I’ve given up reading Top 10 lists.

We’re an industry that taught the world “content is king,” and we certainly practice what we preach.  We’ve also read a million times that a successful way to draw a reader or search engine spiders is to use something kitschy like a top 10 list (or top 20, or top 30).  Clearly it’s worked for Billboard and Mashable as entertainment.  I’ve certainly been swept up in the hype and recommended it to my clients more than once.  I actually have a “Top X” list somewhere on this blog.  But now I find myself ignoring tweets after tweets promoting another “brilliant” top 10 list.  I’ve seen a million white papers in the last year that have promoted the “Top 10 Best Landing Page Tips,” or “Best Social Media Tips,” “Best SEO Tips,” etc.  I’ve also seen the same posts again just using different words, almost as if it was spit out of The Best Spinner.

We’re talking about online marketing.  It’s bigger than 10 – it’s bigger than a million – and these fluffy pieces tend to make people forget it’s still only as applicable to your marketing campaign as it is relative. 

Today I broke my rule.  I just read a Top 10 from a popular search company, put out as a downloadable white paper (I know it’s a lead generation trick – I’m expecting to be ignoring a call any moment now).  This document was clearly written to be generic “industry” fodder. 

On this list, number four definitively suggested the best marketing landing page is bare-bones, one font page, with very little content, functionality, or design.  Sure, you’ve seen that before, but you’ve also seen others say the complete opposite – that a long, content rich page is the way to go. 

In our industry, for every expert opinion, there’s an expert opposing-opinion.  But not everyone takes it with a grain of salt.

Both of these design “tips” are general, and don’t know a thing about your vertical, customer or visitor habits, business goals, products, brand history, or your own company experience.  To me, that makes a lot of Top 10 lists nothing more than noisy fluff.

For example, are you running an inbound marketing campaign, where your top keywords are for a term or concept that the public isn’t really familiar with?  Do you need to be brief because your searchers are qualified, or do you need to provide options or funnels to support further information gathering?  In this case I’d have to think about what kind of landing page I’d want to create, but I’m fairly sure I’d be misled if I blindly followed this particular Top 10 list.

Personally, I think these lists need context, and need to be way more granular.  Granted, they wouldn’t have as sexy a headline or as wide an audience appeal, but they’d be targeted and, well, useful.  They’d actually provide content that is capable of moving the reader forward in their own goals.  If these lists exist, then I’d be all for them, but right now they’re as real as unicorns.  Maybe they’re just off my radar.  My Twitter stream may just be too polluted with fluff.

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In a previous post I was ranting about how the marketing industry seems to write for the sake of being noticed, but it’s akin to millions of people throwing confetti in the air.   We’re taught that content is king.  We’re told it will help us stand out and/or get noticed by the search engines.  Here’s the reality – nobody really stands out if they’re just writing small, non-descript content.  It’s just noise.  You’re actually doing more harm than good by wasting readers’ time.  Usually a single post determines whether you get added to an RSS feed, retweeted, liked, or linked.  It’s likely not going to make much of a dent in Google either.

I suggested not rehashing someone else’s opinion, but coming up with your own.  Simple enough, right?  If you don’t have a take, or something to offer, maybe don’t write.

So what does that leave?  What do you write about?   Where do you start?   Hell if I know – I’m not in your industry and haven’t taken the time to think through your industry.  But I do have a couple places you might think about going (these are my sources of inspiration).

1. Technorati – If you use Technorati wrong, you stand the chance of writing duplicate content. But if you search for a keyword (use the advanced search), and scan the resulting topics alone, you should have your first ingredient for an angle. What’s missing? Write it.

2. Your Sales Team Or Customer Service – These guys know the ins and outs of customers needs or problems.  Have a meeting, and figure out what the issues are.  Write something that gets ahead of these issues.  This alone might be content for years.

3. Q&A sites - From Quora to Yahoo Answers, people are asking questions.  If you don’t like the answers you see, then add your own to those – and your own – websites.

4. Use Social Mention - Conversations are happening, and even though you’re not in them, you can facilitate the conversation with something well written and targeted.  Social Mention will help you track those conversations on topics you are an expert about.

What are your sources of inspiration?

I’m begging the marketing community – please drop “content is king” and replace with “unique, relevant opinions are king.”  I can’t take the flurry of noise in my inbox, reader, and twitter stream anymore.

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