The Power Of Content Curation

Summary

B2B Marketing Exchange Podcast Summary
Episode: The Power Of Content Curation
Release Date: November 13, 2024

---

Introduction to the Episode

In this insightful episode of the B2B Marketing Exchange podcast, hosted by Demand Gen Report, listeners are treated to an in-depth discussion on the pivotal role of content curation in B2B marketing strategies. The episode features Christine Elliott, a seasoned marketing professional with over two decades of experience in content strategy and demand generation, particularly within professional services firms.

---

Guest Introduction and Background

Claudia Tirico and Kelly Lindenau welcome Christine Elliott, highlighting her long-standing involvement with the B2BMX conference since its inception in 2012. Christine shares her journey, emphasizing her passion for content strategy and her work with professional services firms to drive demand through effective content.

Notable Quote:

"When we look at things like marketing automation and marketing technology and how that has really, really just blown up in the last 20 years, we won the award for lead nurture program in 2013 and I bet we could win an award for that same program today. It just has not advanced."
— Christine Elliott [01:43]

---

Shifting from Branding to Narrative Creation

Christine discusses the necessity of moving beyond heavy branding to crafting meaningful narratives that address specific business challenges. Drawing from her experience at EY (formerly known as Ernst & Young), she illustrates how a well-known brand alone isn't sufficient if it doesn't communicate particular solutions to targeted issues.

Key Points:

• Brand vs. Narrative: A strong brand name (e.g., EY Tax) needs to be complemented with specific narratives that address distinct business needs.
• Storytelling: Effective narratives delve into the actual business problems faced by clients and articulate how the company can provide solutions.

Notable Quote:

"Creating narratives at different levels... what are the business issues people are facing and then what can we do to help. And that's the narrative part that I think we aren't good at yet."
— Christine Elliott [00:00]

---

Case Study: Tax Transformation Campaign

Christine elaborates on a recent campaign she spearheaded at EY during a global website migration. Despite limited resources—a small marketing team and budget—they successfully launched a content-driven strategy focused on Tax Transformation.

Campaign Highlights:

1. Developing the Storyline: Identified a unique angle on tax transformation that was under-discussed in the market, using original research and quotes from tax leaders.
2. Content Strategy: Consolidated existing EY content into a cohesive narrative, presented through a streamlined landing page with six key components: technology, data, risk, talent, ecosystem, and operating model.
3. Email Marketing: Simplified the previously complicated email program to a more basic, consistent schedule, resulting in increased content engagement.
4. Demand Generation: Introduced a contact form targeting specific client needs, which successfully attracted high-quality leads, including a notable internal inquiry from a former EY employee now leading a $4 billion company.

Notable Quotes:

"We really wanted to start with content strategy at the heart of everything... we were lucky enough to find one of our tax partners who really had some interesting things to say."
— Christine Elliott [04:06]

"The very first form fill we got was a global tax and transformation leader at a $4 billion company... he filled out a form saying, I want information about these things."
— Christine Elliott [08:36]

---

The "Less is More" Approach to Content Curation

Christine advocates for a streamlined approach to content curation, emphasizing quality over quantity. She highlights the overwhelming abundance of content available and the challenge of identifying and utilizing relevant materials effectively.

Strategies Discussed:

• Focused Narrative: Narrowing down to specific themes that resonate with the target audience.
• Content Consolidation: Utilizing existing content to support the narrative, including repurposing formats for better engagement.
• Selective Sharing: Curating content that directly addresses the audience's needs without overwhelming them.

Notable Quote:

"Think about how much content is out there today... that's where the narrative part, once you get down to a more specific level, you can look for meaningful content that you have."
— Christine Elliott [09:16]

---

Establishing Content Hubs and Understanding the Audience

Christine emphasizes the importance of creating centralized content hubs tailored to specific narratives rather than dispersing content across general platforms. She underscores the necessity of deeply understanding the target audience to ensure content relevance and consumption ease.

Key Insights:

• Content Hubs: Centralized repositories where curated content aligns with the narrative and facilitates easier access for the audience.
• Audience Segmentation: Identifying specific audience segments beyond broad classifications like the C-Suite to tailor content effectively.
• Consumption Preferences: Adapting content formats to match how the audience prefers to consume information, whether through brief articles, podcasts, or interactive media.

Notable Quote:

"Replacing driving them to a piece of content because we're trying to tell a Different story. So we're driving them to sect of the page."
— Christine Elliott [07:52]

---

Balancing Valuable Content with Audience Engagement

The discussion transitions to maintaining a balance between providing valuable content and ensuring it remains engaging. Christine advises experimenting with different content formats to discover what resonates best with the audience, especially in regulated industries where creativity may be limited.

Recommendations:

• Diversifying Formats: Experiment with various content types like ebooks, podcasts, videos, and interactive elements to enhance engagement.
• Team Diversity: Incorporate diverse team members with unique backgrounds to bring fresh perspectives and innovative ideas to content creation.
• Creative Constraints: Navigate regulatory restrictions by aligning content creativity within permissible boundaries while still being engaging.

Notable Quote:

"Nobody wants to read the 10 page white paper anymore. So even if you take something like a 10 page white paper and put it into an ebook format, which is more easy to chunk out and read, it's better for regulated industries."
— Christine Elliott [13:59]

---

Final Thoughts and Future Endeavors

As the podcast draws to a close, Christine shares her personal updates and future aspirations. Having recently left EY, she expresses a strong desire to continue her work in content strategy and demand generation, seeking full-time, fractional, or contract opportunities to leverage her expertise in driving revenue growth through marketing.

Notable Quote:

"I'm so passionate about content strategy and how that drives demand and more generally driving growth in revenue through marketing... I'm open to full time positions or fractional or contract opportunities."
— Christine Elliott [17:18]

---

Conclusion

This episode of the B2B Marketing Exchange provides valuable insights into the strategic importance of content curation in B2B marketing. Through Christine Elliott's experiences and practical examples, listeners gain a deeper understanding of how to effectively craft narratives, curate meaningful content, and engage target audiences without overwhelming them. The discussion underscores the necessity of creativity, audience understanding, and strategic content management in driving successful marketing campaigns.

---

Stay Connected:
For more insights and future episodes, subscribe to the B2B Marketing Exchange podcast on your preferred podcast platform. Follow Demand Gen Report on LinkedIn, Twitter (X), and Instagram for updates and additional content.

Transcript

[Christine Elliott]

Creating narratives at different levels. Whether it's the brand level, we have to go further down into what are the business issues people are facing and then what can we do to help. And that's the narrative part that I think we aren't good at yet.

[Claudia Tirico]

The B2B Marketing Exchange brings together B2B marketing and sales practitioners from across the country to get the latest tools and tips they need to succeed.

[Kelly Lindenau]

Now we're bringing the insights from the stage to your ears.

[Claudia Tirico]

I'm Claudia Tirico.

[Kelly Lindenau]

And I'm Kelly Lindenau.

[Claudia Tirico]

And this is the B2B Marketing Exchange podcast. Hello. Hello everyone. Welcome back to the B2BMX podcast. You might hear some shuffling as background noise because we are on the show floor at B2B MX east in Alpharetta, Georgia. I'm here with my co host Kelly, who's been doing wonderful covering the entire event for Demand Gen Report. And we are also here with one of our fabulous speakers and a B2B MX veteran. She was actually one of the first people I ever met at my first ever, even before it was called B2BMX. She is Christine Elliott. She is here on her new journey after just recently leaving her recent company. But I will let her introduce herself. So welcome, Christine. Thank you so much for joining us. Tell our audience a little bit about yourself and your journey all the way through today.

[Christine Elliott]

Wow. All the way through. I mean, let's keep it, keep it short. Just kidd. I'm really, really thrilled to be here. As Claudia, you said, I have been involved with this conference since 2012.

[Claudia Tirico]

Yeah.

[Christine Elliott]

When it was called and I put that in my presentation, actually, where it was called Content to Conversion. And honestly, I still feel like today there's a lot of work to be done in that particular topic area. When we look at things like marketing automation and marketing technology and how that has really, really just blown up in the last 20 years. We won the award for lead nurture program in 2013 and I bet we could win an award for that same program today. It just has not advanced. And so that's really been the passion of the last 20 years of my career, has been working with professional services firms and really around content strategy and specifically content that drives demand.

[Claudia Tirico]

Awesome.

[Christine Elliott]

I still think we're not doing that well.

[Claudia Tirico]

Yeah. Yeah. You know, everybody's still always learning and content is one of my favorite topics to talk about, Kelly. So let's just get right into it. Yeah.

[Kelly Lindenau]

So you know, some of your previous experiences, you were with a practice that was well known for its branding, but you Realized you kind of needed to shift away from such a brand heavy thing to more of creating a narrative. So can you kind of tell us some of the factors that sparked the need to shift gears with that?

[Christine Elliott]

Do you mean shift gears from a.

[Kelly Lindenau]

Heavy branding to creating a narrative?

[Christine Elliott]

Well, I've, through my career I've had worked at different companies that have different levels of branding. But no matter how much branding you have, like ey, very, very well known brand, that's not enough to just say we're Ey and therefore. And in fact, I think when I was at ey, one of the challenges we had, we were the number one tax brand and it was all about the brand. But there wasn't an acknowledgement that even though everyone knows EY tax, they do not know the specific tax solution we have for them if they are moving their manufacturing facility. And so I think that that creating narratives at different levels, whether it's the brand level, we have to go further down into what are the business issues people are facing and then what can we do to help. And that's the narrative part that I think we aren't good at yet.

[Claudia Tirico]

Awesome. So you just walked out of your presentation here at B2B MX east and you specifically kind of demonstrated a special campaign that you said, and I quote, was built with spit and duct tape, which I love. Can you share a little bit more about what you meant by that and just whatever challenges that you faced for this campaign and how it all came together?

[Christine Elliott]

Yeah, absolutely. So. And all of this was happening during a global website migration, which is always fun. So spit and duct tape really is a thing. But in every organization you have different levels of resources, people and money. And EY is a huge company. The tax practice is $5 billion and we only have four people in marketing and a very, very small budget. But that doesn't mean you go home and cry. You figure out what you can do with what you do have. So we really wanted to start with content strategy at the heart of everything. So the first thing we need to do is develop a storyline. What do we want to talk about that's different and more about what's really happening in the market today? And we were lucky enough to find one of our tax partners who really had some interesting things to say. She was noticing in the market this huge paradigm shift that was going to make things really, really difficult for tax leaders and CFOs if they didn't pay attention to it. And so we use that as sort of the jumping off point to create a Narrative. The topic of it was around tax transformation, which sounds like something that gets talked about all the time. But we actually asked LinkedIn to do some research for us and nobody's talking about it, which was fascinating. Another outside firm, we asked them to go get quotes about what our tax leaders saying about this. They couldn't find anything. So we knew that that was something that we could really own. And we just used it as a jumping off point for how we wanted to tell our story about how we could help our clients. So we started with the storyline and that we consolidated it to two paragraphs that are on our landing page. But that's hours and hours and hours of research and really making it meaningful. But then we had sort of a four prong strategy for bringing that narrative alive. And content strategy is always at the heart of it. First of all, we wanted to make sure that the content we had was going to be seen. And we had a marketo email program that was very, very complicated. Our digital team was not happy about this. We just started from scratch and something much more basic. Three pieces of email twice a week sent out over and over and over again. Not the same content, but on a regular basis. And we saw a tremendous uptick in our content from there. So we knew that that was something we were going to need as a foundational thing. As we put the narrative together around tax transformation, our thought leader, everything we needed. She said, it's really about six things. It's about technology, it's about data, it's about risk, it's about talent, it's about ecosystem and it's about your operating model. And so we were like, this is great. So we were telling them there's this big thing that's happening and then immediately on the landing page, there's a graphical component that tells people exactly what we mean by that. So it's these six things. They could then click into those six things and go deeper in on technology and AI as an example. And when you got to that point, there was specific content about technology and AI, a featured piece and other pieces. We curated all of this content from existing content at ey, which is also another whole thing that people don't really talk about. How do you find the content? How do you know what content you have? And content strategy really, really needs that. So we now have the story. We've got these six components, we've got the landing page. And our whole idea was we're not going to drive people to a piece of content because we're trying to tell a Different story. So we're driving them to sect of the page. And that was really, really powerful because we felt like we needed to get more specific than just transformation that could mean anything. And so those six components really became the heartbeat of it. But also the component that didn't work in the website.

[Claudia Tirico]

Always something.

[Christine Elliott]

Exactly. Another, though big component of the which was really important to me was setting the foundation for demand generation. And so we weren't ready to generate leads or anything, but we put a box right at the top of the page that said, I want more information about. It's not contact us yet, but they can contact us. And then we listed all of the key issues that we knew we could help our clients with. And it was so interesting. The very first form fill we got was a global tax and transformation leader at a $4 billion company. I mean, you could not ask for a better target audience. And it was an existing client. So for all of our leaders who say no, everybody knows what we do. And the kicker was the guy had worked at EY for 15 years.

[Claudia Tirico]

No way.

[Christine Elliott]

And he filled out a form saying, I want information about these things. So I told that story to every leader that I could. And obviously we were able to get that information to the account team that then used it. But that's just such a small thing that can be so, so powerful. And it's all of those kind of components that work together to really bring that narrative alive.

[Kelly Lindenau]

So that's actually the perfect segue for our next question. You, because you emphasized throughout your session that less is truly more, you know, regarding the role of content curation in this campaign. So could you kind of elaborate why on that less is more approach worked for your team and maybe go into a little bit of the advice you would give to other marketers about curating content effectively.

[Christine Elliott]

I mean, think about how much content is out there today.

[Claudia Tirico]

Too much.

[Christine Elliott]

We couldn't even find what content we had, but there was just a bazillion. So I think that's where the narrative part, once you get down to a more specific level, you can look for meaningful content that you have. And depending on what type of company you work for. In professional services, it's all thought leadership. There's not enough content that's actually related to demand. But that became kind of a secondary issue for us. We wanted to tell a story very, very quickly. We did it with all EY content, existing content, which is not the only way to curate content if you need to. If you're a smaller organization, you can bring in Content from other places. It's all about creating that kind of bubble of the narrative to do that. So you need to get creative curating content. I would say don't be afraid to use others content, but you have to be really, really careful about the reputational issues that could go with that. But it's perfectly fine and reasonable to do that.

[Claudia Tirico]

Awesome. I wanted to kind of get into how, you know, any advice that you would provide marketers looking to kind of strike that right balance between providing that valuable content, whether it's your own or whether you're sourcing it from, from other areas and really not overwhelming their audience. Right. You know, what crit should kind of they be using to decide what content to include, whether it's on a landing page or like a resource hub or anything like that. Have you guys ever dabbled in any kind of like hubs or anything like that?

[Christine Elliott]

Yeah, I think, you know, instead of it just being on your website, the content on your website, none of us can find anything from that perspective. So that's why the hub idea, however you can do it, whether it's even in an email campaign, you could say this is the transformation newsletter or whatever. And then you really have to though go deep into your content and you do have to understand what content you have. And then what of what you have can you use to tell that particular story? One piece of content could be very specific about the technology industry, but it could also be good for a different campaign that might be about the regulatory focus. So really getting familiar with your content is probably the hardest thing, but the best jumping off point. But I think overall, wherever your content's coming from, curating it to a place and sending them to that place instead of to your website, which is what everybody wants to do, is just so critically important. You won't, the message won't get through. Right.

[Claudia Tirico]

And you also kind of have to obviously know your audience. Right. Because if they're not looking to read a 70 page ebook, how are you going to provide that?

[Christine Elliott]

Yeah, no one's willing.

[Claudia Tirico]

Nobody is. Nobody is. But you know what I mean, right? Like maybe they don't listen to podcasts, they want to consume that content in a different way. So you have to also know your audience to be able to put that narrative together in a way that going to be easily consumable for them. Right.

[Christine Elliott]

Well, even before that you have to know who your audience is and be specific about who are you talking to. And that shouldn't be the C Suite. The C suite is not an audience that's a classification of leaders. And so by figuring out who it is, what do they care about, what do they care about and what are their challenges. And once you connect into that, that's the really human part of it is if you can connect to.

[Kelly Lindenau]

Wow.

[Christine Elliott]

That is something I am challenged with today. I want to learn more. The tough part is there if it's really something they care about, an issue they have, they don't want to just read about the issue. They want to read about how to solve the problem and then ultimately how you can help them. And that's the big gap that I see in content strategy, at least in services. It's all thought leadership about issues. We don't ever go and say, oh, you know, you have that problem, here's how you solve it and here specifically is how we can help. And it might be the same thing any other firm would do. You have to say it. People don't know. And it's a great opportunity.

[Claudia Tirico]

Yeah, it kind of like makes me think about how I put this agenda together. You know, I tell the speakers, you know, people don't want to listen to these big theories and all of this fluff. They want to walk away with something tangible that they could actually implement and use and that's what and what works.

[Christine Elliott]

And what doesn't like the real examples of how you do it. Because everybody is struggling with that. And yeah, the big theories, it's nice. It feels good to say, yeah, we're the number one brand. Yay.

[Claudia Tirico]

But how can you help me?

[Christine Elliott]

Yeah, exactly, exactly.

[Kelly Lindenau]

Then I would obviously imagine in all this content there also has to be some sort of creativity or engagement factor of the content to keep people reading and clicking. And in B2B, in a lot of these traditional or highly regulated sectors, they often feel constrained in terms of the creativity that they're able to embrace. So do you have any lessons from your campaign that you could help to our listeners or anyone who might be one of those industries, how they could find their own innovative ways to engage their audience?

[Christine Elliott]

Yeah, it's such an interesting concept. Content formats and what is going to be most engaging for people. And I don't know if there's a really easy way to figure that out on a grand scale. So I think having different formats is really important. Nobody wants to read the 10 page white paper anymore. So even if you take something like a 10 page white paper and put it into an ebook format, which is more easy to chunk out and read, it's better for regulated industries. To that question, you do have to be careful. But you can also have the appropriate review within your firm and kind of get a sense of what are we willing to say and not willing to say. For example, it's the election coming up. What does EY want to come out and say about the election? That's a really. That's above my pay grade and always will be. But it is tough and regulated industries. But you still have to think about diversifying the formats, try different things and see what works. None of us know for sure. So I would say trying different formats. Maybe try a podcast. The thing with podcasts, though, and even though we're on one right now, that was on my content emoji slide, which is I wanna do a podcast. Everybody does them. But does our audience care about that? And a podcast, I think if you're gonna do it, you have to have the commitment from the business that they are gonna provide you the insights and that they are gonna show up and do what they need to do to be able to have that meaningful information. We can't make that up. We have. And that's usually where the podcast conversation ends.

[Claudia Tirico]

I also like to think that it's great to expand that creativity through the people that are working on the campaign. Right. You wanna diversify your team to bring in new perspectives and new kind of creative aspects to it. That could also be super helpful.

[Christine Elliott]

Absolutely. I mean, in this day and age, having a diverse team is just so, so critical. People have, in fact, on our team, one member is a fashion photographer.

[Claudia Tirico]

Interesting.

[Christine Elliott]

Another lived at an Irish castle and helped them turn their castle into an Airbnb type of environment. I mean, like, you would immediately say that's not really relevant. But their perspectives are so unique and different. One of our team members we found out in a recent team meeting had been shot in the leg and the bullet was still in him. Now, that doesn't necessarily make him a better content strategist. He's just the most awesome content strategist anyway. But he has a very different perspective. So I do think that that's really important. But I also think that, you know, there's so much information out there, people, if you find out what their passions are, and like, the fashion photographer is really interested in video and has more of that perspective. So I think really aligning, and that's my whole career thing, aligning your talents and passions with what an organization needs is better for the organization and better for each person in that if they can really express themselves on what they're passionate about and what they're good at. And if you can combine those together, that is a dynamite place to be.

[Claudia Tirico]

I love it. I think that's that mic drop moment right there. Very, very good. Like last final clip. I love it. But wait, I'm gonna end this with Christine. Give us an elevator pitch. What have you got going on? What are you looking for? Give the audience a little bit about yourself. What's next for you?

[Christine Elliott]

Well, I'm working out with a trainer four days a week. That's my short term plan. It's all about me now. But you know, I. About when I left. Ey. How do I want to spend the rest of my career? I turned 60 and this is the area I want to spend it in. I'm so passionate about content strategy and how that drives demand and more generally driving growth in revenue through marketing. Spent a lot of my career helping businesses either build, optimize, or transform their marketing team. And I know that's a shorter term kind of career thing. So I'm open to full time positions or fractional or contract opportunities. I want to take my unique skill set and provide value where I can.

[Claudia Tirico]

I love it. And I can attest to Christine's awesome work. She's been doing some amazing campaigns for various companies over the years. So we'll throw her. We'll throw your LinkedIn profile into our show notes.

[Christine Elliott]

So even if you just let it chat, anybody who wants to chat content strategy, hit me up.

[Claudia Tirico]

Good stuff. All right, I think that's a wrap for us. We're gonna go get some lunch, huh?

[Kelly Lindenau]

Yeah, I think it's taco time actually.

[Claudia Tirico]

All right, everyone, thank you so much for listening. We will be replaying Christine's session on the pod, so please stay tuned for that and of course subscribe and like on your podcast player of choice so you don't miss any future episodes and you know where to find us on LinkedIn or X, Twitter, Instagram even and share any feedback that you have on the podcast. And yeah, we're gonna go eat and we will catch you all next week. Thanks again, Christine.

[Christine Elliott]

Thank you.

[Claudia Tirico]

Bye, everyone.

[Christine Elliott]

Bye.

[Kelly Lindenau]

Bye, guys.