Fighting the Content Apocalypse: Are We Really in Shock or Just Faced With Greater Choice?

Whether you call it 'content shock', 'information overload', or even the 'attention crash', there's no denying that there's a lot of content out there competing for our attention on a daily basis and it continues to grow at a mind-boggling rate! From the 350 million photos that Facebook users upload every day, to the 281 million emails that are sent, or the 400 hours of videos that are uploaded to YouTube every minute. There seems to be no end to the exponential and dizzying growth in the amount of data created. All of this adds up to the equivalent of a staggering 2.5 quintillion bytes of data produced every single day. This means that 90% of all data in existence today was created in the last 2 years, so the majority of content available, didn't exist just 2 short years ago.

But just because there is currently more content in existence than in the whole of human history, does that necessarily mean that such abundance results in a paralysis from which consumers are unable or unwilling to engage with it?

The Rise of Content Shock!

Marketing consultant, author, and member of Rutgers faculty, Mark Schaefer, in a thought-provoking article titled, Content Shock: Why content marketing is not a sustainable strategy, initiated a timely debate about the continued value of content marketing in an epoch in which the supply seems overwhelming. Schaefer applies the principles of economics and argues that the supply of content cannot expand indefinitely and that at some point the demand from consumers will be unable to keep up, because of a finite physical limit beyond which we simply cannot consume any more content. Schaefer believes that we are reaching the point where supply of content will overwhelm the ability of individuals to consume it. He calls this point in time, 'content shock', which he describes as

The emerging marketing epoch defined when exponentially increasing volumes of content intersect our human capacity to consume it.

For Schaefer, then, content shock is an inflection point in human development, beyond which the rules of information processing are radically re-written, when we all hold up our hands and say 'too much information'!

But does this stand up to scrutiny from the research?

The Content Apocalypse

Research by marketing and software company Moz and content platform BuzzSumo, seemed to validate Schaefer's apocalyptic conclusions. When analyzing 1 million randomly selected posts, they found an alarmingly low level of engagement: 50% of articles get 8 shares or less and even fewer links, and 75% of these posts receive zero referring domain links. This means that 3 out of every 4 professionally written posts get zero domain links, and while shares are easier to achieve, the data also revealed that the majority of content gets very few of them. The Moz/BuzzSumo data was also supported by findings from marketing analytics platform Trackmaven, which revealed that 42% of professionally marketed blog posts receive no interactions whatsoever.

If Schaefer is right, then we would seem to be on the verge of some kind of 'content apocalypse' and the implications for content marketing teams are that large amounts of your content are going to go unshared and unread. Brands will then devote increasing resources to developing better quality content and in greater volumes, only to gain a slightly higher level of engagement, but at disproportionate cost. Our metrics will reveal low click-through rates and high bounce rates, leading to poor levels of lead generation and resulting in limited conversions that will prompt marketing managers to question whether it is worth the time and effort for the poor payoff from all that expense.

But while there is a lot of content out there, are we really facing a content apocalypse, or are these predictions overblown and the interpretation of our reaction to so much information incorrect?

Fighting the Content Apocalypse

Founder of the Content Marketing Institute, Joe Pullizzi, has taken a less apocalyptic position to that of Schaefer, and, while he doesn't deny the results of the data from Moz/BuzzSumo and Trackmaven, he does refute the suggestion that there is little marketers can do to generate engagement. Pullizzi argues that suggestions of information overload can even be traced back to antiquity, when Seneca the Elder decried the fact that “the abundance of books is distraction.” The advent of the printing press and even the growth of public education, were both greeted with doom-sayers who predicted that too much information would result in an inability of individuals to process it. Seemingly each new technological advance results in opponents who argue that humanity can only cope with so much and for Pullizzi the idea of content shock is just another example. Seneca was proved wrong and the printing press helped advance the Renaissance.

Rather than feelings of being overwhelmed or overloaded, research by Northwestern University suggests that most people feel a sense of empowerment from the availability of so much information. Findings from a study published in the journal, The Information Society, revealed that the idea of 'information overload' is exaggerated. The study was critical of previous literature on the subject, because it focused too much upon the dynamics of overload that result when fighter pilots or battlefield commanders are inundated with large amounts of information in high-pressure combat environments. Situations very different from the individual consulting their smartphone during the daily commute, or the student researching a term paper while sipping a latte at Starbucks. The results suggested that those who did feel overwhelmed were often those who possessed limited Internet skills, whereas the majority of participants, on the other hand, were enthusiastic about the new media environment. Dismissing the notion of overload, lead author of the research and former associate professor of communication studies at Northwestern, Eszter Hargittai, comments that

We found that the high volume of information available these days seems to make most people feel empowered and enthusiastic, ... People are able to get their news and information from a diverse set of sources and they seem to like having these options.

So if this idea of overload is exaggerated, what can content marketers do about it?

Content Marketing in an Age of Abundance

Econsultancy's Jeff Rajeck believes that there are 4 things that content teams can do to create engaging content in this age of abundance. Firstly, don't forget the marketer's rallying cry: focus upon the consumer! What are they trying to achieve at each stage of the journey and how does your content resonate with what they are thinking and feeling at each point of their interaction with the brand? Secondly, does it provide an immediate benefit to the consumer and satisfy an emotional response, such as humor or happiness. Rajeck particularly praises Red Bull's content strategy for its humor in the context of its brand message. Thirdly, brands need to create immersive content, such as Marriot's pop-up VR teleporters that allow people to experience its room service for guests. Finally, Rajeck argues that marketers have never been better served with a wealth of data with which to produce better content, whether it is predictive analytics from Spike, or content performance statistics from BuzzSumo.

Ultimately it seems like the suggestions of shock or overload are overstated and that our capacity to handle large volumes of information isn't finite. For Pullizzi, however, the not-so-secret formula is that good content always rises to the top. He argues that marketers are no yet done innovating and that innovations like native advertising, for example, are still only a few years old and their applications are still being developed. In dismissing the notion of overload, apocalypse, or attention crash, Pullizzi concludes that

the capacity for consuming content will continue unabated regardless of the amount of content available. For most people — as evidenced by the Northwestern study — it’s as simple as this: I can stand all the quality content you can throw at me, as long as it’s about the stuff I’m interested in.

Will Trevor is Faculty Program Director in the School of Undergraduate Studies at Excelsior College.

Disclaimer

Opinions expressed are solely my own and do not represent the views or opinions of my employer.