Content Marketing World 2020: Takeaways from Joe Pulizzi keynote
With the pandemic changing the marketing landscape, brands and marketers have been left wondering what they can do to not only better engage with their audience but broaden their reach as well. Founder of Content Marketing Institute – Joe Pulizzi – addressed this and more during his keynote – Where do we go from here? Disney, Diversification and The New Marketing Business Model – at Content Marketing World 2020.
The entrepreneur and author kickstarted his session with a personal experience from years ago when he bought stocks in what was at the time considered an up and coming tech company. Unfortunately, his investment tanked and Pulizzi, as many investors learn at some point, learned not to put all his eggs in one basket. It was also the time that he learned more about diversifying investments; building on one asset and then using it to branch out into other assets. This lesson, he says, can be successfully applied to content marketing.
Create strategic diversification for broader engagement with audiences
Pulizzi explained that a critical aspect of content marketing is that value comes from audiences. By investing in creating consistent content, brands can grow an audience that can be monetized, thus, increasing the value of the asset over time. A prime example of this, he pointed out, was the Disney Company, founded by animator and entrepreneur – Walt Disney. Through strategic diversification, Disney expanded its reach from books to studios to theme parks, leveraging each brand extension to push the next.
With over 40% of Disney’s revenue coming from its theme parks, the current pandemic and lockdown situation would have ideally spelt disaster for the brand. But the company’s impeccable sense of diversification saw the launch of Disney+ in 2019, a video-on-demand streaming service, whose library includes content from Marvel, ESPN and several others, that probably saved its revenues from plummeting completely.
Likewise, Pulizzi explained, for marketers, there are two types of diversification – Channel and Goal. And the most important new skill that content marketers need to learn right now is the art of media acquisition. This, he said, could help develop three crucial types of media marketing revenues – Win, Grow and Keep.
New marketing model
Building on this strategic diversification, Pulizzi added that marketers need to shift their focus toward a model that includes acquiring assets first and diversifying later. Pointing out that it has already been successfully done by several brands, buying content media assets – whether blogs or other platforms – and then using it to branch into other assets could help marketers reach newer audiences and build multiple revenue channels along the way.