What’s not to like about LEGOs? Most of us have spent more than a few hours playing with them.

A brand recognized around the world, and one that inspires global brand loyalty — something a competitor like Mega Blocks does not — there’s much to be admired. Who would think that LEGO was a master of content marketing? Or that they successfully started content marketing about 20 years ago with their Bricks Kicks and Mania magazines?

Spend a few minutes on the LEGO Club site and you’ll learn a lot about content marketing. Not only does the site appeal to kids, it packs a punch with parents too (just like the LEGO bricks themselves). The LEGO club site allows LEGO fans to “connect” with one another — they can see each other’s Cool Creations or find a calendar of family-friend events that are all about having fun with LEGOs. They can sign up for emails, become a BrickMaster, submit a news story (i.e., become a brand ambassador), get building tips and ideas, share photos of LEGO creations, enter a Comic Captions contest, or get the inside dirt on cool designs and new products. They can also download LEGO screen savers, wallpapers and activities (like “build your own shield” designs), play a wide range of games and view comics and movies. Everything a lover of LEGOs could possibly desire.

How did I discover all this? I have my sister to thank for sharing the BrickMaster idea — on Facebook no less. I couldn’t resist — I had to check it out. Coupons, six sets of LEGOs and an annual magazine! My kids loved it.

And once I was there, we were blown away by the Design by Me function: you can download digital software to design and produce your own LEGO creation, including the nifty little catalog that helps you build it. Better yet, they encouraged kids to “honor their moms” with a custom-created LEGO set. Not only could I get a great Mother’s Day gift, what a great birthday gift for my kids and their friends! We are hooked.

And it doesn’t end there. We kept exploring and found the My LEGO Network — yes, a social networking site for children that let’s them share everything that’s LEGO to them — they can create their own web page, share designs and ideas, and even trade virtual LEGOs.

The point is this — we just kept exploring and never found an end to content we couldn’t wait to devour. And we keep going back.

I know what you’re thinking — “I’m not LEGO.” No, but if you can produce content that helps your customers and prospects solve a problem, anticipate a need or address other interests germane to your service and product offerings — they will come. And come again. That means supplying them with original content you’ve created and also sharing third-party content that you know will tweak their interest. It means helping them learn and making it fun and easy to do so on a wide variety of traditional and digital platforms — be it catalogues, websites or social media channels.

Get creative with your content. Build it. Share it. And “LEGO” of it in the digital sphere.

There’s no question that advertising and content marketing are different. Advertising pushes you for a purchase. It’s loud, unsubtle, sometimes glib and superficial, occasionally obnoxious. In comparison, content marketing is soothing on the frayed nerves of an audience bombarded with advertising messages. It delivers meaningful and often useful information (which can take the form of written, visual or audio content) customized with an understanding of the audience’s needs, concerns and interests. Content marketing doesn’t overtly sell you. It engages your interest and builds a bond between you and the brand the marketer is selling.

A lot of people believe that advertising is the past and content marketing is the future. Maybe that’s true. Maybe not. But there’s no question that content marketing is changing the rules for advertising.

The popularity and success of content marketing is a reminder of something that people who make ads often forget: substance matters. Selling the “sizzle” only goes so far. Eventually people get hungry for the steak. A half-page advertisement in a trade magazine or a 30-second spot on TV can’t deliver the kind of meaningful information that content marketers put online, although it can be a valuable tool for directing customers to that content. But even if you’re not yet doing content marketing online, you can satisfy the growing hunger of customers for substance by making sure your ads deliver something they can sink their teeth into.

Almost all of the creative project briefs that I’ve used in my advertising career include a heading that reads “Reason to Believe” (or something similar). The reason to believe is the substance behind all the hoopla. That gum commercial was funny and engaging and made me think I should grab some before my big job interview, but the “freshens breath better than the leading sugarless gums” claim sealed the deal.

Look at the advertising around you and you’ll notice how often there’s no attempt to offer a reason to believe. A generic headline is almost always a dead giveaway. If it’s a claim that anyone can make you probably haven’t thought about why you’re making it and how you can own it. What makes you different? How would you convince a skeptic that you are different? That’s substance.

Tell people something meaningful. If you can do that you’ll have an ad that even content marketers will notice.

When a company embraces customer engagement as a core marketing strategy, that company has moved well beyond customer satisfaction.  Those companies realize that satisfying customers is not enough.  Customer engagement means connecting to customers and prospects on such an emotional level that they have a need to seek you out for credible information, to interact with you, even contributing their perspectives and opinions about your brand.  The deeper they engage, the more connected they become.  The more connected they become, the more committed they are and the more they recommend your brand to others. 

Gallup Consulting, creators of the CE¹¹ customer engagement metric, categorizes customers into four distinct groups ranging from actively disengaged to fully engaged.

Gallup defines actively disengaged customers as emotionally detached and actively antagonistic. It defines fully engaged as emotionally attached and rationally loyal — your most valuable customers. Gallup CE research proves how valuable they are — , customers who are fully engaged represent an average 23 percent premium in terms of share of wallet, profitability, revenue, and relationship growth over the average customer. 

So, if customer engagement is the best new measurement of marketing success, then content marketing has to be the best new marketing strategy to achieve that success. 

Today’s customers have big appetites for information.  If you’re not continually feeding them fresh information — meaty, relevant and very valuable information designed to satisfy their different appetites — you’re not marketing. We’re talking content like white papers, case studies, insights into product application, and video demonstrations.

Further, if you’re not delivering that content in ways that can be easily measured, you’re not evaluating your level of customer engagement.  You need to use highly measureable Web-based media channels — like Web sites and social media. 

Then drive customers and prospects to the places they can find you’re content — otherwise you’re just wasting your advertising and promotion dollars. The value of traditional offline media advertising increases when you leverage it to promote your content, rather than be your content.

So if you want to be among those world-class companies who have embraced customer engagement as their new objective for marketing effectiveness, start by creating compelling content.  Offer that content in easy-to-measure places where your customers hang out. Then use your promotional budget to take people to those places and measure your level of engagement.

In the 1994 movie, Dumb and Dumber, there’s a classic exchange between Lloyd (Jim Carrey) and Mary (Lauren Holly), which – for me – has always put marketing in perspective.  It went down like this:

Lloyd: What do you think the chances are of a guy like you and a girl like me ending up together.

Mary: Well, Lloyd, that’s difficult to say. I mean, we don’t really…

Lloyd: Hit me with it! Just give it to me straight! I came a long way just to see you, Mary. The least you can do is level with me. What are my chances?

Mary: Not good.

Lloyd: You mean like one out of a hundred?

Mary: More like one out of a million.

Lloyd: So you’re tellin’ me there’s a chance.

Just like everyone analyzed Tiger’s recent mea culpa speech, let’s take a closer look at this exchange, particularly as it relates to content marketing.  A great content marketing campaign always begins with a defining and discovery process about your target audiences – what their needs are, what kind of information they’re looking for, and how they like their content delivered.  As you can see in Lloyd’s opening line, the demographics are completely inverted.  The lesson here is know thy audience, and probably yourself, too.

Now, let’s take a look at Mary’s first sentence.  In content marketing, if something is difficult to say, step back, compose your thoughts, get rid of the marketing and sales-speak, and speak in a language that is genuine and understandable.  This holds true in whatever the content format is – blog, case study, white paper, videos and the like.  If it’s difficult for you to say, it will be even more difficult for your audience to understand.

Back to Lloyd.  Never interrupt the conversation, particularly online or in open or closed social networks.  Your business is not the most important voice; you add value about your company by adding relevant content.  It’s always a good idea to listen before you leap.

Back to Mary.  If you’re going to weigh-in with compelling content, don’t be vague.  “Not good” is vague.  Tell it like it is, share your insights, support your proposition, and wait for the conversation-loop to return to you.

And again to Lloyd.  It’s actually a good strategy to find out where you stand – against your competition, others in your community, or even as a rating of your products and customer service.  It might not always be great, but at least you know where improvement is needed.

And again to Mary.  Obviously, you always need to be honest in your content, but it goes deeper than that.  Your content needs to solve a problem, you need to be the expert without coming across as “the smartest guy in the room.”  In content marketing it’s all about thought leadership, not leading people on.

And finally to Lloyd.  If you don’t define your audience’s needs at the start, chances are you won’t have a chance; unless, of course, one out of a million is a chance you’d like to take.

You’re going to hear a lot about content marketing in 2010 and 2011, and if you’re not hearing it from your marketing team, you might want to ask them why.  In my upcoming column in Central Wisconsin Business, I go into detail about content marketing, and how to do it, but essentially, it’s the practice of putting content first, ahead of the platform for distributing content (Web sites, brochures, videos and TV commercials to name a few), which is so old school.  It’s an approach that delivers relevant and compelling content to segmented audiences in a manner that actually makes them look forward to receiving your messages.  Oh, and by the way, it’s a lot less expensive than traditional efforts.

So, here are a few content marketing truths to consider: Forget your primary Web site as your most important communication tool.  It’s not.  It’s your blog, and the content on your blog is who you are and how you’re perceived.  And if you don’t have a blog, you don’t have a voice.

Nearly 90 million people generated content last year, and that’s only counting people and companies that did it at least once per month all year.  It seems to me that any company could and would benefit from a content marketing strategy, particularly when you know your audience is waiting to receive your great content.

It’s important to remember, patent laws aside, your competitors can mimic everything you’ve got with the exception of your brand.  And guess what?  Content is a huge part of your brand.  Your research, white papers, case studies, your insights, they’re all part of who you are, and they can’t take that away from you.

It’s a buyer’s market out there, and not just because of the recession, and it will be for a long time.  The entire sales motion is completely inverted from what it was.  Compelling content will allow you to be part of the sales mix, and your understanding of the industries you serve, and the entire notion of content marketing, will differentiate you from the pack.  If you don’t believe me, remember all those trade publications you read, or you used to read?  For the most part they’re thinner than ever.  Why?  Because you’re getting content elsewhere; so why not be your own publisher?

Conceptually, content marketing changes the way a designer thinks about pieces that are designed.  We can no longer think of a printed brochure as just a final, folded piece of paper in our hands, we need to think about the many ways that brochure will be distributed as a printed piece and its electronic equivalent that may be on a website,  linked to from a digital ad, emailed, viewed on an iPhone, and so on.

The big idea behind content marketing is to give targeted, relevant content “legs” to reach its particular audience.  What this means for a designer is to try not to get in the way of that important message.  Since most pieces will most likely be read on some type of screen, choose a sans-serif font to maximize readability.  That’s a 180 from the print world, where the fine details of a serifed font guide your eyes through large amounts of copy.  On a screen, the resolution just isn’t there to do them justice, so stick with a sans-serif font.  If you want to work in a contrasting serifed font for large headlines, that’s okay.

Diagrams, charts, and other graphics are important supporting elements in helping readers to grasp complex content in as little time as possible.  Shoot for clarity and simplicity – function first.

Portability is key.  When you’re designing electronic multi-page documents, like an ebook, it’s important to keep the final file size down for fast uploading, downloading and emailing.  Use vector art wherever possible, keep images to a minimum and compress the final file size- but keep in mind that it should print well. Images should be between 72 and 150 dpi, if you have a lot of images, then you’ll probably have to skew it closer to 72.  Think it through and plan accordingly.  You don’t want to wind up with a 10 meg file at the end, so be sure and test it out along the way.

Digital files are at the mercy of the reader’s monitor and printer.  Avoid reversing type out of dark backgrounds, especially for large areas of small type.  Gradients should be used sparingly, if at all, and all bets are off on the precise rendering of your prized corporate Pantone  colors.

In summary, when you think of a printed piece, you have to think of it as something that many or most will only see on their computer screens or printed out on their basic inkjet printer on budget office paper.  Keep this ultimate use at the fore when your begin the design process.

When Seth Godin, the ever popular marketing advisor and blogger said, “The only marketing left is content marketing,” he almost single-handedly stopped marketing in its tracks.  I’m glad he did.  For those of you who haven’t been around content marketing, we’ll define it as a strategy by which you create and distribute compelling, relevant and valuable content to very specific target audiences with the purpose of driving a profitable action.

So what’s different about that?  In the past, it was all about the delivery platform — Web site, TV spot, brochure system and the like — and content followed as a bi-product of the platform.  Now, content takes the lead and becomes the single most important attribute in your marketing plan.  Here’s why — in a report published by the Custom Publishing Council, 80% of business decision makers said they prefer their information through articles rather than advertisements, 70% stated that content marketing makes them feel closer to the content provider, and 60% said they make product purchasing decisions based on content marketing.

But there’s another reason to jump on board.  Content marketing will save you money, and it will probably be more effective than what you’re doing now.  As the folks at content distributor Junta42 say, “Think of this — what if your customer looked forward to receiving your marketing?”  And to that I add, “Think of this —how about not having to pay the traditional advertising costs?”

So, how does this work?  At TMA+Peritus our approach to content marketing, which is a branded product that we call Simpatico™, begins with a content and audience audit for our clients.  In your organization, you will need to understand your audiences and what type of information they need and want, and then determine what existing content is usable, what can be repurposed, and what needs to be created as you work toward the first goal of an overall Content Strategy.

The next phase is Content Creation, and trust me, there’s more in your archives than you think.  This could be white papers, case studies, videos, articles, photos, news releases, research, trade show materials and more.

Then you will need to determine your Content Delivery Platform, or how are you going to get your content into the hands of your audiences.  Will it be through your primary Web site, microsites, Facebook, twitter, Linkedin, private networks, sharing tools or perhaps all of the above?  In any event, you will need to develop new channels or optimize existing channels for distribution.

The fourth phase is Content Promotion — think of this in terms of digital and traditional marketing — and consider your content as your newest and greatest product.  Promote it through news releases, industry articles, digital ads, on your Web site, though email campaigns, during speeches, at trade shows and within your electronic newsletter.  Finally, there’s Content Engagement and Measurement. You’ll need to keep distributing content frequently, and based on how you measure your success, you’ll need to refine your messaging based on different analytics, content consumption ratios and comments.  Remember, you can’t manage it, if you can’t measure it.

A friend of mine used to say, “He who controls the data, controls the transaction.”  True enough, but times have changed.  “She who controls the content, controls the transaction.”

Tom Marks is the President & Managing Partner of TMA+Peritus: A Strategic Interaction Agency. Find them online at www.tmaperitus.com, offline in their offices in Wausau and Madison, or follow them on Twitter@ twitter.com/tmaperitus

Domino’s wants you to know their pizza sucks. It’s not just ordinary or overpriced. It’s pretty darn lousy. And it’s been that way for a long, long time. But they’ve seen the error in their ways. And they want you to love them for admitting it.

You’ve seen the commercials. Domino’s filmed people in focus groups trashing the taste of their product and edited those scenes with scenes of proud Domino’s chefs vowing improvement. The spots culminate with a Publisher’s-Clearinghouse-style visit to the unsuspecting focus group members who are given the opportunity to chow down on the improved Domino’s pizza. Not surprisingly they’re happy to eat both the pizza and their words.

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Do you consider yourself a Creator, Critic, Joiner, Spectator or Conversationalist? In a recently published Ad Age article, Josh Bernoff provided a chart that defined each of these levels of social media participation. According to North American Technographics Empowerment Online Survey, seventy percent of U.S. adults online are categorized as Spectators — they read blogs or tweets, listen to podcasts, or watch video from other users at least once a month. Less than one in four adult online users are categorized as Creators — those who publish a blog or web pages, upload original videos, audio or music, or write and post articles or stories.

Why are 3 out of 4 online users passively absorbing the content that 1 in 4 is providing? Perhaps it’s because an overwhelming 3 out of 4 of us really don’t understand what social networking is all about.

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As if there weren’t enough lists to start the decade, let’s toss in one more.

One: It’s high time we took the “social” out of social media. Let’s face it — social media is as traditional nowadays as traditional media. Over 300 million Facebook users, 861,800,000 tweets in September 2009 alone, 156 billion text messages between June 2008 and May 2009, and lest I forget, $25 billion in digital ad revenue last year. I think social media, or I should say, this type of media, is here to stay.

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