How to create profound content at scale (6 insights from Profitwell's CEO)

We invited Patrick Campbell, CEO of Profitwell, to a private talk about content creation.

[ICYDK Profitwell are so good at creating content that they have the entire media. The interesting part is that they are not venture-backed and their team is rather small.]

Patrick told us some amazing things, which we wrote down and are happy to share with you. It was very useful for us because we are just considering scaling Epic Growth's media and trying to figure out what the structure should look like.

1. Separate Upscale content and Spread content

— What does upscale content and spread content even mean?

1/ Upscale is quality deep content that focuses on the bottom of the top of the funnel. For example, in Profitwell's case, it is Pricing Page Teardown where they deconstruct the pricing pages of different services. It's pretty niche stuff.

This is the content that they try to make 8-9 points out of 10. It's more conversion-oriented and well-researched content, and it takes a lot of time at the research and pre-production stages. They spend a lot of money on preparations and production, most of which is done in-house. They make videos and write articles based on those videos.

2/ Spread is content aimed at the top of the top of the funnel and acquisition. For example, in their case, Protect The Hustle, a more general media that discusses broad topics for a wider audience.

Quantity is more critical here than quality. Quality can be, conventionally, 6 out of 10. They cut costs on the production of such content and try to outsource everything.

— Why is it important to separate?

In the past, they didn't, and the content was too "average." Making something compelling, creative, and engaging was challenging because it was unclear how to justify huge expenses.

Now they even have different teams and different managers for Upscale and Spread content.

2. What qualities should a media manager have?

The qualities that an ideal manager should have:

1/ Great writing skills (writing/story)

2/ Skills to make cool pictures (graphic/look)

3/ Brilliant video production skills (production/editing).

But one can't do all of these things perfectly at once. Therefore, the manager should be an expert in at least two of these qualities and at least not too bad in the third one.

3. Who is on Profitwell’s content team?

— Creative producer, who makes images, graphics, and motion design
— Video production person, who produces high-quality videos
— Upscale content show producer, who produces niche-specific content
— Spread content show producer, who produces more general content
— Text editor, who writes great content, does SEO and manages Content Marketing

Plus all these people work with a bunch of contractors. This reduces the cost while producing high-quality content.

Remember that creative people are very excited about the first episode of the show. And then when they have to do 15 of those episodes, they get tired. So usually, the first couple of episodes are made in-house, and everything else is outsourced.

4. Video or text?

Profitwell does both. Video and text have different audiences and different consumption patterns.

If they make a video, they write an article based on it. If they write an article, they try to shoot a video summarizing it.

5. Why aren't they going to YouTube yet?

Interestingly, now they host all the videos on their website through Wistia.

The reason is that they think that YouTube is a social channel, and they need content there for a wider audience. Something that will become viral.

For example, Patrick recorded a video where he said the word churn 100,000 times. It took him nine hours. This is the kind of thing they plan to put on YouTube [just amazing]

6. Distribution

Now, the question is how you should distribute your content to your audience.

The most important thing for the distribution is, again, your email list. It should grow.

At the initial stage, while no one knows you at all, paid traffic can work. Moreover, you can make partnerships:

— Call people from companies you're interested into your shows;
— Do a joint webinar and share the audience;
— Release a co-e-book together with someone;
— But always keep in mind that there's no magic pill here. So, get ready to do a lot of manual work long and hard.

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