An issue emerged at the beginning of this millennium in the cooling waters of journalism’s encounter with content marketing: Where is the line between journalism and advertising? Norwegian law is strict that all advertising must be labeled so that there is no doubt that something has commercial purposes ( source ).
… it can be difficult to draw an exact line as to what kind of media content is advertising or not when it comes to content marketing.
JENS BARLAND
Welcome to Norway’s largest guide to content marketing! It is aimed at those who want to learn more about content marketing in Norway. The guide’s table of contents can be found here.
The challenge of journalism and content marketing
Journalism in marketing presents challenges. It can be difficult to formulate a single definition of what constitutes content marketing. It must be clearly stated what constitutes advertising, but at the same time it is positive for the readers that the quality of the content marketing approaches the standards of journalism.
In other words, producing content marketing is a delicate balancing act between writing well, being clear in your intentions, and creating indirect sales between the lines.
In Norway, journalists have a duty to uphold certain values in society. This is clearly stated on the be careful poster , which mentions topics such as freedom of expression, freedom of the press and freedom of information. With the advent of content marketing in Norway, media houses and content marketing agencies emerged. This led to, among other things, journalists being hired to create content marketing as it is called in English.
The advertising that was produced was called ” Native advertisements “ . It is a form of content marketing that is often used by newspapers and magazines on the Internet. This type of advertising is written as journalistic articles with the intention of making it more difficult to distinguish advertising from other content.
Product placement in content marketing
Product placement is a practice where companies pay money to have their products strategically placed in a video or radio feature. According to Norwegian law, all such broadcasting must be marked, but very few follow the order.
Lack of labeling applies to an even greater extent for advertising in social media. Now the government is proposing to extend the law so that all advertising where images have been retouched must also be labeled.
NRK was criticized for using poorly marked product placement in the series “semester” in 2019. Although the relationship does not violate Norwegian law, several experts believe that this is problematic. ( source )
Barland’s pilot survey from 2015 shows that such ” native ads “, as they are also called in Norwegian, are sometimes perceived as journalism ( source ). The study was limited in scope, but it nevertheless emerged that this was a disturbing problem for the companies that use such a content marketing strategy.
A phone number database is an important phone number database database that can be very useful for various organizations. It is basically an organized list of phone numbers, which are used for various purposes. Establishing quick contact with customers. Identifying target customers for campaigns | Can be contacted quickly in case of emergency. Establishing contact through various social media platforms. Collecting numbers for contact during seminars, workshops etc.
Unclear distinctions between advertising and other content
In the meantime, it is not just consumers who are struggling to distinguish between content marketing and advertising. In 2016, Per Olaf Lundteigen from the Center Party was involuntarily lured into an advertisement for Rema 1000 in VG’s Family Life section. Afterwards, he stated that he would not have stood up if he had been 100 per cent in agreement with what the campaign entailed.
Political scientist Svein Tore Marthinsen is one of those who follows and writes about the debate surrounding the distinction between advertising and other content. He believes that unclear boundaries between politics and advertising can present problems in certain situations. It would, for example, have been disturbing if VG had written about their favorite politicians in the example above.Barland points out that some consumer journalism is perceived as more commercial than others. His research partner, Ragnhild Olsen, says that it is serious if this development leads to consumer journalism becoming less credible.
Ban on TV advertising defies the EU Court of Justice
Political TV advertising is prohibited in Norway. Many are critical of this legislation as this kind of advertising is permitted in newspapers and other media. Perhaps we in Norway should ask ourselves the question whether we should either opt for a total ban or open the floodgates for political advertising in all media?
The debate seems to be moving in the direction that it will be allowed ( source ). Already in 1999, the Norwegian state lost the right to uphold the ban on political TV advertising before the EU court. Nevertheless, the ban was never lifted in practice.
By allowing political advertising in Norway, we risk ending up with American conditions, where only the political actors with big enough budgets get a real opportunity to win the election. Everyone else will struggle to buy good enough marketing to create solid election campaigns.
Despite all the challenges media houses, press and advertising agencies have faced in recent years, trust in the media is high among the Norwegian people. 8 out of 10 say that they have confidence in the Norwegian media in a survey by the Norwegian Media Authority in October 2019 ( source ). One of the reasons for this is probably that content marketing is perceived as more effective than traditional marketing (according to Content Marketing Guide’s own meta-survey from 2020).
Advertisers are riding on this trend. In recent years, market research has shown that advertisers want to increase their budget, especially for content with content marketing as an overarching strategy .
Example of tactics
Let’s return to Hitler… He made some tactically smart choices during the war; for example, when deciding where to place the artillery in specific battles.
Here I would like to draw a parallel how to choose and optimize touchpoints for your brand to the choices you make and the work effort invested in the various marketing activities, or campaigns: Does the e-book end up with a red or green design? Was it written without spelling mistakes? Is the Google Ads campaign set up with or without negative keywords?
The way all this is carried out are the tactical choices that form the building blocks of the campaign. The building blocks are part of the overall business strategy. This picture hopefully clarifies what I said at the beginning about tactics being the practical implementation of an idea.
Brotherhood is an idea. The implementation, i.e. the tactics you use, can be to pass laws that strengthen brotherhood, or it can be to fight as hard for your brother as you would fight for yourself.
What about Company x? They got a selection of their employees to build the rooms themselves to use during breaks and social gatherings. It was a tactical choice that was made. By working together on the construction cohesion improved. While at the same time they created something for. Themselves and the company.
What is a digital marketing campaign?
The next topic on the agenda is the difference between a digital marketing strategy and a digital marketing campaign .
A digital marketing campaign is the building blocks of the strategy that leads you to the overall digital goal.
Hitler carried out campaigns in which he spread propaganda for his hair-raising political views. These political campaigns can be compared to. A digital marketing campaign for example buying space in. The search engines through Google ao lists Ads. Both Hitler’s campaign and Google Ads campaigns have similar overall strategies, although the objectives of the campaigns are very different.
Although one can think about Google’s goal: They have soon conquered as much digital property as Hitler conquered land mass. Is this Google’s digital “lebens Raum”? It’s obviously a joke, but it’s not entirely out of place to compare Google to Hitler these days.
Let’s include the concept of “tactics” that we were talking about, i.e. how the campaigns are carried out down to the smallest detail on a practical level.
Hitler’s Gestapo used violence and terror to expose “traitors”. My tactic for establishing a Google Ads campaign is to start with a low budget until the right target group and text for the individual ad are defined. Both parts are examples of tactical implementation of a strategic plan.
6 levels of planning in business management
Here you see all the concepts I have talked about in this article presented in a more schematic way. Often they are mixed in a way that makes it difficult to tell them apart. In particular, business strategy and marketing strategy are often used interchangeably.
If you managed to keep up with all these antics. You have a good basis for being able to read more. About how to formulate a digital strategy in practice . Those of you who wonder how to succeed with content marketing now have a more concrete framework to deal with. There you get the steps that lead to success and concrete. Examples of how each step can take shape in reality. Not least, you get a proper definition of a digital strategy.
And I can promise you one thing: You won’t have to hear more about Hitler in this content marketing guide. However, it may happen that you are unlucky enough to meet Trump on a later occasion. Perhaps you would have preferred a few more examples from Nazi Germany…?
Summary
All business starts with a vision. Based on the vision, an overall business strategy is formulated. The company then finds a marketing strategy with a clearly defined market target. For content marketing businesses, a content marketing agency can formulate a content marketing plan. It often takes several campaigns to complete such a strategy.
A digital marketing strategy has a lot in common with marketing strategy , but is limited to the digital sphere. The digital marketing strategy is therefore subordinate to the company’s marketing strategy.
