When many marketers think of content marketing, they think of the same old, same old. Blog posts, videos, maybe an infographic thrown in for good measure. While people enjoy watching videos and many still read blog posts and articles online, sticking to the “same old, same old” won’t exactly set your brand apart or distinguish its content marketing from all the rest in a sea of content. What you need to stand out from the crowd is innovative content marketing.
Innovative content marketing, on the other hand, breaks away from the traditional blog post/video mold. It’s unique, it’s engaging, and it’s what you need to differentiate your brand from the crowd.
Need some inspiration? Take a look at these examples of innovative content marketing.
4 Innovative Content Marketing Examples
Bay Alarm Medical – America’s Sickest States
Sometimes, a brand has a lot of info to share. There are boring ways and there are innovative ways to share that info. A boring way is to just list it all in a numbered or bulleted list. Another not so engaging way to share lots of stats and data is to write it all out in paragraph form.
A better way to share data and info is visually, and that’s what Bay Alarm Medical did with their coverage of America’s Sickest States. The content creators looked at half of a million geo-tagged tweets and tapped into data from the Centers for Disease Control to put together visualizations showing the top 10 sickest states, as well as a color coded map of the US, revealing which states had the most tweets about illness.
The visual representation of data not only makes complex subjects easier to digest. It also engages people, as it can help build a sense of pride in them. For example, residents of Ohio might feel a sense of pride at being the sickest states while in New York or Pennsylvania might breathe a sigh of relief for not making the top 10.
Bulimia.com – Reverse Photoshop Covers
Innovative content marketing should challenge people’s thinking and perceptions, and that’s exactly what the Reverse Photoshop Covers campaign from Bulimia.com does. In comic books, female superheroes are often presented as being super thin or thin but muscular.
Neither body type is particularly realistic and both help to feed a culture of body dismorphia and disordered eating. To flip the script, Bulimia.com “reversed photoshopped” the covers of popular comic books, featuring Catwoman, Wonder Woman and other female superheroes. The reverse photoshopping replaced the women’s super thin, unattainable bodies with more realistic representations.
Not only does Bulimia.com’s content challenge expectations, it also does so visually. Instead of lecturing people on the fact that images of women are often unrealistic, it uses an illustration to show people how unrealistic and harmful those traditional images can be.
Mogo – Adulting 101
Although people often assume that content marketing is reserved for the internet, that’s just not true. Some of the most innovative content marketing takes place offline. Take Mogo’s Adulting 101 series.
Adulting 101 involved wine and financial education and took place in real time, in person, at locations across Canada (Mogo is a Canadian company). The event was free for users/members of the service and $20 for non-members. The brand saw enough turnout for its Adulting 101 series that it launched the MogoLounge, which featured additional financial literacy courses and seminars.
Part of the reason why in-person events can be so refreshing and innovative for everyone involved is that they feature direct engagement. People attending the events have a chance to interact directly with their hosts. They can ask questions IRL and can get an immediate response. They also get to connect the brand to faces, which can help it seem more real and trustworthy to them.
Rehabs – Your Face as an Alcoholic
People are naturally curious and naturally a bit self-involved. That’s why content marketing that directly involves an audience is often the most popular. It could explain why Google’s Arts and Culture app was the most downloaded app at the start of 2018. The app took a photo of a user and found famous portraits that “matched” it.
That same concept can also be used to educate and inform people. Take the “Your Face as an Alcoholic” app from Rehabs.com. While Google’s app was all in good fun, Rehabs’ app helps to highlight the physical risks of alcoholism. To use the app, people upload their picture. The app then shows the changes that happen in the face after 5, 10, or 20 years of alcoholism.
While the app isn’t likely to cure anyone of alcoholism, it can be a wake up call to those who might be on the edge of becoming problem drinkers.
What makes content marketing innovative? To recap, innovative content marketing engages its audience. It makes a direct connection with the audience and takes a new angle on a common issue. It also breaks down complicated data into consumable, enjoyable pieces.
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