There are three kinds of people, the saying goes: the ones who make things happen, the ones who watch things happen, and the laggards who ask, “What just happened?” No one wants to be that last guy.
Much of content marketing‘s strength comes from its ability to be ahead of your competition. 1 It’s knowing what others do not, and moving ahead with what others can’t yet. It’s the difference between winning and losing.
In your content marketing, being ahead of the pack can bring in new impressions, new followers and new leads. It’s like finding the path that no one else has yet taken to achieve the goal. And who doesn’t want that consistently?
But trying to do your full-time work AND be on the cusp of emerging trends in your business field is a handful. Maybe there’s not enough time in your day, or not enough knowledge around a particular subject. But to grow, you need to stretch.
You can learn the ability to spot trends and move quickly with them in your content marketing resources. It’s your chance to lead the crowd, rather than watch the crowd.
So sharpen up your content marketing. Use online trendwatching tools, watch webinars with content marketing experts and attend content marketing conferences. One of the best-known online tools out there is Trendspottr.
It predicts trends and gives you the chance to build content around the newest trends and popular opinions. It’s a killer tool that when combined with great content, can show the sharpness of your industry leadership.
One of the best conferences for content workers to spot new trends, share client studies and learn new processes is the Content Marketing Conference, to be held May 17-19, 2016 in Las Vegas. It’s being chaired by Byron White, CEO of Writer Access, a content creation platform for writers and marketers. For content marketing professionals, it’s going to be *the* content marketing event next spring.
Lastly, stay alive on social media. Don’t use Twitter just send out your impression of last night’s box score. Rather, use it as your intellectual hunting ground to see what’s happening in your industry.
Consistent monitoring of your relevant social media will keep you from being that guy who asks “What just happened?”.