The Deep Content PR Strategy: Win By Going Deeper

I love to use the deep con­tent PR strategy.

Deep con­tent isn’t com­plic­ated, any­one can use it as a digit­al PR strategy, and the res­ults are predictable.

The down­side: You have to put in the work. It tends to be a slow burn.

However, slow and steady wins the race

Here goes:

The Deep Content Structure

Deep Content

Above is an example of an online con­tent struc­ture that’s five levels deep.

In the example above, five lay­ers of ever­green con­tent are stacked:

• Level 1: Articles
• Level 2: Content Upgrade
• Level 3: Resource/Lead Magnet
• Level 4: Ebook
• Level 5: Online Course

Deep con­tent is centred around provid­ing increas­ingly high­er qual­ity to con­tent divers since they’re more valu­able than sur­face browsers.

As for the import­ance of struc­ture and depth, the logic is the same as for ice­berg pub­lish­ing and con­tent themes.

Learn more: The Deep Content PR Strategy

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The basic struc­ture is derived from vari­ous levels of con­tent qual­ity. It doesn’t mean that your brand gets a free pass for pub­lish­ing low-qual­ity art­icles; it means that your art­icles must meet the require­ments of the social object cloud — and from there, the con­tent qual­ity must increase as users dive deep­er into your con­tent catalogue.

The Strangeness of Press Releases

Think of a reg­u­lar press release:
How do most press releases end?

Besides a stand­ard boil­er­plate with com­pany inform­a­tion, you will find con­tact details. Why use those con­tact details? You rarely get a pre­cise reas­on; there’s typ­ic­ally nev­er a com­pel­ling call to action.

So, let’s back out for a second:

The press release writer tries to make the head­line more com­pel­ling than the actu­al press release because every­one wants clicks. Then, the most valu­able inform­a­tion goes into a few sen­tences at the top. And the longer you read, the less attract­ive the con­tent gets.

Press releases are designed to become duller the fur­ther down the page you read. The typ­ic­al end is only befitting:

“For fur­ther inform­a­tion, please contact.”

If someone is so damn inter­ested in your dull press release that they’re read­ing it to the end, that’s how they should be rewar­ded? Huh.

Surface Browsers and Content Divers

The basic idea:

If a user has shown interest in your sur­face-level con­tent and wants to go deep­er and learn more, it’s your job as a brand to allow this to happen.

When users are sat­is­fied, they decide when not to go any deep­er. Your com­mit­ment to this strategy is to ensure that users nev­er leave because the option to go deep­er doesn’t exist.

Why deep con­tent? Unless you’re Wikipedia, it’s a Sisyphean task to offer total breadth. However, provid­ing great depth is pos­sible — with a nar­row enough focus.

Depth is neces­sary because sur­face browsers are still just look­ing around, turn­ing over stones here and there. Content divers are immers­ing them­selves — which is more inter­est­ing from your brand’s perspective.

Opt To Go Deep, Not Wide

There’s an argu­ment to be made here:

The one per­son reach­ing your press release’s call to action is more valu­able than the hun­dred people who read its headline.

The value ratio will, of course, dif­fer depend­ing on the con­text. But the argu­ment is viable enough to build a suc­cess­ful con­tent strategy because con­tent divers are more valu­able than sur­face browsers.

The struc­ture requires the highest qual­ity con­tent at the base. Because if you “put your best foot for­ward,” con­tent divers will quickly aban­don ship if they notice that your con­tent is get­ting worse and worse the deep­er they go.

Content divers are, by nature, pick­i­er about their con­tent. Convince and con­vert them, how­ever, and you gain loy­alty and trust bey­ond any­thing you can accom­plish with sur­face browsers.

Strategic Prerequisites and Fit

The deep con­tent strategy isn’t the right fit for all brands.

Deep con­tent is SEO-friendly and caters to online audi­ences look­ing to dive deep­er into spe­cif­ic niches. It’s a good fit for busi­ness-to-busi­ness ven­tures. It’s a good fit for thought lead­er­ship strategies. It’s a good fit for B2B know­ledge work.

However, the deep con­tent PR strategy also goes bey­ond con­ven­tion­al white-col­lar industries.

Users are also look­ing to go deep in the most cre­at­ive of spaces:

It can be any­thing from music to art, from gam­ing to col­lect­ables. Many online audi­ences are inter­ested in diving into the most remote online deep­sea trenches imaginable.

PR Resource: Content Themes

Content Themes

Let’s use a fic­ti­tious example of an IT com­pany. First, they decide on a prom­ise fil­ter for their con­tent strategy:

Promise fil­ter: We make IT easy to understand.

Then, the IT com­pany breaks their core mes­sage down into four busi­ness-crit­ic­al con­tent themes:

Q1 con­tent theme: We make people under­stand the Internet of Things (IoT).

Q2 con­tent theme: We make people under­stand busi­ness auto­ma­tion.

Q3 con­tent theme: We make people under­stand cloud com­put­ing.

Q4 con­tent theme: We make people under­stand man­aged services.

For each quarterly con­tent theme, they pro­duce con­tent pack­ages. Each con­tent pack­age could con­tain the following:

• Infographics
• Blog Articles
• Whitepapers
• Social Media Updates
• Landing Pages
• Lead Magnets
• Swipe Files
• Template Files
• Content Upgrades
• Online Courses
• Podcast Episodes
• Livestreams
• Email Send-Outs
• Events
• Case Studies
• Webinars
• Video Tutorials
• Interactive Quizzes
• Press Releases
• E‑Books
• Testimonials
• Influencer Collaborations
• Mobile Apps
• Slide Presentations

Learn more: The Content Themes PR Strategy

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PR Resource: Inbound vs Outbound

Inbound vs Outbound

The inbound mind­set is a fun­da­ment­al shift in pub­lic relations.

Instead of focus­ing on try­ing to spawn non-exist­ing audi­ences, PR can do so much more with exist­ing online pub­lics. ¹See also The Publics in Public Relations (Doctor Spin).

If your inbound PR strategy is good enough, you might not even need an out­bound PR strategy.

Read also: The Inbound First PR Strategy: Beauty From Within

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PR Resource: Evergreen Content

Evergreen Content

What’s ever­green con­tent? For a piece of con­tent to be ever­green, it must sus­tain its value over time. Meaning: The con­tent must be rel­ev­ant today, tomor­row, and the fore­see­able future.

While news con­tent might have a more sig­ni­fic­ant impact short-term, ever­green con­tent instead accu­mu­lates over time.

There are dif­fer­ent ways to lever­age ever­green con­tent. I recom­mend a few axioms for ever­green content:

• Two years. To be con­sidered ever­green con­tent, I think the con­tent must be rel­ev­ant and valu­able for at least two years. It’s an arbit­rary time frame, but if an organ­isa­tion can pro­duce con­tent last­ing for two years, it will typ­ic­ally last for much longer.
• Actual interest. To be con­sidered ever­green con­tent, there must be an exist­ing volume of search engine users look­ing for the inform­a­tion. Without search volumes, the con­tent will likely be ‘ever’ without the ‘green’.
• Gentle garden­ing. Evergreen con­tent will only stay ever­green if you tend to it occa­sion­ally. To check if everything’s work­ing, add some­thing help­ful if needed, and per­haps clean out some unne­ces­sary stuff. It’s a bit like garden­ing, I find. 
• Personal touch. It’s dif­fi­cult to pub­lish some­thing unique. However, adding your brand’s ton­al­ity and flair to the con­tent is always pos­sible. The object­ive is to estab­lish trust and author­ity, so a touch of per­son­al­ity matters.

Learn more: The Evergreen Content PR Strategy: Forever Is a Long Time

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PR Resource: More PR Strategies