Taboola’s Content Strategy Team recently attended this year’s Content Marketing World (CMW) to learn the latest in content strategy from the industry’s best minds. The three day show is a culmination of sessions and workshops presented by leading brand marketers from around the world discussing strategy, integration, measurement and new ideas.

The key takeaway from the week? While innovation is usually correlated with speed, we were surprised to see CMW’s speakers preaching the exact opposite: it’s time to slow down.

Here were some of our favorite highlights and key learnings from CMW and how you can apply them:

Don’t Be Afraid to be Niche.

 Andrew Davis demonstrated how creating videos for a little-known senior sport called Pickleball helped a brand soar and find success. This  story truly resonates in today’s saturated content market.  Instead of being all things to all people, try to be important to a small subset of people.

Take Stock.

From Robert Rose to Ann Handley – everyone was talking about taking stock. Encourage your team to take a step back,  “be thoughtful and deliberate,”“ask ‘Why’ instead of ‘What,’”and “reclaim the lost art of focus.” Creating your content carefully and strategically, and doing an audit of your strategy can help your content organization soar.

Don’t Forget to Measure.

Technology is evolving in a way that allows for true measurement of ROI, yet few content marketers take the time to do it – focusing on “vanity metrics” like social shares, instead of looking at the content that is truly driving revenue. By finding tools that will help measure content’s impact, marketers will be able to focus their strategy and spend time in places it really matters.

Quality Over Quantity.

With new channels emerging every day, content marketers are trying to be everything to everyone. Marketers can get into the rhythm of creating content for creation’s sake but the result can often hurt more than help. To quote Joe Pulizzi: “It’s better to do nothing than to be mediocre.”

Get Back to Basics.

New technologies like Facebook Live and 360 Video make it tempting to buy fancy equipment and try things out. Yet still, marketers often forget the basics – like creating a mobile-friendly site, making a site easily navigable, and making your content discoverable. To quote Scott Stratten: “Before tackling 2016, be good at 2003.”

The team came back with a truckload of new ideas, and we can’t wait to share them with Taboola’s media partners. Do you need help with your content strategy? Contact us today!

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