The Content Trap: A Strategist's Guide to Digital Change

Format:Print

Abstract

Companies everywhere face two major challenges today: getting noticed and getting paid. To confront these obstacles, I examine a range of businesses around the world, from Chinese Internet giant Tencent to Scandinavian digital trailblazer Schibsted, from The New York Times to The Economist, and from talent management to the future of education. Synthesizing what these stories have in common, and drawing on the latest research in economics, marketing, and strategy, as well as conversations with key players from the frontlines of digital change, The Content Trap aims to reorient strategy and offers lessons for businesses, entrepreneurs, and individuals trying to figure out what to do next. Companies that flourish in a digital world have focused on establishing and fostering connections rather than creating the best content. Success comes not from making the "best" content, but from recognizing how content facilitates user connections; it comes not from protecting the value of content at all costs, but from unearthing related opportunities—product connections—close by; and it comes not from mimicking competitors' best practices, but from seeing functional connections—choices that are part of a connected whole.