The Problem with Content Marketing

Content marketing was never really a thing. It was just a new name for something that has been around for a long time, namely long-form copy. Content marketing just uncovered new ways to leverage big chunks of copy. The idea itself is great.

Here’s the problem: despite what anyone says, great informative content requires expertise and a fresh take on an industry situation or problem. That, again, is great. But creating that copy requires access to expertise. This means that an expert at some organization needs to set aside a decent amount of time to either write this themselves or be interviewed.

Experts don’t have that kind of time. And there aren’t any good workarounds. For example, re-posting, republishing existing content doesn’t add anything to the conversation. In other words, it is not valuable content.

Except for exceptional circumstances, content marketing doesn’t work.