How do you get your content in front of the right people?

Question

"Outbound Content Marketer of the Year, Joe Chernov (VP of content at HubSpot) told me: Marketers always ask me how to make more or better content, and it’s almost always the wrong question. The right question is: “How do I get my content in front of the right people?” - Forrester's Ryan Skinner
Forrester published a very interesting report in October called "Put Distribution at the Heart of Content Marketing" (here's the related Forrester blog post). My VP shared the report with me and asked me to review and research a key content distribution strategy potentially leveraging the key technologies that are listed in the report. These technologies focus on helping identify influencers, publish content on targeted media properties and publish content if it ranks highly. I have to admit, this is somewhat new territory for me - I've yet to really focus on content distribution strategies across the entire buyer/customer lifecycle and although I've used one or two of these technologies personally, others I've only heard of and some I just flat-out had to Google.
In true intrapreneurial spirit, I starting working through the research phase - I'm actually still working through it - and as I do, I can't help but to start mentally creating a blueprint of sorts... Imagining our technology roadmap interwoven with a content distribution strategy to create and drive a valuable buyer/customer experience (to acquire, keep and grow, of course). Ideally, we'd be able to accomplish all of the above points to significantly - and intelligently - extend our reach moving forward. So, back to the the Forrester report... To help more holistically drive content distribution, Forrester recommends creating a "distribution boss" and linking that person to content creation. I like it. To even further boost success of content marketing initiatives, Forrester suggests: (and I'm paraphrasing liberally here):
1. Your distribution boss needs to be a left-brained analyst with a right-brained way with words
2. Borrow some $$ from your content creation budget for some content promotion
3. Encourage a BFF relationship between your PR and media teams and your content marketing teams
Bottom (or should I say "top") line? I'm looking forward to our organization developing a more scientific content distribution strategy in 2014. Can I get an "amen!"? So, what are you and your teams doing to take a more scientific approach to content distribution in 2014? Or what are you currently doing? I look forward to Topliners feedback!
Cheers!
Kristin
P.S. Technologies currently under review:
- Include your influencers in a distribution strategy: Little Bird, Klout, PeerIndex
- Look to specific vendors to push content on publisher’s sites: Outbrain, Sharethrough, Taboola
- Identify social content winners and invest to amplify reach on the networks that work: SimpleReach
- Keep an eye on emerging technologies for content visibility and distribution: TrendSpottr
- Others: Parse.ly
CC: marilyncox

Answer 1

Alessia,
I agree! In our current blog consolidation project, we're implementing Google Authorship for all our bloggers and we're currently evaluating how to best leverage Deltek's Google+ channel w/in our content strategy. Our PR/Social Director is not a fan - I'm working on, I mean with, her to see the possibilities.