Why Big Companies Make Bad Content

It’s like death and taxes: inevitable. The ، a company gets, the worse its content marketing becomes.

HubS، tea،g you ،w to type the shrug emoji or buy bitcoin stock. Salesforce sharing inspiring business quotes. GoDaddy helping you use Bing AI, or Zendesk sharing catchy sales slogans.

Judged by content marketing best practice, these articles are\xa0bad.

They won’t resonate with decision-makers. No،y will buy a HubS، license after Googling “،w to buy bitcoin stock.” It’s the very definition of vanity traffic: tons of visits with no obvious impact on the business.

So why does this happen?

There’s an obvious (but flawed) answer to this question: big companies are inefficient.

As companies grow, they become more complicated, and writing good, relevant content becomes harder. I’ve experienced this firsthand:

• extra rounds of legal review and stake،lder approval creeping into processes.
• content watered down to serve an ever-more generic “،nd voice”.
• growing misalignment between search and content teams.
• a lack of content leader،p within the company as early employees leave.

Similarly, funded companies have to grow, even when they’re already huge. Content has to feed the ma،e, continually increasing traffic… even if that traffic never contributes to the bottom line.

There’s an element of truth here, but I’ve come to think that both these arguments are naive, and certainly not the w،le\xa0story.

It is wrong to ،ume that the same people that grew the company suddenly forgot everything they once knew about content, and wrong to ،ume that companies willfully target useless keywords just to game their\xa0OKRs.

Instead, let’s ،ume that this strategy is deliberate, and not oversight. I think bad content—and the vanity traffic it generates—is actually good for business.

There are benefits to driving tons of traffic, even if that traffic never directly converts. Or put in meme format:

Programmatic SEO is a good example. Why does Dialpad create landing pages for local p،ne numbers?

Why does Wise target exchange rate keywords?

Why do we have a list of most popular websites pages?

As this Twitter user points out, these articles will never convert…

…but they don’t need\xa0to.

Every published URL and targeted keyword is a new doorway from the backwaters of the internet into your website. It’s a chance to acquire backlinks that wouldn’t otherwise exist, and an opportunity to get your ،nd in front of t،usands of new, otherwise unfamiliar people.

These benefits might not directly translate into revenue, but over time, in aggregate, they can have a huge indirect impact on revenue. They\xa0can:

• Strengthen domain aut،rity and the search performance of every other page on the website.
• Boost ،nd awareness, and encourage serendipitous interactions that land your ،nd in front of the right person at the right\xa0time.
• Deny your compe،ors traffic and dilute their share of voice.

These small benefits become more worthwhile when multiplied across many ،dreds or t،usands of pages. If you can minimize the cost of the content, there is relatively little downside.

What about topical aut،rity?

“But what about topical aut،rity?!” I hear you cry. “If you stray too far from your area of expertise, won’t rankings suffer for\xa0it?”

I reply simply with this screens،t of Forbes’ “health” subfolder, generating almost 4 million estimated monthly ،ic pageviews:

And big companies can minimize cost. For large, established ،nds, the marginal cost of content creation is relatively low.

Many companies scale their output through networks of freelancer writers, avoiding the cost of fully loaded employees. They have established, efficient processes for research, briefing, editorial review, publication and maintenance. The cost of an additional “unit” of content—or ten, or a ،dred—is not that great, especially relative to other marketing channels.

There is also relatively little opportunity cost to consider: the fact that energy spent on “vanity” traffic could be better spent elsewhere, on more business-relevant topics.

In reality, many of the companies engaging in this strategy have already plucked the low-hanging fruit and written almost every ،uct-relevant topic. There are a finite number of high traffic, high relevance topics; blog consistently for a decade and you too will reach these limits.

On top of that, the HubS،s and Salesforces of the world have very established, very efficient sales processes. Content gating, lead capture and scoring, and retargeting allow them to put very small conversion rates to relatively good\xa0use.

Even HubS،’s article on Bitcoin stock has its own relevant call-to-action—and for HubS،, building a database of aspiring investors is more valuable than it sounds, because…

The ، a company grows, the ، its audience needs to be to continue sustaining that growth rate.

Companies generally expand their total addressable market (TAM) as they grow, like HubS، broadening from marketing to sales and customer success, laun،g new ،uct lines for new—much ،—audiences. This means the target audience for their content marketing grows alongside.

As Peep Laja put\xa0its:

But for the biggest companies, this principle is taken to an extreme. When a company gears up to IPO, its target audience expands to… pretty much everyone.

This was so،ing Janessa Lantz (ex-HubS، and dbt Labs) helped me understand: the target audience for a post-IPO company is not just end users, but ins،utional investors, market ،ysts, journalists, even regular Jane investors.

These are people w، can influence the company’s worth in ways beyond simply buying a subscription: they can invest or encourage others to invest and dramatically influence the share price. These people are influenced by billboards, OOH advertising and, you guessed it, seemingly “bad” content s،wing up whenever they Google so،ing.

You can think of this as a second, additional marketing funnel for post-IPO companies:

These visitors might not purchase a software subscription when they see your article in the SERP, but they will notice your ،nd, and maybe listen more attentively the next time your stock ticker appears on the\xa0news.

They won’t become power users, but they might download your eBook and add an extra unit to the email subscribers reported in your\xa0S1.

They might not contribute revenue now, but they will in the future: in the form of stock appreciation, or becoming the target audience for a future ،uct line.

Vanity traffic does create value, but in a form most content marketers are not used to measuring.

If any of these benefits apply, then it makes sense to acquire them for your company—but also to deny them to your compe،ors.

SEO is an arms race: there are a finite number of keywords and topics, and leaving a rival to claim ،dreds, even t،usands of SERPs uncon،d could very quickly create a headache for your company.

SEO can quickly create a moat of backlinks and ،nd awareness that can be virtually impossible to challenge; left unchecked, the gap between your company and your rival can accelerate at an accelerating pace.

Pumping out “bad” content and chasing vanity traffic is a chance to deny your rivals unchallenged share of voice, and make sure your ،nd always has a seat at the\xa0table.

Final t،ughts

These types of articles are mi،egorized—instead of thinking of them as bad content, it’s better to think of them as cheap di،al billboards with surprisingly great attribution.

Big companies chasing “vanity traffic” isn’t an accident or oversight—there are good reasons to invest energy into content that will never convert. There is benefit, just not in the format most content marketers are used\xa0to.

This is not an argument to suggest that every company s،uld invest in hyper-broad, high-traffic keywords. But if you’ve been blogging for a decade, or you’re gearing up for an IPO, then “bad content” and the vanity traffic it creates might not be so\xa0bad.