A Successful Content Strategy Minus the Content

This months Web Smart Newsletter is all about developing an effective content strategy, something I admit is a tough and daunting task. If you read this newsletter and felt intimidated, boy have I got just the motivator for you…

In the latest issue of Wired Magazine, the cover story, Internet Famous: Julia Allison and the Secrets of Self Promotion, concerns celebrity Julia Allison. Never heard of her? Neither had I…apparently for good reason. Allisons claim to fame is essentially her claim to fame. Shes not an actress, really, nor a singer, artist, intellectual, expert, or entertainer of the typical kind. However, she has leveraged the promotional tools of the internet to build an entire brand around herself, which seems to simultaneously attract, repulse and generally confuse the many who find her online. She puts out many blog posts, incessant tweets, and borderline embarrassing (ok, theyre completely embarrassing) videos on YouTube, but ultimately has not produced any content that really holds any value.

And yet… shes on the cover of WIRED magazine! She hangs with the rich and famous. Her websites get crazy traffic. Shell probably be able to monetize her quasi-celebrity before the majority of gawkers come to their senses.

What does it all mean? It means that if she can do it, anyone online with something of value must be able to do it too, right? (After all, shes using the same free tools we are: Facebook, blogs, twitter, etc.) That is, unless there is some connection between online popularity and the depths of vapidity… did I just write that???