Nov 11, 20173 min read

This Week in Content Marketing: Is There a Crisis in Content Marketing?

PNR: This Old Marketing with Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose can be found on both iTunes and Stitcher. If you enjoy our show, we would love it if you would rate it or post a review on iTunes.

In this week’s episode

This week, Robert ponders how we handle filling big shoes. We discuss recent reader revenue moves from CNN and the Guardian, and why Facebook may have nothing to fear from ad blockers. In other news, we debate whether content marketing is in crisis or on the verge of its biggest opportunity yet. Our rants and raves cover audience building and how the flight to video could hurt publishers; then we close with an example of the week on the Electric Boat Company.

Download this week’s PNR: This Old Marketing podcast

Show details

(00:01): An advertising blast from the past: “Buster Brown Shoes”
(00:30): Robert muses on this week’s theme: How big are the shoes you have to fill?
(05:25): Welcome to Episode 208: Recorded live on November 5, 2017 (Running time: 1:05:08)
(06:45): Content Marketing Master Classes – Our multi-city tour is returning for another round of in-depth content marketing training. Starting on November 6, we’ll be making stops in Boston; New York; Washington, DC; Seattle; San Francisco; Chicago; Atlanta; and Austin, Texas. Robert and I would love to see you there, so register today.

content-marketing-institute-master-class-schedule (1)

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The quick hits – Notable news and trends

(11:11): CNN plans commerce and new subscription-based service; Guardian boasts 500k paying supporters and subscribers. (Sources: Variety; Press Gazette)
(22:34): Ad blocker’s successful siege on Facebook enters its second month. (Source: AdAge)

The deep dive – Industry analysis

(31:15): Content marketing in crisis. (Source: EFF Works)

Rants and raves

(47:13): Robert’s commentary: We’ve spoken on many occasions about consultancies competing for the creative services business historically serviced by agencies. However, this must-read Digiday article offers two compelling explanations for why this is happening that Robert hadn’t considered before.
(50:23): Robert’s rave: A new Medium post offers a fantastic perspective on the subject of growing an audience; in particular, Robert felt the author, Josh Spector, hit the nail right on the head when he characterized subscribed audiences as, “the number of people you can count on to consume your next creation.“
(52:38): Joe’s commentary: This Ars Technica post has little to do with content marketing – except for something interesting I noticed in the comments. The site doesn’t typically do much with video content; but because a video was included in this case, it opened up a Pandora’s box of complaints about its execution – including the lack of a transcript and issues with the media player. Though Senior Technology Editor Lee Hutchinson commented with some valid reasons for the absence of a transcript, the rest of his response raised some greater strategic concerns, in my mind.

This Old Marketing example of the week

(59:17): Electric Boat Company: Isaac Rice and John Holland founded The Electric Boat Company in 1899 to build the first submarines for the United States. After Holland’s death, the company reorganized, becoming known as the Submarine Boat Corporation in 1915. But in the spirit of Holland’s original vision, the company soon launched a weekly thought-leadership driven publication called Speed Up, as a way to educate the market on all the technical details involved in building boats and submarines. One issue Robert discovered included a foreword written by American steel magnate Charles M. Schwab, and other industry influencers contributed to the publication on a weekly basis. Through the years, a number of mergers and acquisitions tossed the company back and forth, but it finally landed on solid ground as the Electric Boat division of the U.S. defense contractor now known as General Dynamics. It’s a wonderful example of how content marketing can keep a company afloat – even as it sails through rough seas.