WHAT EARNS ATTENTION NOW
Average content is everywhere. But the stakes for making above-average content are higher than ever. Here's what works, and why.
We all now know the drill: AI has made it cheap and fast to produce content at scale. The result? That's the problem, there isn't much of one.
As a company that specializes in finding and telling brand stories, we think about this. A lot.
Why this should matter to you
- The average customer looks at 13 pieces of content before making a buying decision.
- Nearly 90% of consumers say brand trust is as critical to a purchase decision as price or quality (which is earned through content).
- 94% of customers now use Large Language Models (LLMs) to do their research, and it's unique, original content that will keep brands visible.
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The Evolved White Paper
The white paper isn't dead. The PDF that gets downloaded once is dead. The difference is structure, original insight, a clear POV — an actual argument, not just information. The ones earning attention lead with a provocative thesis, use original research as evidence, and are written to be read, not skimmed.
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Proprietary Research as an Engine
Commission a study. Own the data. Publish it annually. Refer back to it weekly. Everything else — the white paper, the press release, the executive quote — flows from that one asset. The brands winning thought leadership aren't commenting on trends. They're creating the data other people cite.
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Named Executive Perspective
A company POV and an executive POV are not the same thing. One is a brand position. The other is a person saying something they actually believe, with their name on it, in a way that could generate disagreement. That's what builds audiences — and what gets cited by the tools now shaping vendor shortlists.
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The Annual Report as Brand Artifact
Most annual reports are compliance documents dressed up in brand colors. The ones that work have a theme, a human story, photography that earns its place, and a real point of view on where the company is going — the one piece of content every stakeholder actually touches.
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The Magazine Model (Long-Form Editorial)
This is the bet that your audience wants to read something, not just consume it. The brands doing this well aren't producing content about their products — they're producing content about the world their customers live in, and their products happen to exist in that world.
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Platform-Native Short-Form Video
Short-form video is saturated. Success requires adapting to the distinct grammar of each specific platform rather than distributing identical assets across social media monoliths. High utility (85%) and identity relevance (81%) drive far more effectiveness than chasing fleeting pop-culture trends (67%).
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Email as Editorial
Treat email as a high-value publication, not just a drip sequence. With social reach increasingly pay-to-play, an opted-in email audience is one of the most durable, direct audience assets a brand can own.
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Episodic Video Series
One-off videos are tactics; episodic commitments train audiences to return. Each episode must earn its runtime through a genuine editorial reason to exist.
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Cultural & Seasonal Moments
Every brand publishes holiday content. Almost none of it is worth reading. The opportunity isn't the obvious cultural moment — it's the unexpected one, the adjacent angle, the version only this brand could plausibly own. Done well, it creates the feeling a brand is actually paying attention to the world.
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Journalistic Customer Profiles
Traditional case studies focus on features and metrics. Journalistic profiles focus on the human first and the product second, making the story relatable and shareable.
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Documentary-Style Storytelling
Skip the staged promotional video. Focus on real subjects, genuine tension, and meaningful resolution.
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Maker and Behind-the-Scenes Content
Highlight the craftsmanship, production processes, and people behind the product. Provenance is a major cultural driver — audiences want to know where things come from and who cared enough to make them well.
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Employee Stories That Aren't HR Content
There's a version of employee storytelling built to help HR recruit and retain. That's not this. This is the version where an employee becomes a window into what a company actually believes — how it thinks, what it argues about internally, what it's trying to build.
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Community & Participation Content
Content that asks something of the audience — a response, a submission, a choice — creates investment that passive content never can. It's the difference between telling someone your story and making them part of it.
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Values Driven by Action
Audiences are fluent in corporate values theater. Brands earn authentic trust when their values show up in specific, observable, and sometimes inconvenient decisions rather than polished purpose statements.
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Narrative-Driven Case Studies
Buyers may learn facts from bullet points, but they take action when a narrative reflects their own struggles and goals.
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Sales Narratives (The Story Behind the Pitch)
The sales deck is a genre with rules everyone knows and nobody believes in. The alternative isn't a better deck — it's a narrative that does the deck's job without looking like one, built around a real protagonist and a real antagonist.
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Honest Comparison Content
While 67% of B2B buyers prefer rep-free purchasing, buyers who engage with transparent content report a 32-point increase in decision confidence. Addressing competitor comparisons with unvarnished honesty builds immediate credibility.
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Unscripted Testimonials
Simple pull quotes carry low trust because they are curated by the seller. Customer stories told at length in an unscripted, candid tone replicate real peer-to-peer conversations and drive actual conversion.
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Content Platforms vs. One-Offs
Single white papers make individual points, but integrated content platforms build a body of evidence that compounds trust over time.
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The Proprietary Study as an Annual Asset
Pick one question your industry is asking but no one is answering with real data. Publish it every year. A brand that publishes original data gets cited by the AI tools now shaping vendor shortlists. A brand that republishes industry statistics does not.
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Trend Forecasting
Executive decision-makers seek credible interpretation of what's coming next. Providing insightful analysis before trends become obvious positions your brand as an industry authority.
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Co-Created Content
Partnering with complementary brands allows you to share authority and double audience reach without doubling production costs.
This content almanac can help you be sure you know what's working and why. And give you the vocabulary to ask for it.
Content that builds authority
Authority isn't claimed; it's demonstrated through original perspective and hard data.
Content that creates demand
Moving audiences from "aware" to "interested" requires respect for the reader's time and choice of medium.
Content that tells the human story
When AI can generate infinite polished marketing copy, genuine human experience becomes the most valuable currency in the feed.
Content that enables the sale
Middle- and bottom-of-funnel content must bridge the gap between interest and conversion through total transparency.
Content that helps you own the conversation
To win over the long term, move from single pieces of content to compounding platforms.
quality over volume
In an era defined by content saturation, high-volume production is no longer a differentiator. The brands that earn attention, build durable trust, and win vendor shortlists are those that commit to original research, authentic human stories, and unwavering conviction.