What the F is going on in content marketing?

I went to a webinar hosted by Women in Content Marketing recently that tried to explain what the F is going on in marketing right now (literally the title of the event). Some of the conclusions:

• Content marketing roles are evolving toward more “full stack” responsibilities, looking for people who can adapt to multiple functions like demand generation, product marketing, and brand storytelling. (Personally I don’t know that this can last, as expecting marketers to be unicorns and perform all of these well isn’t realistic.)

• The traditional SEO funnel is now a pinball machine, with consumers bouncing across TikTok, Reddit, private chats, and other touchpoints before potentially reaching brand sites. That means we have to think of content marketing as an ecosystem, not a path.

• Organic search has plummeted, no surprise.

• Those AI searches you’re trying to optimize your content for? They’re pulling mainly from sources you don’t control—like reviews.

So what does this mean for your content marketing strategy? Well, first of all, there’s no magic bullet. You gotta do a lot more things to keep up in this environment.

But also: voice, authenticity, and originality are more important than ever. Your content shouldn’t look like everyone else’s. This means you need to conduct research, figure out what you know or can do that everyone else doesn’t, or find a way to speak about what you do in a unique way.

Analyze your strengths, examine your goals, and map out a strategy for creating high-value, high-quality content across the board.