Content is not king. Distribution is.

What’s the most important thing that you do in your current marketing role?

Is it lead generation?

Is it front line sales support?

Is it event management?

Is it recruitment marketing?

Whatever it is (and the above list is by no means exhaustive) it can be summarised in 2 words.

Demand generation.

Demand for the products and services that you are selling.

Demand to get involved with the charitable cause that you are championing.

Demand for the jobs being promoted by your company.

Building this demand requires a number of things.

Firstly, that you’re able to articulate the unique value that you are offering people.

And secondly that you put this message in front of the right people, at the right time and in the right place.

To my mind great marketing has always been about getting these 2 things right.

That’s not to say it’s easy – but it’s definitely a framework for success.

And that’s why this whole ‘content is king’ thing gets on my nerves.

To put it simply its basic foundation is the (very) old and even more out dated idea of ‘build it and they will come.’

They won’t.

They don’t know you exist.

If content is your product then an effective distribution strategy (hell – any distribution strategy) is your shop.

Holding on to that analogy for a minute – it doesn’t matter how good your product is if there is nowhere for people to buy it.

The same applies with your marketing efforts – all the effort you put into writing those great blog posts & case studies, making all of those videos, building that beautiful and easy to navigate website are next to useless unless you put the appropriate effort into your distribution strategy.

So what’s more important? Content or distribution?

The answer is, of course, that they’re both important and it’s all about getting the balance right.

But the next time you see one of those ‘content is king’ articles (seriously – how many times can the same title be used for a blog post?) think of this;

If I had fantastic content and no audience would I get results?

But

If I had good content that I put in front of the right people, at the right time and in the right place would I get results?

That’s why for me distribution trumps content.

Don’t get me wrong – I’m not for one minute suggesting that we don’t try and produce great content.

Just don’t forget about the harder work involved in going and getting yourself an audience.