Every summer, there is a moment when the content marketing requests start coming in thick and fast. And it starts as soon as I book my summer vacation. I’m not exaggerating, this happens every time I confirm my flights .. within hours! It’s actually a standing joke with the Contentworks Agency team. Most requests arrive with the unmistakable energy of, “We need this by September and we probably should have started in June.” Yes, you should have started in June, but welcome!
The three big themes this summer have been whitepapers, GEO content rewrites and September strategy. I have also had plenty of conversations about influencer marketing, which is particularly entertaining because I don’t offer it or offer support for it, and yet somehow I keep getting asked about it. So, here is my unofficial summer content marketing report, from my desk to yours.
#1 Whitepapers Are Having A Moment
I have worked on plenty of different content formats over the years, but whitepapers continue to be one of the most useful when a company has something genuinely interesting to say and needs to say it properly. A good whitepaper gives a business the room to go beyond the usual blog post, LinkedIn thought, sales deck or “five things you need to know” article. It allows me to take a subject, unpack it, bring together research and expertise, build an argument and turn all of that into something substantial enough for a reader to actually learn from. And once we add in great design, a whitepaper is a thing of beauty.
I am not particularly interested in creating a 20-page document that exists primarily because someone decided the company “needs a whitepaper.”
Nobody wakes up excited to download a glorified sales brochure. The whitepapers I like working on reveal insights, secrets and data. Think of them as a James Bond style marketing asset.
They might establish a point of view in a crowded market or help a business explain a complex issue to potential shareholders. Or turn one piece of substantial research into a much wider content ecosystem, with articles, social media content and email campaigns all flowing from the original work. And the great thing about an excellent whitepaper is that it can be evergreen making them a worthwhile investment of time and budget.
#2 GEO Content Rewrites Are Becoming Part Of The Conversation
The other request that has really picked up is GEO, or Generative Engine Optimisation.
This is one of those areas where the language can make it sound considerably more mysterious than it actually is. At a high level, I am looking at existing content and asking a very practical question: does this make sense for the way people discover and consume information through AI-powered search and answer engines? Or even simpler… if I ask ChatGPT to recommend a company/product… will yours come up?
This means running a comprehensive audit on the existing site content.
- Are the answers clear?
- Is the structure logical?
- Are the right phrases and keywords being used?
- Are important questions being answered?
- Is the business demonstrating real expertise rather than simply repeating the same generic information that exists everywhere else?
- Are the important concepts easy for both people and machines to understand?
Quite often, the answer is not “we need 47 new articles.” It is “the 47 articles you already have need some attention.”
That is why I like GEO rewrites. There is something deeply satisfying about taking content that already contains useful knowledge and making it sharper, clearer and more discoverable rather than immediately reaching for the content production machine. I might restructure sections, strengthen answers, clarify terminology, improve headings, add useful context, remove waffle or make the underlying expertise much more obvious.
And, importantly, I still want the result to sound like a human wrote it for another human. That means following brand guidelines, tone of voice strategies, business objectives and linking to useful sources.
If the end result reads like it was assembled by a committee of search algorithms wearing beige cardigans, I have failed.
#3 September Strategy, Otherwise Known As “What Are We Doing?”
September has a particular energy in marketing and here are some common themes I see in financial marketing every year.
- Your top marketing person quit over the summer
- The CEO decided to push the 2027 rebrand into this month
- What’s the content plan? Do we have one?
- Where do we begin with the list of tasks that got dropped before the summer holidays?
- The regulator needs all the risk warnings updated on hundreds of landing pages and social media posts
- Meetings, meetings and more meetings
September is a good time to step back, look at what has worked, look at what has absolutely not worked, and decide what deserves attention for the rest of the year. My September strategy work is about getting out of the weeds.
Rather than immediately jumping into a list of blog topics, I like to look at the bigger picture. What does the content need to achieve? Is the current content performing? Which audiences matter most? Where is the existing content strong? Where are the gaps? Which topics can establish authority? Which assets could be repurposed?
Sometimes progress is halting the stuff that doesn’t work, so, a September strategy might result in a revised editorial or PR plan, a pause on nonperforming contractors and a review of your site’s analytics.
And Here’s What I Won’t Be Doing
Influencer marketing has become increasingly popular in finance, particularly as financial brands and fintech companies look for ways to make investing, money and financial products feel more accessible to audiences who are spending an enormous amount of time on social platforms. As an avid TikTok user, I get it and enjoy following it. The principle isn’t difficult.
- Find someone with an audience
- Give them a product, message or campaign
- Let them talk to their followers
- Watch the engagement numbers roll in
Except, of course, finance is not skincare. The compliance implications can be considerably more complicated than putting “use code Broker10” at the bottom of an Instagram post.
Financial promotions need to be accurate, appropriately presented and compliant with the relevant rules. Influencers need to understand what they can and cannot say. Disclosures need to be handled properly. Claims need to be defensible. And the bigger the audience gets, the more spectacularly expensive a mistake can become.
Then there is the price. Some influencer campaigns come with eye-watering budgets attached, particularly when you move into genuinely large finance audiences. You can end up spending a considerable amount of money for a person who may have absolutely no idea what your compliance team has just spent three weeks worrying about.
Influencer partnerships can be very expensive and even run into millions of dollars. So, if you plan to allocate a budget for an influencer partnership, make sure you’re aligned on expectations. You want to make sure you get what you paid for. If you’re interested in influencer marketing for your brand, you might like to read this article I authored for Agorapulse. It covers all the gritty stuff that needs to be in your influencer marketing contract.
Packing Up For Summer
Before September arrives with its spreadsheets, strategy decks and inevitable “quick” calls that somehow require three people and a follow-up meeting, I think there is something to be said for stepping away and coming back fresh.
Content marketing rewards curiosity, ideas and paying attention to what is happening in the world. It is slightly harder to do that when your brain is still processing last month’s content calendar while someone is asking whether the LinkedIn algorithm has “changed again”.
A proper break from content calendars, metrics, deadlines and the daily debate over what the algorithm apparently wants from us this week is not just nice, it is necessary. So, I’m planning to properly switch off, reset, gain a few pounds of holiday eating and come back in September with a clear head and fresh ideas. See you in two weeks to collectively exclaim.. “How on earth is it September already?”