The ‘quality vs. quantity‘ debate is definitely one of the most heated ones, in the content marketing ecosystem and it has been raging since forever, it seems.
In 2016, in a very short span of only a few weeks, we were treated to two articles that (at least on the surface) backed opposing views – Janessa Lantz wrote in favor of less, but more quality content for ThinkGrowth while Steve Rayson advocated more content in his article on BuzzSumo’s blog.
(It should be pointed out that they both approached the topic more cold-headedly and less partisan-like than the usual case.)
Ironically, the fact that both these articles are so well-written and make some great points actually makes it more difficult for a digital marketer or a business owner to join either of the camps.
And while the ‘quality vs. quantity’ eternal war is destined to go on for years to come, both metrics and common sense tell us that high-quality content is most probably (you can never be 100% certain of anything content marketing-related) the safest bet.
Quality Lasts
Contents
We often see the internet as a collection of moments as news, social media posts and, why not, content is published, consumed (to a greater or lesser extent) and discarded at a rate that is unprecedented in the history of human culture.
There is a reason clickbait used to work. It inspired instantaneous decisions, operating on a very cynical presumption that no content gets truly carefully and comprehensively consumed anyway, so why not just chase the one-off, almost automatical clicks?
This same cynical view is often behind the decisions of marketers, individuals and companies that value quantity over quality. They think that all content is doomed to being forgotten and discarded the same moment it first came to life.
It is not.
Quality content will last. Quality content will be consumed, shared, referred to and commented on months and years later. It does not matter when it was created; high-quality content will remain relevant, sometimes half a century later.
No Time for Quantity
If you took the time to read Mr. Rayson’s aforementioned article, the kind of numbers he is dealing in concerning the quantity of content are just ridiculous for an ordinary small-to-medium company, or even a marketing agency working for more than one or two clients.
Among other numbers, he mentions the 800 articles that Neil Patel somehow supposedly authors himself every year. That’s more than two a day. Mr. Rayson also mentions certain media outlets that are able to churn out hundreds of pieces of content every day.
This kind of content inundation is something only the world’s largest companies can afford and usually in combination with spending gigantic amounts of money.
A smaller company could never spend this much money on that much content. A marketing agency with a few clients would also find it unprofitable to produce that much stuff. An individual would have to be some kind of a content-manufacturing robot to accomplish that.
In essence, this kind of quantity is impossible and it makes much more sense to try and accomplish the same effect with quality content created and published at a more humane rate.
Simply put, high-quality content is the only way anyone smaller than a massive media house or a gigantic corporation can stay competitive.
Increasing Role of Curation
We can all agree that ridiculous amounts of content are being published every day. Just in March 2017, for example, there were more than 87 million WP posts published. That is almost 3 million a day. And that is just WordPress.
Source: https://wordpress.com/activity/posting/
Even if you somehow manage to narrow down your search to only half of thedecently written content in your particular niche, you are still left with thousands of pieces of content to go through every month.
An impossible task.
This is precisely why we cannot ignore the increasing role content curators (both real live people and machine ones) have started to play, and will play in 2017 and beyond. These individuals and pieces of software will, almost certainly, become an everyday part of the web reading experience. The sheer numbers make them a necessity.
Guess what kind of content will attract their attention and tell their readers what to check out?
You guessed it correctly – high-quality content.
Exclusively high-quality content.
Your Reputation
When you start blogging or writing for your business, the chances are quite high that making mistakes becomes an inevitable fact.
This results in company blogs being packed with content that is outdated in a matter of weeks and which, if we are being totally honest, harms the companies’ reputations.
This kind of low-quality content also harms the reputation of the content marketing professional responsible for it.
This may not happen the first few months or even years. This may not happen all the time. But there will come a time when someone will check up on your past content practices and find out that you were a sucker for trends who never bothered to do any kind of serious research for your content.
There is no need to tell you what the outcome will be.
And this is something that is more and more pronounced with each year that passes. Content consumers this year are much more educated and savvy than those from 2013. Content consumers in 2020 will be even more discerning.
You need to be a step ahead and not behind.
Closing Word
There is more and more content being churned out with each year that passes. The sheer amount of low-quality content being published on a daily basis nowadays ensures that quality content has become a necessity.
For 2017 and beyond.
