Compelling Content is the New Advertising

As more and more companies adopt and incorporate social media into their overall marketing structure, understanding of what makes social media marketing effective is spreading. Back in the day, most companies would consider the "social media box" checked if they found a young, college graduate to set up a Twitter account. Now, a more sophisticated, strategic approach is being rolled out in many places...

We at Strategic have always said that creating and aggregating compelling, value added content was one of the keys to successfully building and engaging with a targeted audience. You company has just as much right to a computer screen as the New York Times, but if your content stinks, guess who is going to get the traffic. Your content has to be the Three E's: engaging, education and entertaining. And it has to be distributed to the right folks in the appropriate way. Tweeting your latest press release is a waste of time.

More and more people are getting on board with this approach. Check out this latest post from Copyblogger, "3 Steps to Foolish Online Advertising" (I highly suggest reading the whole thing...)

Remember this first and foremost – educate first and foremost. Give people something they can use, and they’re primed for more value. And that’s exactly what the Motley Fool report does.
While delivering on its promise and providing value, it becomes clear that this information is just the tip of the iceberg, and clearer that deeper analysis is valuable and worth paying for. That’s the natural point to make an offer – when people have been educated enough to do business with you.

Do You Have to Pay for Advertising?

Absolutely not. We’ve been preaching for almost five years that compelling content is the new advertising, thanks to the fact that compelling content spreads for free via social media.
People actually want content.

Compelling content is the new advertising. Compelling content is the new marketing. Compelling content is the new...everything.