Thoughts from Content Marketing World Sydney

During the first week in April, the Camaraderie team took the trip across the Tasman to attend Content Marketing World Sydney.

It was evident from the buzz in the conference rooms that the practice is gaining momentum. Attendee numbers have doubled from the previous year and it was exciting to see the strong presence of senior client marketers keen to understand more.

What did we learn? alot, but here are few insights…

Joe Pulizzi from the Content Marketing Institute talked about the role of content as providing “sales, savings or sunshine”. A good tweet size reminder of the options when formulating a strategy.

Mark Schaefer, an impressive speaker, talked about ROI, or “Return on Influence” in the online space. Mark argues that social media channels alone will not increase influence. Video content, blogs and podcasts are all tools that should be used. Brands should strive to outperform their competitors as influencers in the market through providing useful content. Mark’s blog business grow is an excellent read.

Robert Rose spoke about the content creation process, identifying four archetypes – the promoter, preacher, professor and poet. A great framework when considering approach. He reminded us facts don’t change minds… emotions do. The essence of his presentation is captured here.

Jesse Dejardins from Tourism Australia talked about the strategy of building “the world’s biggest social media team” through utilising the content passionate Australians create everyday. He gave insight on how the organisation’s internal processes needed to adapt to this approach. Senior players need to be educated about implementing realtime responses to content opportunities.

Helen Livesey from AMP impressed by demonstrating the care and attention applied to executing their first content marketing driven project. The unexpected outcome was fresh learnings from how to operate internally and insights offered from the customers. Given the results, the brand is now committed to the strategy. Helen also declared “We’re not going to hire anyone into Marketing that can’t write.”

A key underlying theme through the conference was the tension between “owning” and “renting” platforms. Relying on social media alone to collate and distribute content risks potential disruption to audience relationships over the long term if models change.