6 Reasons Why BuzzFeed Destroys Your Content Strategy

Buzzfeed. That horrific amalgamation of Internet drivel. That endless stream of GIFs, "Top 21" Lists (please note the tasteful choice of only six points on this list), memes, and complaints about every age between 16 and 30. That guilty pleasure, just a click away from your Facebook feed to distract you during work hours (wash your hands afterwards).

There is much to disparage about the content that BuzzFeed spews out, crowdsourcing the college generation to in turn entertain that same age group. What makes it worse, truly, frighteningly, maddeningly worse, though, is the next part.

BuzzFeed's content strategy is far, far better than yours.

Oh, you can make complaints, raise your nose – your brand or product is higher class – above this nonsensical drivel that somehow manages to show up on your Twitter or Facebook, or perhaps by some twist of fate your Google+ the one time you checked it in the last three weeks.

But, here is the sad truth of the matter. That drivel did make it into your feed. And it likely does so regularly. Buzzfeed is doing something more than 90 percent of brands completely fail to do – executing an effective content strategy.

How is this possible? Here are six reasons why Buzzfeed destroys your content strategy:

1. BuzzFeed Isn't Afraid to Take Risks

BuzzFeed editors aren't spending hours checking whether fonts in images match approved brand guidelines. They don't fuss about with color palettes or whether someone will be offended by a picture choice. They post what they think will work.

2. BuzzFeed Has Something for Everyone

BuzzFeed may have a target demographic (likely early 20ish aged college students), but the scope of their topic choices shows they are not afraid to chase down engagement wherever they can find it. Forget customer profiling; they don't discriminate.

3. BuzzFeed's Content Can be Digested in a Matter of Seconds

Internet attention spans being what they are; this is a serious plus. You can scroll through an article in second and determine whether you want to give it more attention.

4. BuzzFeed's Content has Strong Visual Hooks

When you boil it down, BuzzFeed is probably 90 percent pictures, 10 percent text. This is a magical ratio for viral content. Even if animated GIFs were outlawed tomorrow, the image-heavy style of BuzzFeed articles would still work.

5. BuzzFeed's Site is Highly Social

If you want to interact with BuzzFeed, your only real choices involve social platforms. Social buttons are front and center in the UI, and even comments are driven with Facebook profiles.

6. BuzzFeed's Content is Endless

We all know that a regular content schedule improves engagement over time, but BuzzFeed takes this to a completely different level. New content is pushed out several times an hour during peak periods. At this scale, it doesn't matter if half your posts fail because that still means two posts an hour are succeeding. (See point number 1.)

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