Why "Every Company Is a Media Company" Is BS

If you've been online on the interwebz in the past few years, you've probably heard the phrase "every company is a media company," and that it's in the best interests of your business to act like one, too.

Spoiler alert: that's not true. So why would they say this?

It's a very popular way of thinking these days, and they probably saw it online — even HubSpot's CMO, Kipp, said it at the Pavillion CMO summit for example.

At a high level, it may seem like it makes sense to try and combine the two models. Media companies have infinite distribution but no monetizable product. SaaS companies can scale product infinitely but struggle with distribution. Put them together, and your product can infinitely scale revenue like a B2B company and have the infinite distribution possibilities of a media company.

Most B2B companies criminally underinvest in content, so this change in outlook is a kick in the pants needed to make them take action. ‎But in an effort to say something pithy, this phrase has been corrupted. Here's my attempt at digging a little deeper.

The media model is very different from the B2B model. One is trying to sell entertainment, the other, business solutions. It's best to stay in your lane.

If you try to do content like media companies, you risk throwing tens of thousands of dollars at a fancy media campaign... that your customers don't care about or learn anything from. You will probably get a lot of attention. That attention might not be from qualified buyers. Even if you do get in front of qualified buyers, in an attempt to be entertaining and get eyeballs, youv'e drowned your value prop and don't really educate customers on your product. That means no business.

Here's how the "every company is a media company" sentiment collapses for a B2B SaaS model, and why you shouldn't try to replicate how media companies tackle content exactly.

Media Companies Have Different Business Models to B2B Companies

How Media Companies Make Money

Media companies monetize attention. Consumers at large are their audience.

1. Content is their primary product. They invest a lot of money into high-quality articles, videos, news reports, and other media to captivate and entertain their audience.
2. Attention becomes a valuable commodity. In an age where everyone and their mother creates online content, it's more important than ever for media companies to try and seize attention.
3. They exchange these eyeballs for ads. By offering advertising space within their media properties, media companies can generate revenue based on the number of impressions or clicks their advertisements receive.
4. Target very large audiences. Most media companies are targeting millions of people. Eyeballs are eyeballs.

How Most B2B Companies Make Money

B2B companies sell a product or service to a niche audience who exchange money for that product or service.

1. Getting attention is just a means of selling their product. It's not the seller in itself.
2. B2B companies should invest as much in content as it takes to meet business objectives, nothing more.
3. Production value matters a lot less than educating the customer, conveying value, and moving a user along the buyer journey.
4. Target niche audiences. You have tens of thousands of potential buyers.

All Attention Is Not Equal — B2B Customers Don't Need to be Entertained

Think about it. You're not competing against YouTube, TikTok, and Netflix. So why create content like they do?

• Their job is to get as many eyeballs on their content as possible by any means possible.
• It's 90% mindless "put your brain on pause" type of entertainment.

It's very different from a Head of Customer Support tasked with getting their team to answer 5,000 tickets a day faster and cheaper without compromising on quality.

You need to slow down and think to make important business decisions. In B2B, friction is a feature, not a bug.

"Every Company Should Be a Media Company" Leads to Bad Business Decisions

If you take this mindset, you'll overinvest in soft, fuzzy things like brand and production value. There's nothing wrong with an awesome-looking video — if and only if it moves the needle for your business. A quick and authentic Loom video is often sufficient to get your point across.

You could create ten pieces of high-production value content that cost you a fortune and drive a horde of meaningless, unqualified leads. Or, you could create 50 pieces of high-quality but simple content that educates customers, costs less, and drives a smaller number of qualified leads. Better to pick the latter.

Standing out doesn't have to be expensive. That tactic pays off for the media company, not you.

Here are the tips that matter for a B2B company like yours:

• Customer education wins. This transforms readers into buyers.
• Be authentic. In a world clogged with software that's starting to seem the same, customers are choosing brands they trust.
• Talk to and leverage conversations with your customers to bring in more customers.
• Leverage your employees as natural ambassadors of your brand. Practice employee advocacy.
• Remember that the amount of impressions is meaningless unless those viewers are taking action.

Drive Qualified Eyeballs, not Random Eyeballs

B2B companies can't operate like media companies. You care about WHO sees your content, not how many people see it. It's not comparing apples with apples.

This way, you'll avoid wasting resources and instead create content that speaks directly to your ICP and drives real top-line results.

This is our ethos at Letterdrop. We're very practical and want to help content drive business outcomes by automating tedious work and giving you valuable data to make the right decisions. Work with us if you want to actually drive qualified traffic with content