A spark can ignite a creative fire.

A spark can illuminate a moment.

Last week, I witnessed glimmers of light building into full-on radiance on the faces of thousands of attendees at Content Marketing World as new ideas took hold.

The enthusiasm expressed in San Diego felt especially welcome given the general feeling of “meh” about their content and marketing strategies our latest research detected earlier this year.

Here at CMI, we don’t gatekeep good ideas. I’ll share some of the highlights from the keynote stage here. And we’ll bring you many more takeaways from other sessions throughout the year. (Of course, if you can’t wait, you can always pick up a digital pass and watch the sessions on demand.)

I hope these ideas spark your excitement to follow CMI chief strategy advisor Robert Rose’s appeal to do something (bold, or big, or brilliant) with your content and marketing strategies.

1. Inspire admiration and demand

Another college story also lit up the keynote stage — this one from R. Ethan Braden, vice president and chief marketing and communications officer at Texas A&M University and 2023 B2C Content Marketer of the Year.

Late last year, Ethan moved to Texas A&M from Purdue University, where he presided over award-winning content and marketing programs.

On the Texas A&M campus, he spotted this motto engraved in stone:

“From the outside looking in, you can’t understand it. From the inside looking out, you can’t explain it.”

Yet that was Ethan’s charge — to tell Texas A&M’s story and stories to the outside world in a way that stands out from the competition (4,000 other institutes of higher education).

He found the spark to meet that charge in the verb “enchant.” Though it sounds like a Disney philosophy, Ethan prefers this definition: to rouse and attract an ecstatic admiration and demand for something.

How can your brand do that?

Ethan outlines the four principles that make your brand remarkable (or should I say, “resparkable”?):

• Great brands stand for something and someone. Ethan pointed to Patagonia, Nike, and Volvo as standout examples. Standing for something and someone can attract an audience, but it often repels a potential audience, too. Decide what you stand for and who you are for.
• Great brands offer outcomes, not features. I loved the quote Ethan shared from Tony Ives, “Be a painkiller, not a vitamin.” He explained that, though people should take vitamins daily, they often don’t because they don’t see an immediate benefit. However, people take painkillers because they solve a problem at the moment. The lesson? Offer something the audience needs or wants now. Figure out what outcome your brand makes possible for them.
• Great brands are about feelings, not facts. Envy, respect, shame, fear, relief, and nostalgia are only a handful of the reactions your brand can evoke. Ethan shared this observation from Seth Godin (which was a lightbulb moment for me): I don’t know that anyone has ever gotten a Suzuki tattoo, but millions pay to tattoo Harley-Davidson on their bodies. How are you harnessing feelings to develop an enchanted audience?
• Great brands tell great stories. What stories are you telling?

2. Efficiency isn’t everything

A favorite returning keynote speaker, Ann Handley, didn’t disappoint. She sparked the audience’s interest with a topic on every attendee’s mind — the impact of generative AI. Ann extolled AI’s efficiency virtues. But she also asked if efficiency should always be the goal.

Ann’s answer is a resounding no. She sees value in inefficiency — slowing down can allow you to think differently about the content you create.

Cultivating high-growth projects with lasting impact requires a different meaning for ASAP, Ann says: as slow as possible. She even coined a word for it, combining slow and moment into “slowment.”

3. Keep seeking the glow

Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, author of Everybody Lies and Don’t Trust Your Gut, reminded us all that it’s OK if the spark doesn’t light as long as you try again.

He relayed the story of Jeff Seder, a consultant on racing thoroughbred horses. Jeff wanted to adopt a data-based strategy for determining which horses would be big winners. He started studying the nostril size of winning horses, but that spark didn’t shed any significant light. Jeff worked through multiple ideas, including the size of a horse’s poop, which all failed. But he eventually found one that ignited — the size of the left ventricle of the horse’s heart. And that discovery helped him predict a fire on the racetrack — American Pharoah, the horse that became the rare Triple Crown winner in 2015.

Seth shared another story to show how data can spark the future success of your content and marketing programs. Just make sure you have the whole story. For example, likes and follows on social media are not necessarily signals of buying interest. Seth used a comparison between The Atlantic and the National Enquirer. On Facebook, Atlantic Monthly has 45 times more followers than the National Enquirer. However, the National Enquirer sells three times more copies.

4. Put out content fires the right way

At one point, a Salesforce content initiative led by Melissa Leu landed on an “on fire” list — and not the good kind.

But the initial failure of that program provided the spark that led Melissa and her team to work to create a better program. They pivoted to create Salesblazer, which earned recognition as the 2024 Content Marketing Project of the Year.

How? They went back to the basics of content marketing — helping the audience solve their problems on a channel they want to use. (I encourage you to read the in-depth story behind what they did.)

5. Create joy, professionally and personally

Shabnam Mogharabi, author of Harness the Power of Joy to Uplift and Inspire, sparked something within many in the audience.

She co-founded Soul Pancake, a content-focused endeavor to uplift and give meaning to the human experience by creating more joy, with Rainn Wilson (of The Office fame).

Stress and anxiety consume so much of people’s professional and personal lives that intentionally choosing joy is an act of rebellion, Shabnam said. And she also came prepared with a toolkit on how to do that:

• Express gratitude: Being grateful and expressing your thankfulness for other people is the magic bullet. Shabnam says expressing gratitude isn’t just about the recipient. It has a profound effect on the givers’ brains, too.
• Know your why: What you do matters less than why you do it. To uncover your why, Shabnam suggests the seven-levels-of-why framework. Each time you answer the question, you get closer to the essential seed of truth. For example, you may first say a meeting deadline at work is important because you want to be a good worker. But keep asking why, and you may ultimately reveal that it’s because you want your kids to be proud of you.
• Build community. Yes, it can feel uncomfortable to put yourself out there. But vulnerability is the key to good relationships and building trust. How do you do it? Join. Show up. Stay.

Shabnam closed by sharing the final steps in rebelling through joy: Start small. Start today.

You don’t have to go big, but you do have to start.

What small spark will you ignite today? And how will you coax it to burn bright in your content and marketing programs?

Join the conversation about Content Marketing World on LinkedIn or in the Content Marketing World Slack group to let us know.

Meanwhile, I’ll express my gratitude for these incredible speakers and the fantastic Content Marketing World community. Hope to see you next year!

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Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute