On our brand new YouTube Channel, Jeanne shares her thoughts on Joe Pulizzi’s famous quote, “Don’t build your content house on rented land” – as well as why you should actually have a strategy for sharing content on ‘rented land’.
What Is “Owned” and “Rented” Land in Content Marketing?
In content marketing, we talk about owned vs. rented digital land. This is an analogy to building a house. When you build a house, you must own the land you build it on – or else the owner of the land can kick you out of the house at any time.
If you build your digital version of a house, that central place where you direct your customers, clients, and readers to, on a website you neither own nor control, you are at risk of the site owner cutting off access at any time – the digital version of a landowner kicking you out of the rented land!
I’ve seen this a lot with small business owners who build their ‘house’ or digital business presence on a Facebook page. They even go so far as to put the page URL on their signage or business cards. That’s not bad, per se, but using only Facebook as your online presence is very dangerous. Facebook can at any time cut off your access to the page, shut your page down, or decide to charge high fees. If you build your online or digital presence on a website that you own or control, you’re assured it will be there as long as you want it to be there.
Jeanne Grunert, president of Seven Oaks Consulting, is an award-winning direct and digital marketer with over 20 years of senior marketing leadership experience. She’s passionate about mentoring marketing managers and providing exceptional content marketing programs and services to Seven Oaks clients. Jeanne holds an M.S. (awarded with distinction) in Direct and Interactive Marketing from New York University and frequently lectures on content marketing, search engine optimization, and project management techniques.J