What the Rise of Direct-to-Consumer Brands Means for Content Marketing
De hedendaagse consumenteneconomie ziet er heel anders uit dan tien jaar geleden.
Huishoudelijke namen zijn niet langer beperkt tot Fortune 500-merken zoals P & G en Unilever. Nu wint een hele generatie direct-to-consumer-merken - zoals Glossier , Away , Plated , Harry's en The Honest Company - harten en geesten. IAB heeft deze bevindingen onlangs gedeeld in het diepgaande en fascinerende rapport ' The Rise of the 21st Century Brand Economy ', waarin wordt gesproken over hoe merken in de wereld van vandaag winnen en over de rol die content-marketing speelt.
De verschuiving naar inhoud en klantgerichtheid
In het laatste decennium was er een enorme verandering die de manier waarop we winkelen veranderde. Van 1879 tot 2010 vertrouwden merken op massamedia om consumenten te bereiken: radio, tv, kranten en tijdschriften. Hun relaties met consumenten waren altijd indirect. Merken met supply chain-controle en massale reclamebudgetten gedomineerd voor tientallen jaren; Kellogg's, Campbell's en Palmolive waren in elke winkel en elk huishouden.
Dat veranderde met de opkomst van het internet. Beginnende merken die zich specialiseerden in hyper-nichemarkten zoals scheermessen, brillen en lakens konden nu "de tussenpersoon uitschakelen" en hun doelgroepen bereiken via kanalen als sociale media.
It’s no coincidence that the rise of content marketing occurred simultaneously. We founded NewsCred and created the content marketing category because the indirect economy was ending. With a direct connection to consumers, brands needed something to say.
Reaching heads, hearts, and homes
IAB found that in order for direct-to-consumer brands to be successful, they must traverse the “three last miles": to the head, to the heart, and to the home. To cross the first two miles, companies must have strong purposes – and convey them through content.
“Storytelling is a central part of our marketing. We think about what stories we can feed to the press and to social media – things that make people take notice, things people want to share and talk about," says Steph Korey, Co-founder of travel company Away, which has raised $31 million in funding and sold more than $20 million worth of luggage.
In addition, this new generation of direct-to-consumer brands runs on first-party data. Traditional brands had no data about their customers because they sold through a shelf at Walgreens. The new generation of brands knows their customers and everything about them. Collecting opt-in identity data and then building on that relationship through content and services differentiates winning brands.
Take Glossier, the beauty blog that birthed a hot product line. It raised $8.4 million in Series A funding six weeks after launch. Founder Emily Weiss invested the money in data and analytics technology to determine how well each product performed on social media. That move is clearly paying off. Glossier saw 600 percent year-over-year growth from 2015 to 2016, has a massive, engaged fanbase, and just raised $52 million in Series C funding, bringing its fundraising total to $86 million.
Direct brands are interacting, transacting, and storytelling to their consumers online. These brands are built on intimacy, understanding their customers, and delivering value and, ultimately, thought leadership and purpose. They know “why" they exist, and their customers do, too. They are maniacally focused on customer service and experience.
What the rise of direct-to-consumer brands means for content marketing
Many big brands are struggling. Growth is slowing or stopping in nearly every category of the U.S. consumer economy, from retail to food to automotive. Online sales now account for about 90 percent of the overall growth of categories. This is still a very small piece of the pie, even for e-commerce giants like Amazon. But this positive trend means that digital will one day dominate.
Content marketing must be part of the way forward. A new type of digitally native brand is transforming every industry. This type of massive industry disruption happens once every hundred years or so. Content marketing helps brands win because it provides what they need: content to engage audiences, collect data, differentiate, and sell.
Content marketing can benefit both sides, whether it’s the newcomer brands who will double down on their direct-to-consumer, content-based relationships, or the incumbents who will fend off the disruptors by themselves going direct, telling stories, and establishing strong ties with consumers.
All brands today need content. At a time when so many companies are facing uncertain futures, that factor is a given.
Shafqat Islam is NewsCred’s CEO and Co-founder.
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Source: insights.newscred.com
