A year after launching the brand journalism site Smarter With Gartner, two critical inflection points led us to realize we were ready to advance in the Maturity Model for Content Marketing:

• The global team of content creators needed more robust tools to produce the steady stream of articles, infographics, video, and interactive content published daily to help IT, marketing, and supply chain leaders stay ahead of technology trends.
• The global PR and content development team, which launched Smarter With Gartner, had an opportunity to feed our content marketing assets into the broader Gartner digital marketing programs.

When we realized we needed to take our content marketing program to the next level, I had a one-on-one call with Kirsten Newbold-Knipp, research director of Gartner for Marketers. She authored the Gartner report that introduced the Maturity Model for Content Marketing. We made “Leapfrog to Level 4” a slogan for our 2017 content marketing strategy. This was a bold goal because less than a year earlier we were moving from Level 2 to Level 3. What would it take to create a more mature content marketing function for our organization?

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I’m a sucker for first-person stories. When people share their personal experiences, especially in B2B content, they draw me in and I often read to the end, consuming their message while I’m at it. Often personal content humanizes a corporate brand and can pack a big impact — but only if that’s what the brand intends for me to feel.

American Express Open Forum features Member Stories to demonstrate how the global financial services company understands the issues faced by small-business owners.Continue Reading