As the digital industry continues to evolve, new skills, expertise, and experience must continually be added to the core competencies of any organization looking to keep pace. This is particularly true for professionals in content marketing — a discipline too new on the scene to have an established career path yet, or even a clear consensus on what it will take to advance the industry and its practitioners.
CMI asked a few of the experts who will be presenting at this year’s Content Marketing World to share their answers to the question, “What is the best advice you’ve ever received about having a career in content marketing?“
Here are their recommendations on what it takes to excel in a content marketing job:
The best advice I received is to always provide useful information and never forget about the reader. Although content helps our business grow, it would be impossible without the support of customers.
The best advice I’ve ever heard is always listen before speaking, look outside of your industry/space for new ideas, and don’t be afraid of experimenting and failure.
Don’t wait. Just start doing it!
The best advice I ever received was to spend time learning the business model and strategy of the company you work for/with. Content marketing can only be successful if you understand how it fits into the bigger picture of your organization.
“Are you sure that is a real career?” – My dad
I don’t recall getting any advice on this, ever. Most people are looking for help and direction with content marketing, so usually I tell the story of content marketing as it relates to my organization. I built my marketing team and scaled it around a content marketing strategy.
“Show me, don’t tell me.” I picked up this gem from my 10th grade English teacher, and it’s as applicable today as it was then. It’s particularly helpful when explaining technical or “foreign” concepts. Illustrating a point with an analogy is one example. For instance, I am often asked what a social community is, and how one can be built. Rather than saying “It’s the people that follow and engage with you on your various social media channels,” I explain by sharing something they can relate to: “It’s just like a real life social circle. People will hang out with you if they have similar interests and get along well with you.”
“Show me” also applies to demonstrating products — instead of just showing the product, show the application — let the results speak for themselves. If you are marketing a service, showcase jobs you’ve done and focus on testimonials. Nothing sells your product/service better than a happy customer!
This is a difficult question to answer, since I’ve never received advice about a career in content marketing. I now realize that most of my life I’ve been doing content marketing, but the approach, based on offering helpful, relevant buying information, never really had a name, though several were tried.
Names like “knowledge marketing” and “education marketing” were tried, but didn’t adequately describe the philosophy and the process that many pioneers intuitively followed (while everybody else was having “50 percent off!” sales.)
One of the most important services that the Content Marketing Institute provided was to give a name and legitimacy to what early content marketers did as a matter of obviousness, since the results made so much sense in the marketplace.
The best advice — and it’s not new advice, but it’s so easy to lose sight of — is to create every day.
The way to get past a creative block is to power through it. Write, record a short video, sketch, build something. Just don’t let the millions of daily distractions out there keep you from flexing that content muscle every day. Creativity begets creativity.
Get to know Joe Pulizzi.
My boss once told me that the most valuable thing in my wallet is my library card, and he was right.
I’m at the library once a week, checking out the new books and magazine articles on a broad range of topics. Sometimes you need to go back to the source material, and there’s plenty of stuff out there that’s not on the internet.
The public library is a great way to be a life-long learner. The library makes it easy to just try something new and not feel pressured to make a purchase. And if it’s really good, I can choose to buy a personal copy, so I can highlight it or share it.
Be nice to people on your way up — you may be meeting them again on your way down!
The best piece of business advice I have ever gotten works for a career in content marketing as well: Hire people smarter than you. If you are managing a content team, or you need to hire people to create content, or you have to create content for multiple tactics, then you are going to need help. And who better than people who are smarter than you and who are trained to do what you need. You need a video? Hire someone who does it well. Need to plan an event? Hire an event planner. Need an infographic? Hire
Joe K! 🙂 The reality is that you cannot do it all, so build the team with the best talent.
I moved away from a career in journalism in 1996, right around the time the web was taking off. Devoting a career at the time to working entirely online was something some would have considered a risk. Two years ago, I had a similar opportunity entering the world of content marketing. I have no doubt that I’ve made the right decision.
Have you received any essential words of wisdom from your own colleagues and mentors on your content marketing career? We would love for you to share your content marketing career advice in the comments, below.
Don’t miss additional insights and information from our fabulous roster of speakers at Content Marketing World 2013. Register now.
Cover image via Bigstock
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