Why content should be shared in small snacks instead of big meals

My point in mentioning Instagram is, that busy modern life yields little time for reflecting and digging deep. Whereas there are a thousand gaps during a day for simple snacks to pass through the filter. And more often than not, I end up never reading or finishing that important article because other things take over focus and it becomes outdated? The changed behaviour in how content is consumed is very visible in the traditional media industry.

Busy makes binary

All over the western world the domination trend in print publications has been a steady decline in revenue and reach since around beginning of the new millennium. This results in more busy editorial staff accepting more and more pre-produced content from brands like product shots, press releases and generally letting steady advertisers gain more ground in the editorial sections of the publication.

Looking towards scientific studies on editorial production it seems the same number of people produces 2-3 times the amount of content than they did just ten years ago. So what happens to people when you have to do more faster? One of the things we have noticed is, that busy tends to make people more binary. When you are swamped with emails and others things you have to process – you tend to choose the easy ones first. Looking for YES/NO in your to-do list, dilemmas and bigger things, where you have complicated assessments gets to stay longer on the to-do list before it becomes urgent enough to process.

So what does that mean for brands catering to journalists and digital influencers to share their images and words?

Do your research on your target group. Look at their social media feed and learn their taste and current state of mind and give them something that matches: “We just did a new ring collection of more than 100 products, but these three are the three you would like.” (I know because I analyse your social media feed and your content production and have historic data on your download behavior in our digital showroom and your sample history).

Select what you think is relevant and present it to that specific set of people and you will give them a binary choice. As oppose to a complicated task – they get an easy choice of sharing/publishing. Get in the mindset of a person who lives in a fast-pace environment – where it becomes habitual to grab and go. Cater to the online publishing behavior thus getting more coverage and staying on top of mind. Simply do research and execute a day to day plan. This is all it takes.