ARE OUR ATTENTION SPANS ACTUALLY COOKED?

You’ve heard it all before “focus on short form content”, “edit like this for retention”, “keep content fast and short”. that’s the general advice we’re getting when it comes to content marketing because of people attention spans, but I don’t think it reflects the full picture and want to challenge that.

In my 2025 trend predictions, I stated how depth and storytelling will be huge this year. long form is creeping back, you can tell with the surge of both vlog / podcast style videos. additionally people are tired of the surface level content geared by the algorithm. it’s clear to tell when content is made purely for viral factor.

One thing running this platform taught me is that consumers still long for depth and meaning. when brands produce content with depth, emotion or story behind it, the feedback counters all the common advice we get around algorithm driven content. when speaking to brand owners, many of them don’t even want to go into short form as they feel it doesn’t fit the brand. so if short form isn’t your thing, double down on what you want to do, trust there’s people who’ll be out there who will enjoy it.

I’ve built undiscovered off long captions i thought no one would read. i turned out to be wrong when people actively said that’s the content they prefer. there’s an audience out there longing for content contrary to what’s recommended.

So let’s slow down. if short form isn’t your vibe and you want to create something slower paced, something that’s not optimised for the algorithm but instead has depth, story and meaning behind it, then go for it. meaningful content will help your brand so much in the sense of authenticity, branding, connection and more. social media is filled with repetitive, fast paced, surface level content, people want an escape. and people are most definitely tired of the algorithm.

This isn’t anything against that style of content. by all means double down if it works and fits your brand. my point is content marketing shouldn’t be one size fits all, go your own way and align with what feels true to you.