and mobile video. A lot of companies block YouTube and Facebook so that their employees don’t “waste time” watching video streams at work. But iPhone, iPad and Droid technology will fix that as more people will view video at work; just not from their company-issued computers.

assetperformancemanagement.com

Gordon PlutskyDeveloping content applications for the iPad and other tablets will become an important discipline to master. Its’ unique properties make it ideal for content distribution and creating action drivers for both online and offline retailers. More publishers will create content to be served locally via geo location technology.

The “experimental phase” of social media will come to an end as CEOs and marketers will start to demand ROI payback for the expense and time effort. The results must tie back to sales objectives, just creating “engagement” is not enough. Original content creation will be the key component to social media success.

Traditional media companies make a concerted effort to get into the content marketing game to stem the tide of lost advertising revenue. This will blur the lines between what was once “hands-off ” editorial content and custom content designed for and by brand marketers.

kingfishmedia.com


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Howard J. SewellPR agencies will begin to lose their monopoly on social media strategy as companies realize the true potential for blogging beyond simply brand awareness and (so-called) thought leadership.

Corporate blogs will start to play a major role in content marketing, customer communication, demand generation, and lead nurturing, helping marketers:

* drive search-generated traffic and net new sales leads* use targeted, insightful content to attract and engage with qualified prospects* expand the company’s leads database and community of followers* educate, cultivate, and nurture existing customers and prospects

spearmarketing.com

Christine B. WhittemoreContent marketing allows businesses to connect with potential customers, develop relationships with them and identify for them solutions that often prequalify them for doing business with you. No surprise if you’ve been paying attention to the chaos in the marketplace, the diminishing success of traditional based advertising programs and appreciate how customers are increasingly time constrained, marketing-skeptical and information overloaded. Savvy brand content marketers have noticed and taken action.

They have listened intensely to their markets and customers, uncovered critical issues for which they have solutions, and successfully created content where fluff and false claims have been replaced with meaningful, engaging and even entertaining material in the words customers use. They are convincing upper management that content marketing provides a direct connection to customers and that further success is a function of corporate buy-in.

Despite the pressure to create meaningful content, the more content marketing is adopted throughout an organization, becoming part of its culture, the more content creation can be distributed, too. Zappos comes to mind.

2011 will see more and better integration of content marketing within organizations. As organizations adopt the customer-focused attitude resulting from content marketing, they will expose the voice of the customer to the entire organization. In so doing, more people in the organization will be drawn into participating in the content creation process and the customer-feedback loop.

In fact, they will realize how it adds value and richness to their roles in the organization! Brand marketers may curate this content, but they will no longer be solely responsible for its creation.

SimpleMarketingNow.com


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Scott FrangosThe Content Marketing game will stretch to include “authentic connections” in the Social Media space, plus factor in conversion rate optimizations to the total tool set.

Good content will continue to engage prospects with your brand. But rather than just redistributing content automatically, more savvy marketers will use the “greeter in the booth” tactic to make real connections in social media -- simply redistributing content would be like having a tradeshow booth with literature but no people in it.

People buy from those they feel they know. Then, when visitors arrive at your site, Content Marketers will move beyond simply providing good content and focus more on what engaged visitors do leading up to a desired business outcome like becoming a sales lead.

The new formula is: Content Marketing PLUS Authentic Engagement in Social Media PLUS Conversion Rate Optimization at your Sites.

webfadds.com

Michael A StelznerProspects will demand more quality content in 2011 than ever before. It will be spurred by social media sites that allow social ranking and sharing of content.

The best information will be ‘commercial-free,’ and designed to educate and inform.

Those businesses who stand apart with outstanding content will thrive.

SocialMediaExaminer.com

Amanda MaksymiwIn 2011, brand marketers will be focused on improving customer engagement. It will be important for marketers to create written, audio, and video content so that customers can consume and engage with the content on their terms. Marketers will continue to focus on utilizing social media to identify and market to, through and with influencers in order to effectively reach their customers and potential customers.

blog.openviewpartners.com

Danny BrownBusinesses and brands will start to look at velvet rope content, to make theirs stand out from the crowd by not being part of the crowd.

If RIM, for example, would only realize they have one of the best list and marketing platforms around with its BBM service, they could truly tap a big market.

We’ll see less free sharing and more freemium content production, with episodic content to spread the return further. Additionally, mobile content will become far more ingrained and interactive as tablets and smartphones finally overtake laptops and WAP phones.

dannybrown.me


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Kevin “Nalts” NaltyI believe marketers are finally understanding that the “Viral Hail Mary” is less effective than smarter alternatives.

The Old Spice Isaiah Mustafa series proved that personalized videos for “online influencers” can amplify an advertising campaign. In 2011 watch for more brands engaging existing audiences by partnering with “weblebrities” (for instance, popular YouTube creators).

Brands can and should continue to create entertaining and educating promotion, but recognize that Budtv’s death wasn’t an accident. There will always be entertainers and advertisers, and it’s nearly impossible to do both well.

Finally the savvy brand marketers will broaden the form of its content to provide a consistent “look and feel” but appropriate to various mediums -- from websites and streaming video to short-form content that’s appropriate to mobile marketing.

beyondviral.com

Jeff KorhanSocial search will explode. This will help marketers to better understand the need to use social media less for broadcasting traditional business content, and more for encouraging engagement and interaction that creates more contextual and meaningful social graphs.

As a result, content marketing in all of its forms will become more relaxed and informal, with business in general being profoundly social.

jeffkorhan.com

Kaila StrongThe online world is constantly growing and expanding. In 2011 brand marketers will have to step up their game.

Creating interesting and innovative content using many mediums is just one piece of the puzzle. Effective strategies to promote your content will require not only social components, but also local components.

2011 is shaping up to have a local focus unlike any other year. Finding a way to integrate local into your content marketing efforts will make or break may brand marketers efforts in 2011.

verticalmeasures.com

Ambal S. BalakrishnanTitle: What is the appetizer for your Content?

Welcome to the era of content “snacking”.

Notice how we consume content as continuous feeds - blog posts, twitter updates, short podcasts, 2 minute videos etc?

Attention span is diminishing; as a result, content consumption is changing.

In order to alleviate information overload, we marketers will pre-package content with a brief summary . Example - Story Highlights (3-4 bullet points) for Cnn.com articles. This will allow our target audience (blog reader, potential client or customer) to get a flavor of the content before digging deeper to finding out more.

Respect your target audience’s time. Minimize your content. Provide an appetizer (catchy title, meaty summary) before inviting your reader to the full-course meal.

clickdocuments.com


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Chris WilsonThe Mobile eBook Art directors are going to be keeping busy in 2011. Not only will they be designing for print and web, but also for the iPad and other e-readers. I’m forecasting a huge boost in mobile eBooks. This content format, when executed properly, offers companies the ability to creatively and affectively deliver their content to potential customers via a multitude of vehicles. Customers’ expanded vehicle options will increase the number of eBook downloads. Oh... and I hear there are some pretty slick new design tools from Adobe that will make this product even sweeter!

custommedia.bnpmedia.com

Daniel BursteinBrand marketers will increasingly segment content based on device and location.

People no longer access digital content exclusively via computers. Brand marketers will segment and determine how important audiences that use tablet and mobile devices are to their sales, and for companies with signifcant niches of buyers from these audiences, expect an increased focus on content customized for iPads, iPhones, Android devices, and perhaps even Windows phones. So unless the Flash wars subside, programmers that know HTML5 will be in high demand.

Hand in glove with the increased use of portable devices is an ever-growing focus on location-based content. Marketers will customize their content so a potential customer in New York and a potential customer in Florida are each presented with highly customized content. Heck, its likely that someone on New York Avenue in Washington, D.C. will see different content from someone standing on Florida Avenue...at least from the savviest marketers.

Mass communication will further wilt away in 2011, replaced by niche communication. A huge improvement for the average consumer, and a massive challenge filled with rich rewards for the brand marketer.

twitter.com/#!/DanielBurstein

Simon KellySome brands will realize owning is better then rent-ing and start to create their own media channels. Better to be the content than adjacent to it.

Some brands will realize that the future of advertising is to outsource marketing to the audience & that they will gain a wider reach, with a deeper engagement for less spend.

Some brands will realize they can save the media business and start to rekindle expired, dormant or critically endangered titles by owning them (What am I to bid for Gourmet?)

Some brands will understand that they are nothing more than a story and brands that tell their story will win.

Most brands will do none of the above, not just yet anyway. Ask me again in 2012. Ho hum.

Postadvertising.com

Kevin Dugan2011 will be a year without silos.As the line between paid, owned and earned media continues to dissolve, we’ll see more roles changing. Chief Marketers and Chief Technology Officers will start to overlap more. Marketers will be required to understand technology more and how it impacts marketing. Social media will still be messy -- it’s not something you can map out using PowerPoint’s Smart Art. In fact, we’ll see more examples in 2011 that social media can be paid, owned and/or earned. And the more marketers understand this -- instead of focusing in their comfort zone -- the more successful they’ll be in 2011.

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Paul DunayI think smart Social marketers will be using content to create engagement on Facebook so they can rank higher in Facebook’s algorithm that determines how you appear on individual News Feeds (the landing page when you log into Facebook)

This is a growing science I like to call News Feed Optimization (NFO) which will become the new SEO in 2011!

pauldunay.com

Gavin HeatonThere’s going to be a whole lot more fragmentation as businesses begin to create secure b2b social networks that serve the particular needs of their customers.

This will drive a renewed focus on quality content - as leading businesses seek to build trust and a sense of authority by becoming what we might call “semi-transparent” (open, but only to selected customers/partners).

servantofchaos.com

Rex HammockYou will start thinking the word “social” is so last decade: Maybe this is just wishful thinking, but I’ve been saying the following for about three years: When you start calling everything “social,” then you don’t need the word social.

So, if every page on the Internet has “like” buttons and comment boxes and at least two ways to join or see what friends have visited that page, is there really a need to use the word “social” anymore?

hammock.com

David ReichSocial media will be used more, with Facebook getting experimentation by brand marketers as they continue to search for the unique content mix that works for them. As so many more smartphones come on line, we’ll also see more branded apps out there.

And, of course, many will keep looking for the holy grail of a video that will go viral and get hundreds of thousands or even millions of hits.

reichcomm.typepad.com

Navneet Kaushal2011 is going to see more and more brand marketers use social media sites like Facebook and Twitter to distribute their content.Distribution means exposure and these two sites coupled with easy RSS feeds.

Following will help on choosing where to distribute:

Try to notice any particular preferences within the target audience/readers in their social web participation?

Do they prefer particular sites? (Twitter vs Face-book – blogs vs forums)Do they comment, do they contribute content, do they tend to observe, do they not participate at all?

And as always, keep an eye on the stats, see which one works for you well and keep tweaking/posting accordingly.

pagetraffic.com


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Lisa ThorellOn the B2C front, 2011 open with Apple TV, Google TV, Microsoft TV, the Boxee Box and other initiatives - all vying for position in the 5-year War for the Digital Living Room.

In their wake, the traditional broadcast TV hard-ware and programming markets will be disrupted and a new tide of player will emerge: Indie low-cost video production and distribution houses, new hardware OEMs, app design houses creating software for discovering content, connecting with friends while TV viewing to many othe yet-to-be-imagined Social TV experiences.

Much as we see in NBA Digital today, 2011’s successful TV content producers will be rewarded for developing a cross-platform digital asset strategy, encompassing TV, PC notebooks, smart phones, iPad/tablets to gaming consoles.

Just as important, successful content producers will increasingly directly involve the audience in their story creation via Facebook, Twitter and YouTube social networks.

offthegrid-pr.com

Eileen SuttonThe financial crisis may have a modest silver lining. Many financial marketers are now on the hunt for copy that is plain spoken. They understand the value of fresher brand content that speaks in a more transparent, more inviting voice across channels. Marketers are dusting off and reinventing client communications like long, indirect letters, overly complex emails, and Help copy that often reads, negatively, as a brand’s fine print. They are committing resources to hiring the right creative vendors so the talk is straight. I think this trend will deepen in 2011, as the financial industry, broadly, works to repair trust.

suttoncreative.com

Paul GillinIn the B2B world, marketers are going to scramble to give away as much useful information as possible. Anecdotal evidence indicates that helpfulness translates into awareness which generates leads and sales. If you keep too much information close to the vest, people just ignore you. Look for a lot of new white papers, ”how-to” guides, online courses and big info graphics. On the consumer side, it’ll be the year of the app. The Internet is going mobile in a big way and apps are the means of consumption. Every consumer brand is already thinking about how to create a mobile app that’s either useful or fun.

gillin.com

Jeremy VictorQuite honestly, I believe most brand marketers will continue creating and distributing content in 2011 in the same manner as they always have. Creating brochures and web sites filled with features and benefits and talking about themselves and their products. Remaining oblivious to the evolving nature of marketing and communication in the real-time world.

I am not sure I have an answer why this will be the case, just that is what I am predicting for most marketers.

Now, for the growing minority of brand marketers, I predict a focus on creating and distributing content centered on three questions:

1. What their customers like (via buyer personas)2. Where their customers are (both in the buying process and the social web)3. What their customers know (using lead scoring and behavioral analytics to determine the right content to deliver at the right time)

Buyers are a lot more sophisticated which translates into them having much higher expectations of a brand. Getting the right information in the hands of buyers at the right time AND place is how brand marketers will focus in 2011.

b2bbloggers.com


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Tia PetersonCompanies will finally start to create content that is of significant value to their audience.

I also predict that some of the old, tried and true aspects of marketing, such as (ahem) market research and planning, will come back into focus, and companies won’t be as quick to jump on shiny new band wagons.

webbedinkinc.com

Joanne GreyMy opinion is that print, radio, and television advertising will point consumers towards online content, and these traditional forms of advertising will continue to be cheaper and snappier.

Marketing spend will increase in the content area, but I believe that organisations will focus more on increasing their budget in order to track and measure the response to online content.

spottedwombat.com

Chris WilsonGamificationThis is my pick for the buzzword of 2011. But buzzword or not, the concept of gamification is something that brand marketers should know and understand. To put it simply, gamification is adding mechanics typically used to keep people engaged while playing a game to other processes. Gamifi-cation isn’t anything new to marketing. After all, customer rewards programs have been around for decades and are built on an achievement model often used in games. Do X a certain number of times and you will be rewarded with Y and move up to the next level.

Game mechanics will find new life in 2011, as consumers become more and more connected to people and information through their mobile de-vices. The ubiquity of this connection will create an opportunity for brands to keep consumers engaged with regular branded content.

Mobile provides consumers a way to escape by dipping in and out of these connections throughout the day. They can easily take a five minute break to check what’s going on with their friends and family on Facebook, and later take another break to keep tabs on their Fantasy team.

Smart brands will find a way into this behavior by applying game mechanics to marketing programs and content, keeping users coming back again and again.

freshpeel.com

Newt BarrettOutsourcing be the name of the content marketing game in 2011 for SMB brand marketers. Lack of time, talent, and specialized skills will drive more and more marketers to third party specialists.

Developing and deploying a solid content strategy will become ever more challenging because of the need to use a variety of content methods such as websites, e-books, eNewsletter’s, video, as well as an ever-changing universe of social media. Moreover, effective SEO copywriting requires the integration of both creative and technical skills that are rare within an SMB.

This will be good news for third-party content marketing specialists and for those displaced journalists who are ready to learn new skills and put them to work on behalf of SMB’s.

ContentMarketingToday.com


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Ann HandleyCreating content is critical—but it’s not enough. In 2011, companies will increasingly understand that content that really “rules” must be the right sort of content: It shares or solves, and doesn’t shill. It speaks human. It shows, not tells. It stokes a campfire of conversation. And it may even do something completely unexpected.

contentrulesbook.com

Craig HodgesThe battle for search will heat up between Facebook and Google. There will be no doubt that all digital content will now need to satisfy three masters: the user, Google and now Facebook.

kingcontent.com.au

Vince GiorgiA couple of issues to watch in 2011:1) To what degree content marketers strike greater balance between giving content away vs. requiring registration. The notion of ”gating” vs. ”ungating” content is a big hurdle for many corporate marketers to get over. The common reaction: ”You mean I’m going to spend all this time and money creating great content, and I’m not even going to collect names and contact info in return?!” Yet, marketers who require registration for all of their content run the risk of being perceived as engaging in yet another form of marketing ”at” their audiences. The kind of marketing consumers and B-to-B buyers have shown themselves inclined to avoid, even disdain.

2) It’ll be interesting to see what happens with mar-keting and sales strategies that are based on track-ing and follow-up as a person is visiting a website. The FTC is making rumblings about ”do not track” regulations. Meanwhile, at a personal level, I’m not convinced many people will welcome call or e-mails from sales reps that start with, ”I noticed you’re visiting our website right now...”

Content can be powerful as an engagement catalyst and a relationship builder when it at least appears to spring from a marketer’s sincere desire to offer something relevant and valuable ”for” the customer or potential customer. Excessive content registra-tion, and online behavioral tracking that crosses a line to become overt and intrusive, would seem to run counter to that ideal.

hanleywoodmarketing.com

Gabrielle RosarioBrand marketers will start paying more attention to curators of content as they now start playing the role of the influencer. The curator is that individual who scours, finds, consumes and then gives the rest of us what ”we need to know.” If a brand is clever and has the resource, they might actually seed their own curators (not content generators) to start trawling for relevant content and employ them to use that to continue building relationships with consumers.

Happy Curating!

gabriellerosario.com

Eric Ingrand1- I bet that branded online Video Marketing in-cluding more precise optimization of Video scripting text and clear distribution strategies will boom.

2- Specific Smart Phones and tablet content marketing productions will boom and results will be higher than any expectations.

3- Multilingual content management and SEO will become a specific part of online marketing yearly budget.

enveritasgroup.com

Sarah KraftBrand marketers are at different stages of adoption for online content. Cutting Edge: Shifting written/magazine content to Mobile Apps + gaining a presence on Foursquare . Going Mainstream: Facebook contests and ”How To” PDFs, Podcasts and Videos. Oldies by Goodies: ”Top Ten” blogs and targeted niche e-newsletters.

meaningfulmarketing.wordpress.com


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Drew McLellanI have two hopes/predictions for 2011 but they’re interwoven.

First -- I believe 2011 is the year that small busi-nesses will really begin to see the light re: content marketing and understand it is their way to not only differentiate themselves but also compete with the big boys.

Second -- I believe small business will harness the hyper-local aspects of Facebook and it will become the hub of their content distribution. They’ll use it to create a fan base, run ads to drive trial and sales, share content (even if the content is housed on a website or blog), create a customer service center and listening post.

The ability to segment out and genuinely talk to a very niche audience and have multiple touch points is what small businesses have been looking for.

They thought they had to drive people to them -- hopefully 2011 will be the year they realize they can go where the people already gather and talk to them there.

drewsmarketingminute.com

Russell SparkmanWith significant progress having been made in 2010 in the area of educating marketers that content is crucial to successful contemporary marketing, focus will gradually shift from “why” and more toward “how” to create branded content in 2011. This will force new thinking in the traditional relationships between ad or PR agencies and their clients, as agency clients will need to become more active “publishers.”

The agencies will get this first and adjust accordingly, some faster than others. However, the friction will be on the client side, as unfamiliarity with the costs and value proposition of quality custom content will slow things down.

However, case studies will emerge in early 2011 that are supportive of the fact that content investments are key to social media success, and to delivering excellent return on investment for every dollar spent.

By the end of 2011, a marketer not having a content-related marketing strategy will be more the exception than the rule.

fusionspark.com

Valeria MaltoniThere is still opportunity for those brand marketers who didn’t rediscover the power of sophisticated email list management in 2010.

Opt-in is the most powerful form of content distribution for marketers to follow their customers. And email use as a tool to get things done is stable, particularly among decision-makers. It also remains low-noise compared to social networks. Metrics are easy to manage, and lists can be very granular.

How else will people be exchanging content in 2011?

Twitter and other existing social media channels should be used to be social, engage people, and point them to the list, which is where conversions happen.

In 2010, we saw more people offering information products. Smart companies are also retooling their teams to attract organic search, both by publishing original, high value content, and becoming useful filters, curating the best content from customer communities.

The key will be finding that happy medium between customer utility and brand value proposition.

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Paul ConleyI’m not much of a futurist. But I’m pretty good at spotting a trend in its early stages. And what I’m noticing in the world of B2B content where I make my living is a new obsession with quality.

Here’s why: Now that seemingly every marketer in the world is producing content, there are just too many voices competing for attention.

And what were once the loudest voices in any given B2B market have faded. In every industry there has always been at least one brand from a traditional publisher that could make a legitimate claim to being ”the bible of the industry.” But is that still true in the verticals you follow? It’s certainly not true in the spaces that consume my attention.

Content marketers did a good job in recent years of stepping into the vacuum left by traditional publishers. Now the vacuum has been filled -- but content marketers are still pouring in. As 2010 ends, we have a cacophony of voices -- brands, social-media gurus, bloggers, Web-only publishers, trade associations, aggregation services, etc. -- in even the tiniest niches.

That’s why the only way to be heard now is by being extraordinarily good. Your brand name won’t get you there. Volume won’t get you there. The days when producing even ”good” content could make you a major player are over.

Smart marketers are responding accordingly. I’m seeing truly wonderful, high-quality content coming from a number of B2B brands. And they’re paying good money to produce it.

This will continue through 2011. The smartest companies will hire the most talented journalists, designers and coders they can find to run their content-marketing efforts. The smartest companies will continue to buy brand-name publications from traditional B2B publishers. The smartest companies will hire chief content officers who can attract and keep the high-level players needed to compete in a crowded content space.

The smartest companies, in other words, will become more than content marketers, they will become the bibles of their industries.

paulconley.com

Mario MedinaMedia companies will continue trying to find ways to charge for content, and consumers will keep right on being perfectly happy not paying for it.

Smart companies will continue using custom content (content marketing) as their most effective form of advertising/marketing, and their customers will keep right on enjoying informative, compelling (and free) content.

I still will not have a jet pack, a robot maid or an implant in my skull that allows me to instantly learn Kung Fu, and I will keep right on waiting.

madisonmilesmedia.com

Barbara RozgonyiIn 2010, creating and distributing content advanced from a to-do list item to a top priority. With budgets and attention in place, 2011 will be a year where frequency, quality and relevancy not only matter, but will be essential to maintaining a competitive edge. Brand marketers will stretch out creatively to reach collaborators within their customer community with spokespersons who represent and model the brand in real life. Events will be created as content-drivers that leverage multiple networks all at once for long-reach playback.

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Paul GillinIn the B2B world, marketers are going to scramble to give away as much useful information as possible. Anecdotal evidence indicates that helpfulness translates into awareness which generates leads and sales. If you keep too much information close to the vest, people just ignore you. Look for a lot of new white papers, ”how-to” guides, online courses and big info graphics. On the consumer side, it’ll be the year of the app. The Internet is going mobile in a big way and apps are the means of consumption. Every consumer brand is already thinking about how to create a mobile app that’s either useful or fun.

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Barbara RozgonyiIn 2010, creating and distributing content advanced from a to-do list item to a top priority. With budgets and attention in place, 2011 will be a year where frequency, quality and relevancy not only matter, but will be essential to maintaining a competitive edge.

Brand marketers will stretch out creatively to reach collaborators within their customer community with spokespersons who represent and model the brand in real life. Events will be created as content-drivers that leverage multiple networks all at once for long-reach playback.

wiredprworks.com






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Tom PiselloThe “consumerization” of B2B marketing is upon us, and this will have important implications into 2011 and beyond for marketing strategies and budgets:

1. Internet Fueled Buying Cycles– In the B2C space, the Internet has dramatically impacted how books, apparel, electronics, music, cars and other goods are bought and sold. The consumer is now in charge: researching specifications, configuring and customizing solutions, getting peer reviews and advice, comparing prices, and “buying now”. During the B2C Internet revolution many a vendors world was turned upside down by failing to recognize and invest in the fundamental shift towards empowering consumers with content and buying tools. Similarly in B2B we have seen a dramatic shift towards prospects taking charge of the buying cycle, using on-line content marketing, resources and tools to drive research, comparisons and purchase decisions. As well, sales professionals are seen as less important and valuable in the decision making process, being invited later and later in the buying cycle, often after decisions have already been made. 2. It’s Only a Matter of Trust – B2B buyers will rely more and more on your on-line presence to make a judgment as to whether they will do business with you, and this presence needs to overcome typical vendor skepticism, convey credibility and gain trust. Does your company have the brand affinity, endorsements, reviews and validation needed to create trust? Buyers rely on peers, analysts and independent publications to identify credible resources, and more investments in content and contributions from these sources will be required.

3. Information Overload –even though B2B buyers are relying more on the Internet to fuel purchase decisions, these buyers are being inundated with more marketing messages over more channels than ever before, leading to information overload, confusion, and stalled decision making cycles. Better content targeting and personalization is required to end “carpet bombing” B2B marketing techniques, evolving to create a dialogue with buyers to guide them through the decision making process and buying lifecycle with personalized one-to-one advice.

4. Fight Frugalnomics – with two economic downturns over the past decade, B2B buyers are focused more than ever on what solutions are available to enable “doing-more-with-less”, driving savings and realizing quantifiable bottom-line impact. Even with a continued recovery in 2011, the shift to frugality is fundamental and permanent. This means even more investments in content and tools that help buyers assess and quantify the economic impact of implementing the proposed solutions, quantify the cost of “doing nothing”, and prove competitive cost advantages and value.

alinean.com

Graeme Harrison2011 will be the year that brands effectively create and distribute content for the non-web. The web isn’t dead, but brands now have to think long and hard about engaging with their target market on The Splinternet.

The challenge is creating and distributing engaging content to an audience that are regularly connected to the internet but rarely the web.

The majority of brand campaigns will have an app on Apple’s platform, and almost every brand campaign will have a Facebook Page, but the difficulty for these brands is to achieve cut through on these platforms - presence isn’t enough.

graemeharrison.typepad.com