The Archive

Insights

Essays and field notes on content, markets and the craft of thought leadership.

9 articles

If William James were a content marketer…

If William James were alive today, I like to imagine him hunched over a laptop, coffee gone cold, trying to understand why his latest Substack post didn’t perform as well as last week’s. He’d be bemused by engagement metrics, intrigued by SEO, but more interested in the psychology of why people click, scroll and believe

Verbal randomness and the comfort of writing

The other day I was sitting in a reception area of a large asset manager.…

Content Equity: The origin story

Every agency, like every superhero, has an origin story. Here's ours.

A picture of a typewriter and messy thoughts coming out of it.

Subject to change

A fictional conversation between a portfolio manager and an investment writer.

The lossy compression of value propositions

Why asset managers all sound alike

The Wiggle

Why straight lines make for dull stories

An image of a heap of sand

An ode to nuance

A conversation between a portfolio manager and an investment writer about the dangers of black…

Why there is no “write” length for content

Stop counting words and start earning attention.

Image of a butterfly within circular shadowed light.

Content as creative

Why investment content specialists should shape campaigns from the outset, rather than simply polish them…