What was once the one-stop shop for email, IM, and search is now becoming a content factory. Under CEO Tim Armstrong, AOL is quickly approaching the launch point of its new algorithm-based unique content marketing system that will allow brand marketers and advertisers the opportunity to play an active role in creating the content that discusses their brand. Effectively, AOL will soon create blogs, articles, and video about brands, with the help of those brands, on a massive scale to enhance company consumer outreach (and grow its own revenues).
Though several firms currently exist in this space – Demand Media and Associated Content for instance – theWall Street Journal reports AOL’s technology and scalability put it head and shoulders above the existing competition. Apparently, it can pinpoint what consumers want to read and when they want to read it based on market trends, time of year and popular corresponding events, as well as other pieces of online data which AOL has gathered in its 25-year existence. Logistically, AOL will use a large stable of freelance writers (3,000+) to generate the actual words on the pages, which are then funneled to an editing team for fact-checking and approval. Revenue will come either from ads being placed alongside corresponding content i.e. a Nike ad next to a story about running shoes, or through “custom content” i.e. a story about the 10 best Nike shoes.
So what does this mean for small businesses? Currently, not much. And down the road, little more. The idea driving this innovation – content which engages customers is superior to ads that interrupt customers – is not groundbreaking. Its been the backbone of Web 2.0 innovation. And AOL’s model prioritizes around those businesses that are able to allocate a great deal of resources to paying for custom content and/or advertisements alongside the general content, or placing high enough in national popularity trends to be picked up by AOL’s algorithm to warrant creation of an article or blog.
This is not to say that small businesses cannot create and target custom content without AOL. On the contrary – AOL’s investment in this new technology is instead reflective of the fact that small businesses should get in the custom content game themselves. You don’t need an algorithm to write a blog about your restaurant’s weekly meal-deals or your banks latest account savings. And you don’t need 25 years of industry trends to answer customers’ questions on Twitter or a Facebook fan page.
Don’t wait for AOL to approach you about replacing your newspaper ad with their version of “custom content.” You can start making your own right now. And we can help.
