Examples of timely content marketing

Successful content marketing requires a mix of planning and spontaneity. You need to create your content calendar to keep yourself on track with your strategy and day-to-day planning and you need to react to current events to prove your brand is more than just scheduled posts; it is up-to-date, relevant and interesting.

We have written several posts about planning your content ahead of time, but that is the easy part. Being timely and relevant is hard. It requires quick thinking, creation and approval. And on top of all that you need to make sure the post is still inline with what your audience wants.

Brands doing timely content marketing right

I know the example everyone is thinking of – Oreo’s blackout tweet. While that tweet certainly got people’s attention – especially the attention of marketers – it is just one of so many good timely content marketing examples. Here are a few you may have missed that will inspire you:

#TheDress

The question that tore families apart in February 2015 – “what color is the dress?” Every brand hopped on this bandwagon and made reference to the trending controversy in their social media posts. Some were painfully bad, but most were quite clever. Here are a few fan favorites:

#DeflateGate

While I don’t know anything about sports, even I couldn’t help but be impressed by how many brands made reference to DeflateGate in their social media marketing. Part of the appeal of this topic was how long it stayed relevant; brands had plenty of time to come up with content that promoted their brand and referenced the incident.

#BreakTheInternet

We can’t talk about social media relevancy without mentioning Kim Kardashian; Kim, herself, admitted she would be nothing without social media! Kim made this an easy one for brands to latch on to; she gave a clear CTA – let’s break the Internet. It is debatable whether the internet was broken due to her Paper Magazine cover, but it certainly provided an opportunity for brands to be relevant.

Whether you like pop culture or not, there is no denying that posting about pop culture trends on occasion offers big benefits for your brand. For example, the Nissan #BreakTheInternet post got the brand a 22,000% increase in retweets and 15,000% increase in favorites versus what it usually sees. Love it or hate it, your social media success relies on embracing it.