In this episode of The Ecommerce Braintrust, Kiri Masters is joined by Lauren Livak, lead at the Digital Shelf Institute, and Mike Black, the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) of Profitero, a global commerce acceleration company. In this podcast, they’re discussing the new Digital Shelf Institute and Profitero report “Defining Content Effectiveness”. Here you can register to join them in the webinar in February. In today's episode, we delve into the ever-evolving world of content effectiveness in digital retail. Kiri, Lauren, and Mike unpack the intricacies of creating impactful content that resonates with consumers and drives conversion. Drawing from their new report which involved interviewing over twelve digital leaders, they explore the duality of art and science when it comes to defining what effective content truly means for different brands.  If you're looking for comprehensive insights on improving your ecommerce content strategy, you won't want to miss this enlightening conversation. Are you ready to transition from merely sufficient content to truly effective communication with your consumer base? Make sure you tune in! More about the guests: Mike Black Mike joined Profitero in 2017 as Vice President of Marketing and has been instrumental in the company’s growth after joining Publicis Group, grew the company’s offerings beyond digital shelf analytics to include predictive analytics, retail media, and content activation solutions. Before joining Profitero, Mike held marketing roles at Nielsen and Staples Lauren Livak Lauren leads the Digital Shelf Institute in defining the strategy to create a global commerce community that supports brands, retailers, and future leaders in the complex world of digital. Across her roles, she has worked with hundreds of brand manufacturers helping them to develop an overall commerce strategy and vision for their commerce journey leveraging her work at Johnson & Johnson where she was the owner of the Digital Shelf for the Consumer family of products for North America. She launched a new approach for the way the Consumer North America business went to digital retail both in pure play & omni-channel streams covering multiple platforms such as OTC, Beauty, Oral Care, Baby Care & Wound Care with accountability for 40+ retailers and 33+ brands.   In this episode Kiri, Lauren and Mike discuss: - The five core pillars of content effectiveness: people, data and systems, process, measurement, and retailer collaboration. - The importance of understanding shopper behavior and using that knowledge to drive engagement with content. - How content impacts organic search and can be utilized to educate leadership teams on its importance. - Using retailer conversion data and measurement tools to understand content effectiveness in terms of emotional and brand impact. - The necessity for organizations to go through a maturity curve to fully understand and define content effectiveness. - The significance of internal processes and avoiding siloed teams to maximize content impact. - The potential of advanced tools, such as AI, once the content effectiveness fundamentals are well-established. - Upcoming webinar announcement and the availability of the content effectiveness report at digitalshelfinstitute.org. - The debate around whether content is being managed for mere sufficiency or optimized for effectiveness. - The essential role of communicating the value of content to leadership, particularly in the absence of clear-cut metrics. - The value of search-optimized content and transitioning to content that both builds a brand and drives conversion. - The need for resources that can harness consumer insights, and processes that ensure content reaches the right channels. - Surprising variations in content effectiveness definitions among digital leaders, indicating a lack of a one-size-fits-all approach. - Importance of content integration with product launches, and how some