What Really Is Relevant Content?
I appreciate digital programmatic advances as much as the next person, but I’m seeing more and more cracks in the quality of the content. You’ll hear digital gurus pontificate about the advantages of “relevant” content. I’m not really sure I know what that means as the databases work to keep up with the speed of stakeholders. 
For example, I’m still being “followed” by retargeting ads for new television sets. Sorry Amazon, I bought the TV. In fact, I bought it through Amazon. How do you not know that, Amazon? You’ve been retargeting me now for 90 days.
The other example was an email I received from TripAdvisor. The email touted the best restaurants in my city. So I clicked on it. The only problem, the No. 1 restaurant for our city had been closed for months. The first review was from a person who was visiting from out of town and found it closed.
Relevant content means it connects directly with my needs, but there is also a layer of trust that is built or lost with the sharing of information. What do I think of TripAdvisor now? Will I trust it when I travel again? Will I trust the email headlines? The content may be relevant, but the brand is not credible. You might need more than a database and an algorithm to win me over again. Be relevant, but work on the quality, not the quantity of the data.
Mark Mathis
Mark wrote his first direct-mail fundraising letter in 1981 for the University of Iowa Center for Advancement. The effort raised a few million dollars in undiscovered wills and legacy gifts. From that day forward Mark discovered a love of the big idea that moves the needle. After 12 years at KWWL, Mark became a business owner as a co-founder of ME&V — rebranded as AMPERAGE in 2015. After 25 years of leading creative teams in video production, graphic design, PR, writing and web development, Mark transitioned out of ownership in 2021. Today he serves in an employee role as special projects consultant. He is creatively ambidextrous — son of an artist and engineer — and famous for distilling complex ideas down to a few words and a few visuals. Mark is a writer. When he found that many nonprofits struggled with complex branding puzzles, he wrote the book, “NonProfit-NonMarketing .” He also wrote a novel called “Reenactment.” Mark is an active blogger OneMinuteMarketer® with nearly 1,000 readers each week on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter. One of his most popular YouTube videos is on “How to Look Good on Zoom.” One of Mark’s fondest business memories was being named to INC 500 two times and attending the INC 500 conference with other winners. Mark is considered by some a Civil War expert (and that explains his novel). Mark also served as an adjunct professor in the business and in the communications departments at Wartburg College. Mark is a graduate of the University of Iowa and is currently vice president of the University of Iowa Journalism and Mass Communications Advisory Board. Mark is married to state Sen. Liz Mathis, and the two love to travel, even when it means being trapped by a volcano in the Czech Republic for three weeks.
