At the 2019 Contently Summit, we wanted to focus on a different model. Over 200 people showed up to the PlayStation Theater in Times Square to hear from some of the best brands in content marketing. Christine Polewarczyk, senior director of content strategy and operations for SiriusDecisions, took the stage in the morning to talk about content transformation, and a big part of her keynote looked at process. When we talk about content maturity, are all involved teams working in sync? Love this Einstein quote shared by Christine Polewarczyk at #mastersofcontent — if you want better marketing content, you’ve got to change the way you think about marketing. Few companies embody that combination more than RBC. The Canadian financial institution has scaled its content program to dozens of teams, offering marketers a model for growth and success. Shawna Dennis, VP of marketing and communications for MD Financial, cautioned that brands should focus on building relationships with the right audience before they think about cashing in on them. “Content should be non-negotiable too.” 6. The future of content marketing is complete visibility Tools and technology have to make it easier for content marketers to work across their companies.
Today’s marketers are expected to be Swiss Army knives. They’re supposed to write, edit, shoot video, run campaigns, analyze data, prove ROI, work with sales, help accounts, know HTML, and then maybe sleep if there’s any time left in the day. That’s an impossible model for success.
At the 2019 Contently Summit, we wanted to focus on a different model. One that empowers marketers to collaborate with other people in their companies, instead of setting them up for failure or burnout. Our theme this year was Masters of Content. We wanted to riff on content mastery and a “master’s degree” of sorts, which played into our educational event.
Over 200 people showed up to the PlayStation Theater in Times Square to hear from some of the best brands in content marketing. Here’s a list of the most important things we learned.
1. Sales enablement needs to improve
Alignment was on everyone’s mind from the beginning of the day. Christine Polewarczyk, senior director of content strategy and operations for SiriusDecisions, took the stage in the morning to talk about content transformation, and a big part of her keynote looked at process. When we talk about content maturity, are all involved teams working in sync? Do they have a centralized place to share knowledge and give feedback?
The answer, in many cases, is no. SiriusDecisions found that, on average, salespeople have to look in six different places to find the content they need. This is usually not an indictment on sales or marketing teams. Both could do a better job communicating. To stick with the education theme, it’s like a group project, only the group split in two and the sides aren’t talking to each other.
Love this Einstein quote shared by Christine Polewarczyk at #mastersofcontent — if you want better marketing content, you’ve got to change the way you think about marketing. pic.twitter.com/Fn1MROyyeb
Polewarczyk laid the foundation for the rest of the program. With enablement, alignment, and visibility as core concerns, many speakers who followed explained how they managed to bring their teams together and drive meaningful results.
2. Content marketers and data analysts should become friends
We like to say content marketing is an art and a science. Few companies embody that combination more than RBC. The Canadian financial institution has scaled its content program to dozens of teams, offering marketers a model for growth and success.
People throw around the term “data-driven” a lot, but RBC gave more context to how that actually works in practice. Jason Lewin, director of digital marketing and optimization, explained that RBC uses content data to tell a story internally. Lewin checks RBC’s custom dashboards every day, as does Ashleigh Patterson, senior director of global content marketing and social media. They sync regularly to check on factors like leads, campaign performance, and traffic channel data.
This reporting fuels a lot of the new campaigns and programs RBC puts out into the world. As…
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