There’s a concept that’s pervasive in the content marketing field that each time you put your brand and message in front of the audience – wherever they are in the customer journey – you should “delight” them.

It’s not a bad idea. It encourages you to find new and interesting ways to create a positive impression of your company in the mind of the audience. You want to surprise, inform and help them and they should come away from the interaction feeling as if your company is a good one and one they will consider doing business with in the future.

A basic understanding of audience dynamics will tell you that’s not always possible, and striving to attain such goals, as laudable as they may be, will only drive you a little more insane every time you try.

Creators Are Offensive

Content marketing, as should be clear, requires content. You have to produce something and put it out into the world in order to engage in the kind of inbound marketing tactics that content marketing is one part of.

In other words, you need to work with those who are, in some manner, creators and producers. These people by very definition are not fit for civilized society, no matter how they may dress. Creators are offensive and divisive. It takes a certain personality type to say “Yes, I’m going to create this new thing and put it out for public consumption.” You have to be borderline crazy to do that, even in a corporate environment.

The simple act of creation is offensive. It’s much safer to not do so and just sit back and consume, or comment snidely on what others have created. The best creators will take positions and share opinions that will ruffle some feathers, regardless of how constructively they might be presented or how useful that material is meant to be.

Someone will disagree with what you’ve shared because it offends their perspective. Or they’ll dismiss your whole argument because they’ve tried what you’re suggesting and it never worked or was shot down by a boss that held a grudge going forward.

One thought on “Content Marketing is Creative, and Creativity is Sometimes Offensive

Comments are closed.