More than 5 billion pieces of content are being produced every day, including +100,000 articles and +2 million blog posts. Along with technology and connectivity, content is one of the Internet’s backbones, an essential part that makes the digital revolution not only possible, but also very real.
In a broad sense, content is everything that can be labeled as ‘digital data’. However, we often use the word ‘content’ when referring to the text, video, audio and images that make most of our online experiences as users. Nowadays, we’re experiencing an explosion of content, a truly unique series of events that are new to the history of mankind. Think about this: an average connected citizen consumes more content in a couple of days than the average citizen did over a lifetime a hundred years ago. Established publications like the New York Times, the Washington Post or BuzzFeed create, edit and upload 200+ content pieces each and every day, 24/7 – and we’re not counting their Facebook status’ updates, tweets and other social media uses.
In addition, the towering numbers of content production, distribution and consumption do not live in a vacuum. An increasing number of people is feeling overwhelmed by the amount of content they consume. Tweets, emails, status updates, news, events, viral videos, episodes, articles! The content wheel spins faster and faster, and at the same time the connectivity and technology supporting it only gets better and better. It’s actually hard not to feel overwhelmed by this scenario. Given the facts and feelings that surround the content proliferation, question arises: are we heading towards a peak-content scenario?
You can tell a question is good when the answer is not clear. And no, we can’t tell if a peak content scenario is near, or even possible. On the other hand, we can tell that an increasing number of people may not be enjoying the current situation, and thus we try to improve it within our field of expertise. It’s not an easy task, but a necessary one, especially for the brands that can’t afford to get themselves lost in the noise.
So, what to do? Since every brand is a universe, instant solutions are a no-go. A series of steps, on the other hand, can be taken in order to take action:
- Know where your brand stands. Content per se isn’t a marketing messiah. There are brands who need it, others that need to improve it and, most likely, a bunch who are doing just fine with their current strategies. In-depth evaluation always comes first.
- Plan the next moves. Time to create, improve (and update) the strategy. Once you know where your brand stands, you can set goals and get things going.
- Take action. When it comes to content, taking action doesn’t necessarily mean creating more of it. Maybe it’s time to focus on quality over quantity, or perhaps to reach different audiences with new messages. The key is to improve the brand-user relationship, and each relationship has different issues that can be attacked from different angles.
To conclude, we believe that a peak content scenario will be tackled not only by digital marketing specialists like ourselves, but also by technology (something that is already happening). Segmentation tech is constantly improving, and that’s good news for everyone out there. However, until we get there, we’ll have to deal with the current state of things, the good ol’ reality. To do that, we must understand it and act in consequence to achieve what we want.
