The End of Easy Content Marketing

Speaker A: Winning is crazy.

Speaker B: Your opportunity. Your opportunity.

Speaker A: Things have changed a lot uh last year and they are going to change even more the the following month and years. In terms of content marketing with this explosion of AI, um, the one to one, the touch in person is more important now than ever. And being in in person events, it's also uh, a really big opportunity to make the difference with the idea that uh, this can happen maybe one day, uh, one of your channels will not work as well as it did before. So you have to pivot to other things. You can not only rely on content, on blog content, on articles content, you have to try to produce other pieces, uh, another kind of content. I want to 10 uh, buyers for tomorrow and it doesn't work uh, like that. You can achieve a lot with marketing but you need consistency and time.

Speaker B: Hello and welcome to the We Marketers podcast. I'm Andrew and I'm happy to have for the second time on this uh, podcast Albert Mercada, a marketing manager at TalentApp IO Albert, happy to have you today.

Speaker A: Hello Andrew. Thank you very much. It's a pleasure to be here again.

Speaker B: Amazing, amazing. Uh, we um, caught up with uh, Albert a couple of weeks ago. We touched very um, interesting question, uh, the problems uh, that content marketers um, face now in regards to AI and uh, let's dive straight in. So my question to you is what is the biggest challenge right now you see in terms of content marketing for you in your job right now?

Speaker A: Well, I think I don't impress anyone if I say that uh, things have changed a lot uh last year and they are going to change even more the following month and years in terms of content marketing. To put uh, things in perspective, uh, uh, a few years ago everyone was uh, pushing to be in the first position in Google in other searches and that was the competition to be there. And people started working very hard to be there. But uh, lately the game has changed a lot with the appearance of really strong uh, competitors involving AI. Before the competition was extreme, but now it's, it's ridiculous. Now it's super massive because uh, a lot of people have the ability to produce massive content. So the, the game really have changed. So you are not uh, competing with a lot of content. You are competing with massive, massive content. Now more difficult than ever to, to make content that finally arrived uh, to the right audience because there is a lot of noise and also there is a big, big problem that I'm sure that a lot of marketers around the globe have uh, feel that um, visits that content, uh, Drive to less conversions cause of the search ie engines. Because Google ChatGPT gives information and maybe of course they cite information but in a really uh low level you have to make an effort to see what uh, where this information comes from. So uh, this kind of engines, even Google uh are moving to that direction to take content but don't give the proper credit to this content. So we are uh fighting against that. Uh we are very focused all of marketers to appear in this kind of searches on Google AI search on ChatGPT, uh on Perplexity. We really want to appear that in those searches. But at the same time this search appearing to these searches is not the same, uh will not have the same impact that appearing a few years ago in Google Search because this kind of information will not lead uh customers to your site and that is a big issue.

Speaker B: Yeah but if we, if we talk about this decline in visibility on Google Search, what does it mean in your particular case? Uh, did you measure this?

Speaker A: Yes, we've seen uh a decline of long search tail appearances. Uh but at the same time we try to move it all these uh new users to the platform in another kind of searches, uh, pointing to those people that were interested in really particular uh information that we only have. Ah so we tried to do really, really really specific content, super long tail to try to keep going. Um what I saw is that for instance we made a lot of blog content with uh, talking about different topics uh related to hr. I see this content didn't work so well uh this uh last few months and I seen uh a decline in this type of content. We have to move it really fast to content that uh, really resonates and that we can escalate confidently. So you have to use really niche content to really try to differentiate from your competitors and then uh, have a chance to position it to impact the searches.

Speaker B: And it's all about using alternative channels. Right. Uh in your particular case uh how do you deliver this content that you create? Because over relying I would say uh on Google Search now, uh, it can be dangerous in the long term perspective. So what's your approach to using alternative channels?

Speaker A: Sure, of course. So uh, we are going back to, to all school to basics that is face to face talking to people, trying to build strong relationships so we can communicate better and see what they are uh looking for and um, want for the respect from talent app, uh and then work uh with them. I will say that with this explosion of AI, um the one to one the touching person is more important now than ever. And being in in person events, it's also uh a really big opportunity to make the difference.

Speaker B: Yeah, I can fully relate because uh now what we see that the more and more companies they start utilize uh events as uh one of the main uh driving channels of leads. But it's not only only about leads but it's also about uh building trust uh, and relationships. But if we uh get back to uh AI, do you optimize your content differently given uh the expansion of AI to make sure that it is visible on um AI search?

Speaker A: Sure. So AI is as far as I see, as far as I understand AI have uh been trained to read the content how it was done uh a few months ago, a few years ago. So uh, these AI uh engines can search information in a really good way uh as the information is up now. But yes, uh, we've been putting the information in a more clearly way in sale terms. So AI and other engines can take the information answering uh very particular questions about our content. Uh so I will say yes we try to even adapt more to make things easier to be uh, to be understand uh by AI engines in terms of sale. These have been done with the frequently asked questions.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.

Speaker A: And the code, um, um and having a clear structure of the pages that we have. Yes we've been doing this work. Uh but I will say that you have to put a more focus on this kind of strategies if you want to be relevant for these engines and if you facilitate the information to be scraped or to be seen by these engines it will be good for, for, for the appearances and the impact of the, of this content.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah I fully, I fully agree especially with the questions. You just go to uh ChatGPT, let's say and ask um, give me 20 questions about what our potential customers are, um, what worried them and you get all these questions and you create content around these uh and you can cluster this around different aspects like pricing, like uh, uh contracts, uh, whatever is related to um, uh working with the clients and you have enormous amount of questions and you create uh the whole content uh calendar around this. Of course you're building content not only around this but this becomes great uh, uh basis uh for you to proceed with the content strategy.

Speaker A: Yeah way that users are searching for answers. It's really different now than it was back a few years ago. When you look for something in Google a few years ago you only put like two or three keywords really uh, about what you were looking for. But now in the search engine people uh rely on doing more question Related phrases like how much I will uh earn if I search a job as a software developer in Barcelona for saying an example. But uh, if you want this information, this kind of information a few years ago, you will not put this in Google. No one put this in Google. People put software developer salaries in Barcelona. You were thinking in a question but you don't put it in the engine. And now people put the whole question with the very specific demands. Uh I have uh four years of experience. I also put this in the question to give uh the search more uh, more information so the answer can be more accurate and that is where you can make the difference. Putting this kind of questions in your content with really specific information. And yeah that's, that's the game now.

Speaker B: And uh, in terms of content formats, uh do you still rely mainly on blog posts uh on your website, uh or you also create something different that work uh in nowadays?

Speaker A: So we don't uh rely ever much on the blog. The blog was a really nice uh, nice tool and I think it's already a nice tool to be in contact with our subscribers to put relevant content out there that you want to write. But uh, yes the effectivity of the blog have ah have uh had a uh slowdown uh but um, our main focus always have been our reports. We produce free resources, uh high quality free resources that are very well known in our niche in our community and we are working, uh we have been working in this for several years now. So we make uh a space for us there and people know uh our free silence marks. So we put our effort on this. We not always uh be focused on our blog. We try to open different channels and keep working on them, trying to learn from them. So uh, we can improve it uh with the idea that uh this can happen maybe one day uh one of your channels will not work as well as it did before so you have to pivot to other things. But our focus right now I will say that is this kind of content, the free resources, high quality free resources that we can produce because we have uh this kind of information and is our work. Uh other marketers uh, they should uh see or look what they can produce that uh, it's high quality for their niche, how they can differentiate. But I will say that you can not only rely on content, on blog content, on articles content, you have to try to produce other pieces, um another kind of content. We also uh have uh, uh a freestyle free companies um type of content that it can be escalated really really well. Uh and we also rely a Lot of that. It's content that is produced by the platform. Uh, I will say, um, that kind of content really works well also. And it's not block content.

Speaker B: M. I'm subscribed, uh, to your newsletter and overall I follow, um, follow, follow your activities on LinkedIn. And from what I see, you uh, you're doing a great job in building the whole content ecosystem. Not only producing some specific, um, content piece, but overall. I can see your um, email, uh, with the newsletter right from your company. I can see reports sharing on LinkedIn. I, I see the other, uh, what's your approach to building the whole content ecosystem and making sure that content uh, engine is actually running?

Speaker A: Sure. I like a lot the word that you use, ecosystem, because at the end, uh, is this. So we try to open different channels, but at the same time all these channels we try to be connected. So uh, for instance, uh, the reports that we launch with our information for HR or even for workers, uh, that are interested in, in size, this kind of reports we keep updating. Every year, uh, we launch a uh, different report and people are already expecting these reports. Uh, we are more or less we launch it at the same time every year. And um, when we launch it, we launch it by LinkedIn, but we also launch it in our newsletter that we send weekly. And um, after the launch when you can access to the reports from our web, but also you can access the reports from our newsletter. So subscribers are continuously seeing these reports. And also uh, if they don't remember or they uh, we are not in, in their radar data. Hey, I, I use uh, download uh, report that was very interesting six months ago, uh, but I don't remember. And then we appear in their inbox with the report that is already there. We I already, I see that uh, some people download the report several times because they download it one time, they forget it maybe, and then they download it uh, two months ago and they download it again when they receive the newsletter. So we try to be always there when we get one subscriber, we get one customer. Uh, we try to be there uh, providing useful information so they can stay with us and appreciate uh, the work that we do.

Speaker B: And I know that you already have a lot of uh, subscribers for your newsletter and overall building the whole um, community around content that you create. You, you really uh, do a great job around this. How do you make sure that people who um, get into your content, uh, funnel they eventually become your customers because, uh, apparently this is, this is a goal, right?

Speaker A: Sure. So this is very, very difficult to do so. It will be amazing that all the subscribers at the end, uh, for customers. So uh, a lot of subscribers of the newsletter, for instance, or the people that uh, download the report has been truly compared uh, to a customer. But at the end it's really difficult to tell that uh, every person that subscribes to the newsletter will be a customer. We actually try to uh. We're not very pushy. We are trying to really produce uh, meaningful content and meaningful um, products that really resonate with the audience so they can buy if they want. But uh, the goal of the newsletter and all of the marketing actions, of course that at the end is that end, uh, reaching uh, potential customers that end buying our solution. But at the end also is a uh, way to generate uh, this mass of people that uh, follows Talent App that knows Talent App that uh, can recommend Talent App to other people. When you produce content, when you produce a newsletter, sometimes it's really difficult to see the return, uh, how many people have impacted this newsletter. But uh, sometimes when a new customer arrives, I follow the. I search uh, where this customer comes and you see that it's a subscriber that starts uh, at our newsletter six months ago, downloaded one report three months ago, then receive it uh, one Friday or newsletter, download the report again and then uh, buys our solution. And you see that it's a person, uh, that uh, started with us like six months ago and by the newsletter, sorry, the solution, the talent app solution, uh, six months later.

Speaker B: And it's very, and it's very uplifting. Right for us as a marketers to see that people eventually lend uh, it to the clients out of all these activities.

Speaker A: Yeah, it's really rewarding see that the actions that you made work at the end.

Speaker B: Yeah. But interesting uh, what it looks what a consensus on general view on marketing inside your team, uh, look like. Is marketing for you more like um, way to generate awareness or it's more viewed like um, client machine.

Speaker A: So for me marketing always will be, uh, you have to generate money.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.

Speaker A: Of course there is a lot of, of ways to. To achieve that. Um, and um, you have to generate customers through marketing actions. Of course it's really important to, to gain awareness and but if I tell a marketer, uh, what do you want 1,000 visitors to your, to your web or you want 10 buyers to your web? So 10 people that arrive to your web and buy the product you want the 10 buyers you don't care about? Uh, I think that marketing uh, sometimes uh, lost itself in Numbers. I want like a lot of views to my content. I want a lot of people in my website. I want to arrive to a lot of people with my LinkedIn campaigns. But maybe that is not your goal. In m. The most cases your goal is to arrive to the right people at the right time that want your product or that you can help uh, with your information or your product. So maybe one day they can be your customers. So I will say that my view from marketing is to engage with potential customers, that you can provide them value and at the end they can be uh, your customers and pay for the solution that you are working on. And yeah, that's it. Of course, awareness. It's a little piece of all this ecosystem, of all this marketing machine. But it's a little piece.

Speaker B: Yeah, it's very, it's very interesting because I've just um, had the management team meeting uh inside our company and um, Adrian our CEO, he shared that we've just received very good uh lead potentially interested in our uh, services. And I asked, just curious uh, from where did they know about us? And he said oh, they attended one of the previous events and I wanted to specify like which kind of event. And he said they have no idea. Like they just attended uh, maybe years ago, who knows. And the tricky thing is to measure all this um, effectiveness of these activities.

Speaker A: Yes, it's really hard but you can see it because when this start to happen you see it in a lot of user cases that uh, he, he come from, from the newsletter. It was a subscriber. Yeah, you, you meet them in a, in that event and you see the machine is, is going uh, but this took a lot of time and effort I will say uh, you have to be consistent. So you, you make an amazing events uh, in, in Netherlands and other countries. Right. Uh, but you don't just do one event. You've been doing for several years, you have been improving uh, uh and then the machine is working and you can get this kind of leads, this kind of wins. The same happens with the talent administrator. You have to have the confidence of the management uh that you can achieve the results if they support marketing actions. Because I feel that in marketing areas sometimes there is a lot of misunderstanding of the marketing um value and um mission and they want like super fair results and no, no wanna a post and I, I want 10 uh, buyers for, for tomorrow and it doesn't work uh, like that. You can achieve a lot with marketing but you need consistency and time.

Speaker B: If we look um, a little bit into the future for Example uh, till the end of this year 2026, uh what's your main um activities, maybe some tests, uh some strategies that you want to implement to make sure that your content gets uh, constant visibility and more importantly drive new prospects.

Speaker A: So from my particular uh market I will say for me it's really important and I will say also for companies like Maxer and others the new pay transparency law. So we will a uh lot of our content and web and even the product to this kind of law that will bring a lot of, of customers. But in terms of marketing I will say that I want to potentiate more from the person events, uh, be in more uh, in more person events and um, and face to face events where we can actually meet our customers and try to, to improve um partnerships with other players. So that most important thing for for me this year is to work with persons and not to work for AI because uh, I think uh, you can put uh an effort there but you have to focus also in other things. And as we were talking at the beginning I think the, the game changer for these next years will be also uh, have a strong presence offline, be offline and talk with people and be in events and know how to move uh there not only on the web or not only on uh AI engines. One thing that it really actually scares me and have me keep thinking this last few months is the AI uh you know the this kind of browsers and AI that also can uh perform searches and actions through the web. Um we will have to be very, very careful as marketers how this is both but because now a lot of the Internet content is made by AI. But what will happen for our companies for content if also all the Internet um traffic or a lot of the Internet traffic is driven by agents uh AI. It will also change a lot how we, how we produce content and understand content. Because if it's not uh made for, by persons or persons, it's made by AI. For AI.

Speaker B: For AI.

Speaker A: Yeah, uh, it will be. Well we will have to see how it evolves.

Speaker B: If you want more in person interactions, come to Amsterdam um to TRC on November 5th.

Speaker A: We will see if we can make.

Speaker B: Albert, thank you so much for joining this episode. I hope that uh, all these efforts that you put into uh content uh will transform into real results. I wish this to you and I also wish this for everyone who is working uh on the content including myself. So we get really great results uh out of this. Thank you for joining and bye bye.

Speaker A: Thank you Andrew. Bye bye.