{"id":121537,"date":"2018-08-09T16:00:00","date_gmt":"2018-08-09T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.smartinsights.com\/?p=121537"},"modified":"2018-08-08T22:53:25","modified_gmt":"2018-08-08T21:53:25","slug":"fact-checking-is-the-heart-of-high-valued-content","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.smartinsights.com\/content-management\/content-marketing-creative-and-formats\/fact-checking-is-the-heart-of-high-valued-content\/","title":{"rendered":"Fact-checking is the heart of high-valued content"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chart of the Day:<\/em> \u2018Accurate and informative\u2019 are most important aspects of online content<\/h2>\n

Everyone is always asking \u2018what does good content look like?\u2019 Turns out, people don\u2019t mind what it looks like, so long as it\u2019s accurate.<\/p>\n

\"most<\/p>\n

A survey of over 1,000 adult consumers (for my money, the most knowledgeable of all consumers) from Adobe has shown that people put higher stock in the factual base of content than how it can be consumed, such as its simplicity or interactivity.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no doubt that videos and interactive landing pages can make your content memorable and shareable. They could even end up bagging your brand an awwward<\/a>, being showcased as some of the internet\u2019s most well-crafted content, but they won\u2019t put you at the front of people\u2019s minds when they want what has become the most valuable commodity of this century: information.<\/p>\n

Some great examples of putting substance over style can be found over at the subreddit r\/dataisbeautiful<\/a>. Here, many charts and graphs could be more aesthetically pleasing, but the focus is on the information being presented and how effectively it is conveyed. Every post needs to cite its source so visitors to the subreddit know that they aren\u2019t being tricked into giving their all-important karma.<\/p>\n

Just look at the graph at the top of this page. It doesn\u2019t do anything more than it needs to. No cute icons or distracting \u2018did you know?\u2019 boxes trying to crowbar more information in. You know what you\u2019re going to learn and then you see it.<\/p>\n

Creating content to promote a brand is hard. I wrote, edited, designed, photographed, and briefed people who can draw far better than me for almost five years and my clients weren\u2019t always from exciting industries. Success, however, cannot be bought with slick graphics. It\u2019s a matter of knowing what information your readers\/customers want to hear and giving it to them.<\/p>\n

Here is a handful of sites you can use to find quality third-party information to bolster your content - Bureau of Labor Statistics<\/a> (US employment stats),\u00a0YouGov<\/a> (UK stats and whitepapers),\u00a0Statista<\/a> (global research).<\/p>\n