This year, our writing team has written a record amount of content for our clients. In 2012, I’m expecting our writing assignments to continue to multiply. As one of my co-workers likes to say, “Content is king of marketing”. Which got me to thinking, when did copy become content – and why are good, experienced marketing writers now in such high demand?
Remember when …
I cut my journalistic teeth during the era of typesetting machines. At the trade magazine where I was associate publisher, our articles were written on electric typewriters. Those were the days of rubyliths and tissue overlays. Graphic artists hunched over large drafting tables, using hot wax to paste up the entire magazine onto art boards. If an article ran too long for a space, editing was done by literally cutting out words with a knife.
Back then, we referred to what we wrote as “copy”. There was marketing copy, ad copy, editorial copy … but it was all copy. Today, our writing team produces “content”. The difference is more than semantics. That’s primarily because the written word has become so portable.
Most of yesterday’s copy – including articles, interviews, product profiles, etc. – was manually typed for each publication. Alternatively, we’d receive some pre-written promotional articles in the form of negatives (ready for the presses) or as a “camera-ready” art (ready for the plate makers). Both options were pricey and required careful handling. For example, I remember carefully checking each negative that arrived for scratches. A damaged negative was trashed, and the company had to overnight or messenger over a replacement. (Today, most printers print directly from digital files.)
Those days sure weren’t conducive to the easy information syndication that we’ve grown to expect today. The change started with personal computers, and has grown exponentially since the advent of social media and portable communications devices.
An unrelenting need for content
The word content more aptly describes the today’s humongous thirst for news and information. Content fills a void, but never for very long. Once we were content with daily news. Now we expect new information minute by minute, hour by hour.
The content that our writing team produces is like a huge, keyword-rich repository. We create multi-purpose articles, press releases, case studies, product profiles, blogs and other pieces. We dip into it whenever we need nuggets of information that can be shared, tailored, updated and re-purposed to fulfill our clients’ never-ending need to provide the media, their sales teams, customers and prospects with fresh material. And we replenish it frequently so nothing gets stale.
We now supply information to the traditional media (radio and TV stations, newspapers) … the online news websites managed by traditional media as well as our clients’ own websites … plus all of the social media: blogs, Facebook pages and Twitter feeds.
Our clients appreciate our efficiency, because frankly most feel overwhelmed by the need to generate all of this content. They’d rather focus their energies on other areas of their businesses. You too can have professional writers ready to help whenever you need something written to promote your company or services. Just get in touch with us. We enjoy what we do, we’re easy to work with, and we’ll get the job done right.
