Yesterday, ransomware encrypted (made inaccessible) the bulk of the files on 200,000+ computers, demanding a BitCoin payment to release them. Even after the ransom was paid, in many cases, the files remained lost.

Suppose this happened to the computer or server that hosts your Content Marketing material. You’d be pretty unhappy, but would anyone else be?

If the answer is no, then you have serious problem. A no means nobody sees your content as anything more than advertising, and, maybe, they aren’t seeing it at all.

People are constantly bombarded with advertising and have learned to hate and mistrust it. Further, a gaggle of web browser extensions filter out all paid ads, so even the best executed promotions may go unseen. To be valued your content must serve others, and not just yourself – it should be a lesson, or a discussion, rather than a sales pitch.

In effect, the content marketer should follow Seth Godin’s mantra: “Our job is to connect to people, to interact with them in a way that leaves them better than when we found them, more able to get where they’d like to go.”

Your content should be able to stand on its own, to be something that people would pay to see, rather than pay to get rid of.