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Hello, fellow content peeps!

It’s Friday night and you know what that means — I’m back! This week, I’ve been thinking a lot about the flux, ups and downs of our beloved industry and of course, pondering many questions including — what’s next?

We’ll get into all of that…

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Google Wants to Help Combat Creator Burnout!?!

I’ve been thinking about how tough it is to be a creator these days, especially one that depends upon the kindness of search engines to build an audience.

It’s been a rocky, wild, tough year to be a content creator.

But I think we’re far from calling it quits.

And yet, we’re all feeling the unease and swoosh in our bellies as we keep riding this SEO and content rollercoaster.

While some of my fellow publishers have been pushed into extinction, many more are seriously contemplating a complete shift away from a pure content-led business.

In the midst of all of these massive shifts in our industry, Google once again did not ‘read the room’ and offered a podcast on how to avoid creator burnout.

Yep.

I couldn’t make this stuff up if I tried.

I think Katie Berry’s tweet encapsulates how many are feeling:

But, this got me thinking.

I’ve been in burnout mode before in my life and career.

If you care about your craft, about your career, I don’t think any of us are immune from times of burnout and frustration.

But there are always ways to keep moving forward, to keep our content creation muscles active.

And so that’s what I’ve been doing these days. It’s one of the reasons I’ve clung to writing this newsletter every week, even as the days get longer with actual project and content work.

I want to keep my own content muscles lean, limber and ready to dance.

It’s what I’ve always done during times of great change in my career.

In between content jobs, I’ve always found a way to keep creating, and finding ways to keep learning.

What strategies have you found effective in combating burnout and staying motivated? Share your thoughts and let’s learn from each other.

Choose Your Internet

There’s been so much advice these days about diversification of traffic sources.

And, while I’m 100% on board with finding your people outside of SEO or Google, this strategy can also quickly lead a content team to wearing themselves thin.

So, today, I ask, do we really need to be everywhere, or can we choose our internet?

I’m not the only one thinking about this either.

This LinkedIn post from Joe Pulizzi echoes what I’ve been feeling:

We have the ability to choose our internet. Not just as users, but as content creators.

Yes, our content strategy and distribution strategy should consider where our audience lives and hangs, but we can also choose to invest in a channel that feels good for us.

Not everyone can commit to a daily newsletter, or has the resources to invest in that.

Not every brand needs to hop on the Tik Tok train, but hey, some might want to.

So, these days, I’ve been paying attention to where I like to find new content, where I get inspired online, where I learn about a new product or service.

I think we can all get distracted by ‘shiny object syndrome’ in content, but we do get to choose.

I Still Believe We Can Build Something Great

Our very nature as humans is to connect.

And, that’s where I really feel that’s where the path forward is taking us in this AI-fueled, digital world — connection.

And, yes, content is one way we can build connections with our people.

In a world that is becoming overly saturated with hype, overly templated content creation, mass production, what can we do as content people to build a better way to connect to people?

It’s in these touchpoints of connection where I feel there are many opportunities to build a better content strategy.

In the past few weeks, I’ve been working on a few new, fresh content strategies and projects — it’s been fun to think about new ways to build that content moat around our brands.

I think the ones that are going to survive this content shift are the ones that are willing to do all the ‘hard’ things that others won’t do.

Some examples:

• Building a strong community, one member at a time, spending time to build engagement and bringing a lot of value to early members. The data from these discussions and ‘insider’ questions can be a gold mine for topical creation as well.

• Spending time finding better experts, and one-of-a-kind creators that can share insights not so easily found in today’s search landscape.

• Personality: I see a big need for brands and content strategies to push the personality factor, especially with so-called ‘boring’ topics. Give your creators some free reign to bring their own thoughts, ideas and hot takes on your content as well.

These are just a few of the strategies I’ve been working on in the past few weeks. And, yes, some of these strategies are not easily scalable.

That’s kind of the point.

It’s easy to scale templated, SEO content. We all have access to the same SEO tools and now AI assistants at the ready, so how is this a competitive advantage?

It’s not.

Things to Read, Watch, and Ponder

▶️ I feel like this interview with Scott Galloway is worth a listen right now for all of us in content. There are so many gems here, from someone who has won big and lost big too. How do you handle it all? There’s a reason this is making the rounds. Worth a watch here!

▶️ The Verge weighs in on Google’s new AI Overview and the many, many inaccuracies that its displaying for users. Read that article here. 

▶️ Is the SEO job market in decline? With all the changes in search these past few months, SEO Jobs takes a closer look at the data for Q1 of 2024. Read more here.

▶️ I still think having subject matter experts as an integral part of your content ops is important and necessary. Whether EEAT matters or not in the current Google ecosystem isn’t really the point — how are you creating content that gives you a moat on your competitors? I like this discussion from Jes Scholz, you can read more here. 

▶️If you are going to work with freelancers, you need to have a solid onboarding process. Here are some great tips on how to do that! 

It finally feels like summer in my part of the world which brings a renewed joy after a really long winter.

I look forward to many more days on my back patio with an iced coffee and my laptop. There’s something about sunshine that makes everything more fun!

Have a great week!

Cheers! Amy

Some Bonus Newsletters You’ll Love

If you want to get into the weeds on these topics, here are some newsletters that I read regularly that I think you’ll enjoy: