Green Bay Couldn’t Win With Field Goals, and Neither Can Content Marketers

Jan 2015

Photo: blogs.seattletimes.com

For us NFL football fans, Sunday’s NFC Championship Game between the Green Bay Packers and the Seattle Seahawks was one for the ages.

In the first half of the game, the Pack scored 4 times for a total of 16 points — 1 touchdown, 3 field goals — while the Hawks remained scoreless.

Fast-forward to the end of overtime, and Green Bay had 22 points on the board — 1 touchdown, 5 field goals.

It wasn’t enough. Why? Because they were playing a team that knew how to score touchdowns.

Time after time, the Packers came within reach of the end zone, only to settle for 3 points instead of 7. As my hubby remarked after the third time the ball sailed through the uprights, head shaking, “All these field goals are gonna come back to bite ’em in the a**.” He was right.

Are We Settling for Field Goals?

As content marketers with busy schedules, it’s easy to get into a checklist mentality. As long as we can check that blog post, that podcast, that weekly video tip off our lists, we figure we’re good.

The question to ask ourselves is this: Are we scoring touchdowns, or are we just getting points on the board?

Now, don’t get me wrong — there’s nothing wrong with creating good journeyman content that fills a basic need: the top 10 lists, the roundup posts, the basic how-tos. They’re important. They keep our content pipeline full. They feed our SEO. But by themselves, they’re not enough.

We need to supplement those “field goals” with our equivalent of the touchdown.

Why We Need Touchdowns

So, what do “touchdowns” look like for us content marketers? Content that not only serves your audience — it elevates your conversation with them to a whole new level, and it elevates you above the rest of the noise.

A post that makes an innovative connection between your main topic and a seemingly unrelated but popular subject (say, content marketing and football)
An insightful, well-researched post on an emerging issue that’s important to your audience
An in-depth interview with an industry expert whom your audience respects
A one-of-a-kind white paper based on your own original research

As I pointed out in last week’s post, 2015 will be the year that content marketers will have to dig deep and go for quality.

In other words, content marketers who can only crank out field goals will not survive. The future belongs to those who can score touchdowns.

OK, your turn: How is your content marketing team going to “score more touchdowns” in 2015? Tell us about it in the Comments — we’d love to hear from you!

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