A question I often get from early-career creators, social media marketers, and content writers is, “How can I learn content marketing?” This is the first article of a series where I attempt to answer this question with simple, no-bullshit answers. Please stick around.

I’ve been funemployed for three weeks, basking in a much-needed career break. During this time, I’ve tried my hands at new things: I briefly ran a wine series sharing videos about wine and cooking on Instagram and TikTok. I also consulted for tech and VC startups looking to hit the ground running with storytelling, and picked up video editing and storyboarding. It’s been freeing just creating content just for fun without the pressure of KPIs and deadlines.

Then I started this blog to draw from my 10-year experience in storytelling and content marketing.

Today, I would like to talk about what is probably the most repeated buzzword in the content marketing industry and creator economy.

Finding and defining your niche as a writer, journalist, or content marketer will do wonders for your career as opposed to being someone who writes everything.

There are two main approaches writers, creators, and content marketers find their niches: the archeologist approach and the architect approach.

The archeologist 

The archeologist approach is when you find your niche by exploration. In this approach as a creator, you ideate, create, and publish content about things that interest you and see what happens. You try out a bunch of things, improve as you go, and learn from audience feedback. Over time, you discover what the audience really likes, then you double down on the most successful content types.

After a while, those well-loved content types form the foundation of your niche and you start experiencing exponential growth, making money, and/or building a solid career path in corporate. Like an archeologist, if you keep digging and excavating, you might find a treasure.

TLDR: The archeologist tries and experiments with different ideas and isn’t afraid to do things afraid.

The architect

Unlike the archeologist who wants to explore several passions to find what works, the architect wants to have a solid plan before they even get started. They spend a long time creating a blueprint, forecasting and accounting for every possible outcome. Only when they have all the information organized, do they get started.

TLDR: The architect spends a lot of time doing planning and strategy before starting anything

The archeologist vs the architect approach, which is better?

Like every good marketing answer, it depends. Each approach has its good points and would depend on variables like what stage of career are you. What kind of campaign are you trying to run? What size of companies do you serve? Etc.

The architect approach will typically work for mid-level and senior career writers and content marketers looking to try a new venture at a large scale. They already have years of creation and project management experience under their belt and as such can find it easier to make plans and projections as they already understand the fundamentals and intermediates.

For early career content marketers though? It’s best to try the archeologist approach as they still have the luxury of time and childlike wonder. Most of the great creators and artists today started as archeologists.

If you have little or no experience in creating content, focus on experimentation. If you spend a lot of time planning and strategizing, chances are you’ll get overwhelmed pretty quickly because it’s painfully difficult to figure out your niche in advance. The experimentation and exploration stage is where you figure out what you enjoy doing consistently while honing your skills.

By the time your skills mature, you’ll have a strong grasp of different creative fields, then you can niche down and specialise. What’s better? All those skills you gained are transferable in case you either want to switch companies, become an influencer, or just do freelance work.

Content marketing is the present and the future. Millions of businesses, even in the smallest of niches now moving into content marketing. Whether it’s a fintech or a food supply chain business, an explorer mindset will fit right in. And then you can layer a bit of the architect approach on top for specific large-scale campaigns.

Final word

For content marketers looking to break into content marketing writing, exploring and finding a niche to specialize in is the very first step. Let your creativity roam and don’t restrict yourself. Once you nail the basics, getting the work is easy. 

Follow me on Twitter @the_amazingama and LinkedIn where I share more content about creativity and content marketing.