Watch How Olympics Content Discovery Behavior Blankets Search Behavior

We’ve all figured out that our customers don’t just wake up in the morning and feel like going to YourBrand.com.

They also don’t just go to Google and search for your company or product. Search behavior only captures a piece of the customer journey puzzle.

This fact is well pronounced when you layer content discovery behavior data on top of search behavior data surrounding a major event like the Olympics.

Discovery Behavior

In last week’s video, we looked at our data from the 2012 London games and compared it with Google Trends data.

The behavior of people consuming content about the Olympics starts before people start searching about the Olympics, and trails off only after the final search query about the Olympics.  Especially for brands looking to own the conversation around major events, this is a trend that can’t be ignored.

Discovery Opportunity

In addition, even though the consumption of content remained high after the London Games, the actual publishing of Olympics related content dropped 51%. This increase in demand and drop in supply that will certainly happen again after the Rio Games end this coming Sunday night marks a huge opportunity for marketers to produce Olympics content while interest is still high.

So, how are you creating demand and capturing interest surrounding the Olympics or the next major event, before anyone thought to turn to Google and after they stopped asking questions? How are you extending the shelf-live of a moment in time?

Interest Not Intent

The answer is great content that peaks the interest of your target audience, and the channel is content discovery.

A search engine gets you to the content you knew you were looking for.

A content discovery engine gets you to content you didn’t know you were looking for.

While search is an integral part of a comprehensive marketing mix surrounding an event, to completely own the conversation, it’s interest, not intent, that should drive your content marketing.

I’m sure Puma will be capitalizing on the beauty of friendly competition long after Usain Bolt and Andre De Grasse leave Rio.