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Between the Lines
The ‘Marker’ Guide to Content Marketing for Non-Hucksters
If the term content marketing upsets you, feel free to replace it with a synonym like 🤮
I hate the term “content marketing.” I’m 100% opposed to calling anything I write “content,” and 100% opposed to thinking of anything I do as “marketing,” so I’m already 200% against content marketing. Sadly, that’s the word for something I do, and something I think more people ought to try.
If the term “content marketing” upsets you, feel free to replace it with a synonym like 🤮.
The basic idea is: there is a lot of money in being an expert, relative to being merely 90th percentile. If you don’t have the right combination of natural talent and a superhuman work ethic, you probably won’t be #1 at any job the average person has heard of. But if you define yourself more narrowly, particularly at the intersection of a couple things you do well, you can be #1. And thanks to the power law distribution of search clicks and salaries, it is vastly better to be #1 in a category that matters to a few people than to be even very good at something with broader appeal.
Take Scott Adams. He’s tricky to use as an example, because most people don’t have a ton of respect for his comics or his writing. But consider this: he’s only slightly above average at everything he does — funnier than the average person, but not hilarious; better at art than, say, the XKCD guy, but not a talented artist; a better writer than the median YouTube commenter, but not exactly Haruki Murakami. Despite these drawbacks, Scott Adams is very rich, and can spend his time doing whatever he wants.
Judgments of talent are always subjective. Your view of Adams’ drawing talent is probably colored by whether or not you like his opinions on, say, the president. So I’m going with a reliable source whose biases I can easily adjust for: my assessment of Scott Adams’ talent in his chosen career comes from Adams himself.
“Everyone has at least a few areas in which they could be in the top 25% with some effort. In my case, I can draw better than most people, but I’m hardly an artist. And I’m not any funnier than the average standup comedian who never…
