I was recently invited to speak at Australia’s largest digital marketing conference in Melbourne last week - DMAC 2020.
My specific topic was ‘How to Leverage Video to Position Yourself as an Authority’ which seemed to be a timely subject as the room was filled to capacity with some attendees and speakers, unable to find room to stand.
But what I think is of more value is not so much my talk exactly, but more how my piece of the ‘content puzzle’ fits within the rest of ‘social media picture’ at large.
Currently digital focus seems to be metric-centered - by this I mean, we’re valuing the statistics of likes, shares, views and comments - we translate this as ‘engagement’ and in turn invest hundreds, thousands and in some cases hundreds of thousands of dollars into ‘pay to play’ in order to optimise SEO algorithms and be seen by as many as possible.
This math has be proven to be effective, to a point, up until now.
My talk was specifically about using video to build authority, ie: trust with our audience.
The focus was more on the quality and effect of content in order to create the desired outcome.
That, fortunately/unfortunately, trust was not a direct measurable metric but the payoffs were longer lifetime value of an audience, higher R.O.I vs. C.O.A and most valuable of all, authority content engenders positive word of mouth; the most effective form of marketing which is (conveniently) 100% free.
Over the three days there were a multitude of business leaders, SEO experts, Content Kings and Queens and a many, many data analysts.
It was illuminating to hear what they had to say and get an insight into how the neighbours live.
What bubbled to the service was a general consensus that while SEO and algorithms had been effective up until recently, the landscape was also shifting dramatically.
There is more content than ever before (and this will not slow down).
There are more content creators.
More platforms to share content on.
And they all have access to the same SEO tools and algorithms.
So with the competitive field levelling out and ‘pay to play’ starting to hit its limit… it was refreshing to hear other digital experts validate a long held concept of mine.
What is the one key ingredient that is wholly within your control and unique to you?
Creative.
Your creative content is the one variable that cannot be mimicked, copied or reproduced.
It uniquely defines you and your service.
And with SEO algorithms beginning to adapt to audience UX, they are starting to prefer original (video) content over something the system has seen before.
With this information, a savvy digital marketer could save hundreds, thousands, even hundreds of thousands in SEO marketing, by funnelling a small percentage of the budget into creative development instead.
By issuing original creative content to your audience, not only do you benefit from everything mentioned above, the ROI of original video content now becomes exponential as it is more likely to be prioritised and viewed by, not just your audience, but the audience outside your immediate echo chamber… and this is where the true value of marketing plays into your growth.
#appliedcreativity #rebelcreative #blackbulbcreative #innovation #mediastrategy #creativity #thoughtleader #author
Founder + Director of Black Bulb Creative
Christopher. S. Sellers is a Keynote Speaker + Author on Creativity + Innovation.