The Hubspot blog has more than 18,000 pages total.
Seth Godin has published more than 8,000 blog posts.
Salesforce has published 1,510 blog posts since 2013.
Twilio has more than 1,140 videos uploaded to YouTube.
I’m sharing these numbers because most marketers and brands underestimate the amount of work that goes into creating a competitive advantage through content.
There’s no such thing as an overnight content moat.
You create it with time.
The oldest blog post I could find from Salesforce was published on March 23, 2013.
In 2013, there was no TikTok, no Clubhouse and Facebook had a little over 200M monthly active users (today it has 2.7 billion). The 2013 article is titled: “6 Techniques for Effective Objection Handling.”
It’s pretty good.
But since then, Salesforce has published a handful of blog posts on this exact topic.
“The Salesforce Guide to Successful Objection Handling” and “5 Tips for Overcoming Objections in Sales” along with a plethora of others that can be found in their archives. This level of commitment to creating content is an idea that most brands like in theory but don’t have the patience to embrace long term.
It reminds me of one of my favorite quotes from Warren Buffer: “In the end, what counts is buying a good business at a decent price, and then forgetting about it for a long, long, long time.”
He’s talking about investing in stocks.
Right now… The stock market is also in shambles. There’s a lot of lessons in that quote that you can apply to stocks as well but that’s not what I’m here to write about. Back to content.
In some ways… I think this idea can be applied to the marathon of building a content moat just the same. My variation of this quote would be: “In the end, what counts is creating good content at a decent price, and then letting it work for you for a long, long, long time.“
The part that most people overlook is the importance of letting that content work for you.
You have to be willing to create content every single month to truly build a content moat. You also have to be willing to distribute that content every single month to build a content moat. It’s not enough just to put up a mediocre post here and there. You need to allocate budget every single month to creating & distributing content. Over time… That will give you an edge.
Every piece of content you create is an asset. Some will give you quick returns and come with high risk (ie. Long Form Reddit post). And some will bring slow and gradual returns (ie. SEO focused efforts).
The truth is:
Not all content will generate flashy metrics in week one but over time…
The results compound.
That one post published by Salesforce back in 2013 has had 7 years to drive return.
It’s been shared on Twitter. It’s been emailed by sales pros. It’s been amplified on LinkedIn.
This is why I always say: Marketing is more like investing than most people think.
If your brand is willing to allocate resources into creating the right assets – it can help you build a competitive advantage. The key is ensuring that you create the right assets.
Here’s a list of things to try and incorporate in every asset you create:
> Create assets worth sharing
> Create assets hard to replicate
> Create assets worth referencing
> Create assets in multiple formats
> Create assets that get people talking
> Create assets that rank for high growth phrases
And of course promote them…
Over time all of the content that you have invested in will compound and act as your saving grace for generating leads, traffic and media opportunities when you need it most. Especially when things start to go south. Content can be the lifeline your brand needs when algorithms change, markets tank and your sales team hits a cold path.
Once an asset is created → You own it forever.
No one can take away the fact that Hubspot has thousands of blog posts published on marketing & sales. No one can take away the fact that Seth Godin has thousands of blog posts. No one can take away the fact that Twillio has hundreds of YouTube videos.
Over the years, these brands have consistently created content that has helped them ride whatever wave is thrown their way. It’s a continual investment in content marketing that helps these brands (both business and personal) develop a content moat that is unshakeable. So take a page from their book and invest in content today so you can reap the benefits tomorrow.
Your future self will be grateful you did.
