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An SBM team – comprising Chris Pang, Crisann Choy, and John Ho (above from left) – has won the Outstanding Paper Award at the Emerald Literati Awards 2021.  

The paper, titled ‘Content Marketing Capability Building: a Conceptual Framework’, was published by the Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing on 20 Mar 2021.

Emerald Publishing is a leading digital-first academic publisher, with more than 500 researchers in 130 countries. It has more than 350 journal titles. The Literati Awards are given to outstanding authors and reviewers of books and journals. According to the judging criteria, the outstanding paper selected would need to have research that is impactful and generate real change, and it needs to contribute something new to the body of knowledge.

Explains Chris: “We started this paper due to a two-year applied research project with funding from the NYP Capability and Translational Development Fund. We wanted to do something which would benefit SMEs and hence, we decided to look at Content Marketing (CM).”

The team looked into case studies for five local brands: Denis Asia (known for its AYAM brand tinned food), Allswell (known for Red Bull), Sakae (known for its sushi chains), Bata, and Cat & the Fiddle. They discovered some best practices to do content marketing for their products and brands.

Based on the study, the paper went on to propose a new and original content marketing capability-building framework to help companies better tap on CM, based on the stages of growth the companies are in. 

Besides the paper, the team also invited the local brands for workshops, where they shared the findings of the paper and their recommendations for the companies to better utilise content marketing. They also use this newly developed CM model in the teaching of SBM's marketing-related CET courses, as a guide for SMEs. 

Says John Ho: “This award is really a testament to the saying that ‘when you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything.’ The true motivation is in knowing that there are endless possibilities out there and there is always room for exploration for what is to come next. We are truly grateful that we have produced something that others found useful.”