If content is king, and it is, then what, really, is content these days?

On the web, it’s simply not enough to write hard hitting sales copy and call it content. Content, content that educates and builds trust, has become much more active than that and requires a strategic view to be truly effective.

To compete in the content is king world small business marketers must consider creating, aggregating and filtering the following forms of content:

• Written content (blogs, articles, static web pages, RSS feeds and news updates)
• Spoken content (podcasts, testimonials, case studies, core messages, press releases)
• Video content (tutorials, case studies, testimonials, customer generated, company story, demos and stunning images)

The bar has been raised and your prospects expect to find information in the format they want. They expect to be able to consume this content in many ways, including on a mobile device like an iPhone. You can’t afford to sit this out.

And, guess what, Google, Yahoo and MSN think so much of the mixed media content strategy they have all begun some form of what is being called Universal Search. Now when a surfer goes to a search engine looking for content they may find local directory results, images and video mixed into the organic results. If you aren’t producing these types of content you may find it tougher to compete.

For a great primer on Universal Search look no further than this post from Lee Odden at TopRank.