If your experience is like mine, “breaking through the noise” to reach buyers is getting harder and harder.
We are seeing companies produce great content and still feel like they are struggling to capture mindshare.
It is for this reason that I was thrilled to learn in a recent conversation with Jennifer Griffin Smith, Chief Marketing Officer at Brightcove, that there is a solution.
“Your goal should not be to produce individual videos or individual content items,” says Smith, “but to deliver a streaming-first content strategy. Think about content as part of a series. If we think about content like a media company would think about content, we will create more targeted, more relevant experiences delivered in a format that is how people are used to consuming information – in a Netflix-like experience.”
Jennifer notes because many companies have failed to shift to a streaming-first content strategy, “they are not getting the same return on their digital spend. Instead they are spending in many places, often getting outcompeted, and are left trying to figure out how to break through.”
Jennifer’s path to a streaming-first content strategy consists of four key steps.
- Exploration 🧭
For many teams, COVID accelerated experimentation. Most teams tried to break through with video and other forms of content across a variety of channels, including their website, SEO, pay per click, AdWords, YouTube, etc.
“They were often outcompeted,” says Smith. “But that’s OK if they understand this exploratory phase as inputs to a broader strategy that can be developed through measurement. Teams should never be afraid to just get started.”
Exploration of content channels and types turns into value when coupled with measurement.
- Measurement 📏
As exploration starts to turn into a content strategy that connects multiple departments and multi channels, the two most important types of measurement in Jennifer’s view are efficiency of content production and proficiency of audience engagement.
“It is common for efficiency to drop as you move across the organization and bring in other departments,” continues Smith. “So you want to identify those channels and content types that help you become more proficient in engaging audiences. Those are the types to scale.”
Jennifer’s three most important measures of proficiency are: (a) number of views, (b) average minutes per view, and (c) attention index (meaning the percent who viewed 75% or more of a video minus those who viewed less than 10%).
- Operationalizing 🛠️
Getting the right mix of efficiency and proficiency measures is key to operationalizing an enterprise-wide streaming content strategy. Operationalizing at scale includes repurposing and reusing the content and channels that have been shown to be most effective.
It is only through effective measurement along these two dimensions that a team can start to build the right resourcing plan for its content strategy by answering questions like:
- What kind of content do I need?
- What kind of video do I need?
- What are my most important team skills and resources?
- Streaming Content Strategy 📲
The ultimate goal of a streaming content strategy is to make persona and segment targeting possible. It means having the right stream of content going through the right channels in a programmatic fashion to deepen audience engagement.
“Just like we all look at our marketing budget, at this highest level, it is about looking at our content budgets to see where we can use content more strategically and with the highest ROI,” Smith concluded.
At Winalytics, we have used Jennifer’s model to think about content in terms of programs targeting go-to-market leadership, go-to-market teams, and audiences in specific verticals.
It has helped us be more intentional and collect data about the types of content and audiences that work for each audience.
We would encourage you to do the same.