As digital has become the most important channel for brand exposure and customers can make fast communication on digital media as much as they want, the brands that pursue "Digital First!" are earnestly creating a great amount of content that befits various digital channels fast. However, why are the brand visuals, the results of so much efforts, so difficult to get 'likes' without advertisement?

 The contents below are from cosmetic brands on the most important platform these days - Instagram. It is very sensuously well made. What is surprising is that they are not Instagram contents of one brand – they are from three different brands.

 It is important that the mood of content should be sensuous and trendy. But, from the perspective of customers who view the content, there are a few other things to be considered. In this column, I would like to demonstrate how we can address the challenges that many brands are facing in the content planning process.

 Photography and video are the most representative ways of visualizing digital content. Both methods are based on vision, and the quality of the visual materials often becomes the standard for quality. In many cases, brands may think, 'this content is so well-made!' in self-congratulation and upload it, but the responses from customers are different from expectation. This may be because brands created the content only from the perspective of brands. How about considering the following standards for 'making good contents' from the viewpoint of customers rather than brands?

 For a cosmetic brand, relevant contents to customers do not always have to deliver information faithfully such as How-to or information on color formation. Relevant content to customers is something that evokes feelings in customers. When a brand pursues something that is linked to customers' lives and customers find the content happy, fun, or useful, it could lead to sympathy, which makes the content truly delivered to customers (I am not saying it should evoke some grandiose feelings from deep inside of customers' minds like a movie, so do not get me wrong…).

 When creating digital channel content that is sensitive to trends, it is easy to miss the important reasons why customers choose a particular brand and make only the content that follows trends. Not only are such content unlikely to be differentiated from the content of competitors, but also it is basically telling customers that they can choose other brands whenever they want. Originality does not refer to an amazing idea. It means that at least there should be a point that allows a brand's content from that of other brands. It can be something that represents the value of a brand, or it can be a design factor of a brand. When a brand finds a differentiating point and makes continued effort to infuse it in content in a consistent way, it could be cumulated and make the brand equipped with originality that cannot be easily copied by competitors.

 A survey targeting millennials shows the millennials cannot trust skin appearance or color formation on beauty brands' content anymore and many look for product information from the content of general users because they do not like 'advertisement-like!!' content. Customers already know the technical side of content, and brands cannot fool customers with computer graphic these days. What is sincerity in content? In the end, sincerity can be linked to customer-oriented thinking. It should start from considering what customers want to see in content rather than what a brand wants to show about the brand. Everybody knows that the content created by a brand is for advertisement anyway. Nevertheless, brands should think about how they can make the most honest content. A simple before-and-after content through a retouching of images does not work anymore. When demonstrating the information and facts customers want to know, there should be a real experiment and experience process from the customers' perspective even if it takes time. When the honest process is recreated into content, there will be real communication with customers, and it will result in trust in the brand. The concept of 'customer-oriented thinking' and 'sincerity' should be always remembered as it is easy to miss when creating content to keep up with digital speed.

 In the end, gaining viewers' sympathy is the most important thing in content. If it does not evoke sympathy, there is actually no reason to put so much resource into creating content. I believe sympathy can be gained when you make something that viewers want to see from viewers' perspective. The contents created by brands should of course be made from the viewpoint of customers. I hope my column will offer an opportunity to think from customers' perspective when developing content and assessing the results of the content. Thank you.