So we’re in an environment right now where your customers answer the phone on their TVs, turn on their cars from their phones, and listen to the radio on their computers. Somehow you are in the unlucky position of trying to get your content to these amorphous channels in order to make money. It’s not an easy position to be in, so here’s some advice.
Simplify
The design philosophy that your digital marketing should contain a riot of colors, images and columns is pretty much over. And I’m not talking about user fatigue or a change in the design philosophy of the nation, I’m talking about rendering here. If your content needs to render on a 4” screen, a 90” high def television and everything in between, we’ve got to go easy on how we assemble images.
As the design changes to fit different sized screens, the left-to-right sizing creates a “break point” when the screen size limit has been reached. Anything to the right of the break point drops to the next row. You can see how this might make an intricate design go haywire.
Simple, clean, minimalist – that’s how to keep everything working regardless of screen size. If you need something fancy, put it in a video. Videos work great, regardless of screen size.
Focus on distribution
Customers don’t necessarily go looking for information these days, they wait for content to find them. Yes it’s lazy, but think about how bombarded they are all the time. Your job is to make sure your content is distributed as far as you can, with the hope that the information finds your customers.
Think automation: set up automatic distribution systems so that you publish content once and it instantly shows up in many places. Tools for this include RSS, “Publish to Facebook/Twitter/LinkedIn” buttons and content syndicators like newswires.
Think Channels – Text/Audio/Video
If you’re really interested in being successful in this mixed media culture, you really should be exploring text, audio feeds AND videos. Each of these formats have content distribution channels that are unique to the file format. YouTube, for example, has its own content promotion feature within Youtube, and now they are also able to display as part of your Google Adwords ads.
Audio has terrific distribution in online radio channels and iTunes. Social audio sharing in this nouveaux radio-slash-mix tape online environment is exploding right now. Expect business consulting, comedy and education audio files to join this environment in the next ten minutes.
And text… well… text is still the backbone of the Internet, and don’t let anyone tell you differently.
There is much to do. Just make sure your efforts are streamlined and as efficient as possible to create a lot of impact in this nutty environment. Things are still changing, but the possibilities are getting bigger and better all the time.
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