Founders, get yourself a content person already

This week I read a stat that surprised me. But only after sitting with it for a minute did I realize why.

According to a new study from the Content Marketing Institute (CMI), 86% of B2C respondents use content marketing. Wow, I said, that’s a huge number. But then I realized it wasn’t actually surprising that so many consumer-facing businesses are using content in their marketing plans. The more I thought about it, the more the other number (the remaining 14%) stood out. Why are those B2C companies not using content?

Some of the most successful public and private companies today, like Glossier and Groupon, started out of content, conversation, and community. While other businesses trend product first, content second (or, heavens forbid, third or fourth), there’s an obvious lesson here about talking to your customers early. In those cases, before they even had products to sell.

The same study from CMI found that 93% of the companies deemed “most successful” with their content plan claimed that their organization is “extremely/very committed to content marketing.” On the flip side, 23% of the “less successful” companies surveyed said they had that same extreme level of commitment.

The companies that found their content marketing efforts most successful were the ones that claimed the highest levels of commitment to those plans. Surprise, surprise.

That takes me to two more stats of note (although there is much, much more to dig into in that report). Fifty-nine percent of those most successful companies claimed to have a “documented content marketing strategy” opposed to 8% of the least successful companies. And of those top performers, 82% claimed to deliver content “consistently” compared to 16% on the other side.

So, to recap, the “most successful” B2C companies surveyed were extremely committed to content marketing, had a documented strategy, and delivered content consistently.

All of this goes to say one thing: don’t half a** your content. I talk with founders inside and outside our portfolio all the time about how to design a content strategy that will set them up for success. Those who see the best ROI building the community and brand affinity that drives clicks to product pages invest in their blog, their social, their email newsletters, you name it.

As startups scale, they’ll hire that first marketing manager who’ll wear many, many hats. But, if that organization isn’t seeing a great return on their content plan, it’s probably because they aren’t (as the study suggests) committed to it, operating with a strategy and/or publishing consistently.

The solution is simple. If you’re running a consumer-facing business and want to spend time producing content, actually invest in it. Take it seriously, do it early, and don’t push out posts whenever you get the time. Put a content plan in place ASAP. And, please, don’t over-assign your solo marketing person.

I’m encouraged every time I talk with the many founders in our portfolio who really understand what content can do to build their brand and their business. But for all the founders who haven’t gotten a real content plan going, I humbly suggest you do one thing: hire a content person.

What’d I miss? Share what you think founders should know about content strategy in the comments or tweet at me.