Which matters more: Skills or curiosity?

They might not understand everything, but do they care enough to learn? [View Message in Browser]( / [Add Us to Safe Sender List]( [CMI Logo]( WEEKLY NEWS 10.18.24 WEEKLY NEWS 10.18.24  [Together with Brightspot]  FEATURED [6 Ideas for Epic Audio and Video Storytelling [Examples]]( By Jodi Harris [6 Ideas for Epic Audio and Video Storytelling [Examples]]( See (and hear) how six brands, recognized at the 2024 Content Marketing Awards and Cannes Lions, captivate audiences with their creative storytelling. They offer inspiring lessons on crafting engaging, impactful content. [Read more](  READ OR LISTEN TO MORE OF THE WEEK'S BEST STORIES: [How Travel Oregon’s Content Strategy Drove $50+ Million in Economic Impact]( by Ann Gynn Travel Oregon’s inclusive, one-team content and marketing approach inspires visitors, uplifts communities, and drives revenue. Find out how — and why its content leader Mo Sherifdeen made the B2C Content Marketer of the Year finalist list. [Research Finds Data Standards for Marketing Are a Must, But Few Brands Have Them]( by Content Marketing Institute Team New research reveals almost all marketers say data standards are essential for ROI. Yet, many lack them. Learn the first thing to do to establish a data standards strategy (Spoiler: it’s something that will help in more ways than that one). [Why You Have To Care Enough To Send the Very Best in B2B Marketing]( by Robert Rose B2B marketing is more than an intellectual puzzle to solve. To succeed, you have to know and care about the people you’re creating marketing for — and also the products and services your brand creates. Here’s why. [ICYMI: How To Create a Video Strategy for Now and the Future]( by Ann Gynn Creating more videos for the sake of video won’t get you far (even when the requests come from your CEO or other executives). But a customer-centric video strategy will. Here’s what to consider as you build yours.  A NOTE FROM ROBERT ROSE Which matters more: Skills or curiosity? I’ve noticed something troubling in recent years. Many B2B marketers who work for brands with highly specialized or technical topics aren’t trying to understand those subjects. For example, I recently worked with a new CMO at an engineering-focused B2B technology company. When I asked how well the marketing team understands the solutions they sell, he told me he wasn’t sure. And he admitted he didn’t yet fully grasp them himself. But here’s the thing: He was trying to learn. He dove into the industry, learning about the customers, the competition, and the technology. Yet, he hadn’t brought his team along for the ride. The real kicker? When he offered them an opportunity to learn, almost no one took him up on it. They didn’t care. Does anyone care about what we do? Over the years, buckets of tea have been spilled over how customers don’t care about our products. The [jobs-to-be-done framework]( explains this perfectly: Customers focus on solving their needs, not on the products themselves. The adage often attributed to Theodore Levitt captures this well: “People don’t want to buy a quarter-inch drill. They want a quarter-inch hole.” Some of CMI’s earliest posts about content marketing discuss how [customers care about their needs]( not yours. David Meerman Scott has been writing for the last decade about how [no one cares]( about your product except you. Lately, though, it seems marketers have stopped caring about their products. They’ve become more like special agents — laser-focused on optimizing their pieces of the customer journey without ever asking what real value the widget holds for the market. The product is just a prop in their mission, not the star of the show. I recently asked a senior marketing director at one of the largest cloud infrastructure companies in the world to give me a primer on the space and the company’s competition. He replied, “Oh, I don’t know much about that. My job is to make sure leads get into the funnel. I could put you in touch with one of our subject matter experts.” He wasn’t trying to be difficult. He didn’t consider having that depth of product knowledge essential. Increasingly, I find B2B marketers view their efforts as an intellectual puzzle. Fitting together the internal and external pieces of the creative, process, data, and measurement is an intellectual challenge they must solve to level up (or stay) in the game. They lack emotion about and interest in the products or the industry they work in. I don’t blame marketing practitioners. The reason many of them don’t seem to care has just as much to do with most companies’ lack of investment in fostering that curiosity as with their reluctance to dive deeper into learning. Businesses often see content and marketing practitioners as replaceable chess pieces. Then they’re surprised when their practitioners feel like pawns — unmotivated, disengaged, and unwilling to learn the details of the game. Maybe I’m longing for a version of marketing that no longer exists. I remember the passionate debates among marketing teams 15 or 20 years ago. Back then, B2B marketers felt excited about what their companies did. Marketing leaders made sure of it — they ran training, brought in guest speakers, and provided journal subscriptions and continuous industry education to keep everyone engaged. Product marketing would evangelize the innovative new features of the product to an excited sales-enablement team. Brand and demand-gen teams constantly learned the finer details of the industry; everyone became (at some level) a subject matter expert in the topic. They cared. Deeply. But that brings us back to the question: Do we care? As you plan your marketing for 2025, would you prefer to work with people with specialized skills or the curiosity to become an expert? Does that difference matter? I think it does. I explain why in [Rose-Colored Glasses]( this week. [Let me know what you think](mailto:robert@contentadvisory.net?subject=CMI%20content%20feedback%20—%20content%20is%20caring&elqTrackId=51EC07DD1496CDB3369988B8FE22ACF9&elqak=8AF5639A8A9F51CE9C11AC531F19F521A77E004216E70BC38AB48F2DF60D7A3E0AB1). In the meantime, remember: It’s your story. Tell it well. Robert Rose Chief Strategy Advisor Content Marketing Institute Robert Rose Chief Strategy Advisor Content Marketing Institute Would any of your colleagues or friends benefit from Robert's weekly updates? 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