Andriana BoyrikovaHeard-it-though-the-grapevine words repeated a couple of times become truth. Yet, such misconceptions lead to costly mistakes for B2B owners and marketers. This is why last year I launched Stop Believing This Myth, my monthly myth-busting series on LinkedIn and Facebook. Each edition shines a light on a content marketing myth that harms your company’s image or internal processes and offers a way forward. To help you stay up to date, I have compiled all the 2025’s truths in disguise here.
Stop Believing This Myth #9
11th December 2025
Myth: “More followers and more likes mean more customers.”
No, it is probably people who want entertainment but will never buy from you.
It is understandable to track likes and comments on social media to analyze the performance of your content. However, those metrics say absolutely nothing about conversions.
You can post a video of your team dancing to a trending song with a caption “POV: our reaction when a client finally implements our advice”, which gets you 100,000 views. But do you think that post will make people go to your website and book a demo? It might get you new followers, but are they your ideal audience, the people who need what you sell, or the collaborators you want to work with?
100,000 views doesn’t mean an increase in your revenue.
Now compare that to a post like:
- “Last quarter, we lost hundreds of leads because our onboarding email flow was too complex. We rebuilt it, and demos went up by 32%. Here is what we did.”
- “This is how our new integration helped a customer cut their manual reporting time by 6 hours a week.”
This kind of content might not go viral, but it is more likely to make interested people curious to check your website, read about your products, download your ebook, and three months later, when they need a solution like yours, remember you and contact you. Just because you can’t track that whole journey doesn’t mean the link isn’t there. But yes, measuring ROI from a post with low engagement is impossible.
Content that performs isn’t synonymous with content that converts. Ideally, they would be, but it often doesn’t play out like that. That’s why you need to set clear goals for your content:
Are you creating content for likes and comments — the ego boost — so you look popular? Or are you creating content to position yourself as someone who knows what they are doing and to attract serious customers?
Everyone likes the ego boost: thousands of likes, thousands of followers. But such numbers, especially considering the gazillions of fake accounts and bots, don’t equal converted leads.
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So in 2026, when you plan your content, ask yourself about every post: Would my ideal client find this useful? Does it solve a problem or spark a conversation?
Stop Believing This Myth #8
14th November 2025
Myth: “We need a big budget to create content that really works.”
A big budget doesn’t guarantee success; the right strategy does.
A lot of companies choose not to invest in content marketing because they assume producing high-quality content is too costly. But quality content isn’t costly, content that misses the mark is:
- Content that doesn’t match your audience’s needs.
- Content that isn’t aligned with your business goals.
- Content that isn’t created with a clear purpose.
- Content created for metrics instead of for people.
A large budget doesn’t guarantee success if you don’t know:
- Who you are talking to;
- What matters to them;
- Why you are creating each content piece;
- How it supports your business goals.
The latest B2B content marketing research from Content Marketing Institute confirms this:
- 74% of the B2B marketers in the survey said that refining their content strategy—clarifying goals, planning better, aligning with audience needs—was the main factor that made their content marketing more effective.
- Even the impact of AI and automation is limited unless it is grounded in a strong content strategy. Tech is only half the story, and it needs its other half: a more coordinated direction.
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You don’t necessarily need a bigger budget, you need the right content strategy. Often, better planning, clearer goals, and a documented content strategy are all it takes to improve results.
Stop Believing This Myth #7
09th October 2025
Myth: “We want people to see us as authentic. So we need to share more about who we are and how we work.”
Authenticity is built when you live up to your promises.
You keep hearing that you need to be more authentic amidst the waterfall of AI-generated fluff. Supposedly, your authenticity will set you apart from all the companies flooding with AI-cloned content.
But what does it really mean for a company to be authentic? While it is important to show the human side of your business—your origin story, what you believe in, how you work, your team, the challenges you have overcome, your product in action— all those don’t make you authentic.
Your company becomes authentic when it does what it promises.
- If your company claims to “simplify complex workflows,” but your onboarding process takes weeks and your UX confuses your own team, this isn’t authentic.
- If you highlight “ethical” as one of your main values but you copy your competitors’ best-performing posts and repost them under your company’s name (something the founder of a big Dutch marketing agency is proud of doing), well, you are anything but authentic.
You build authenticity when your words and actions align. If you promise “customer-first” and your support team resolves issues on the first call, that is authenticity. If you claim sustainability is at the forefront of your processes and transparently share your suppliers and environmental data, that is authenticity.
So instead of spending hours tweaking prompts to make AI-generated content sound “more human,” spend that time brainstorming with your team: What do you always deliver, no matter what? Where can you shorten the gap between what you say and what you do?
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When you start to walk the walk, people know they can rely on you. And this is when your company becomes authentic.
Stop Believing This Myth #6
15th August 2025
Myth: “We have the next 4 months of content planned out: we have a content strategy.”
Having a content calendar isn’t the same as having a content strategy.
Confusing a content strategy with content planning is one of the fastest ways to waste budget and burn out your team. I see companies put out weekly video series, start branded newsletter hubs on Substack, and even launch a podcast, only to realize a year later that none of it was attracting the right audience and generating qualified leads.
Is this you, too?
- Starting a YouTube or TikTok channel because your biggest competitor did;
- Cranking out AI-generated LinkedIn posts that say nothing new;
- Launching a private community because everyone else is doing it.
If you haven’t defined what content success looks like for your company, every new platform, idea, or AI generative tool becomes a desired detour, which doesn’t necessarily mean progress. More often, it means throwing good money after bad.
A documented content strategy forces you to make well-thought-out choices aligned with your business goals. It gives you the discipline to stay on track when results are slow and the clarity to pivot when the numbers show you are moving but in the wrong direction.
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Content success in 2025 is about knowing exactly what you are building toward and taking the right steps. So, my question to you is: if I looked at your content calendar right now, could I tell what you are trying to achieve?
Stop Believing This Myth #5
12th June 2025
Myth: ”We are the best.”
Fantastic. Now prove it.
If you have to say you are the best, you probably aren’t.
These days, everyone is calling their business the best. The #1 software. The best branding agency in Europe. The best coaching services in the Netherlands.
Says who?
You? Oh, then it is super convincing.
Unless you have won awards and have direct quotes from clients saying those exact words, such claims carry no weight. It is like walking down a street yelling: “I AM THE BEST! BUY MY PRODUCT! I AM THE MOST CREATIVE! WORK WITH ME!”
You might get a chuckle or an eye-roll. You might trick a few people into buying. But is your goal to trick people or to show them the real value you bring?
Besides, if everyone is the best… What does the best even mean anymore?
Next time you are tempted to add that superlative on your website or LinkedIn, consider saying something real:
- We help [type of companies] double their leads in three months using a no-ads strategy.
- Our clients say, “This software does what five others couldn’t and with half the complexity.”
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Let your product or service speak for itself, spotlight your clients’ words, and show your value through real case studies and testimonials. This is more credible than any self-awarded “#1” claim.
Stop Believing This Myth #4
9th May 2025
Myth: “We have outsourced ideation and brainstorming to tools. It works like a charm.”
And what is missing is creation.
Once upon a time, we attended conferences, meet-ups, lectures, and talked with people from our industry and other industries. We listened to their problems and worries and heard different perspectives, even those we disagreed with.
We took up different hobbies and conversed with the people who practiced them. We traveled, not necessarily by plane to the other side of the world, but crisscrossed the country we lived in by train or bike, and we explored. And we would read books, industry-related and unrelated, and reflect on what we had read. Some of us would even spend time in nature and meditate daily.
Today, we input a sagacious prompt into ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, or any of the hundreds of similar tools under the sun, and let them brainstorm for us. We are stuck; they do it fast. But the question is: why are we in a mental rut? Isn’t it possible that our over-reliance on AI content generators to “brainstorm, draft, and think” on our behalf is obliterating our ability to think? Surely no, I hear you say.
Don’t you miss the days when you would sit down with a blank sheet of paper until you came up with at least ten ideas? Ideas born from your experiences, knowledge, and interactions, not recycled from others’ content?
Nowadays, it feels scary to sit still for hardly an hour, doing nothing but pondering and writing down raw ideas. Why bother when a tool can do it for you and churn out a series of posts in 10 minutes? And you are proud that you post ten times more than before, even if it is the same lousy content you are weary of seeing.
At the end of the day, who are you trying to deceive: the audience you want to attract, or yourself?
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In a digital world that has never been more artificial, let’s be the change we want to see. Use your experience of interacting with the world, along with that of your team, customers, and prospects, to create content. Because other humans will read it. And we are all drained by the echo chamber AI content generators have manufactured.
Stop Believing This Myth #3
11th April 2025
Myth: “Copy. Paste. Rewrite. Post. It is a brilliant strategy.”
Choose integrity over commoditized content.
Yesterday, I heard a statement from the CEO of a big Dutch online marketing agency (which I won’t name, I am not here to promote them):
“Find your competitors’ best-performing posts and throw them into ChatGPT to rewrite them. Now you have your own best posts!”
I was stunned. Immediately, I imagined my competitors doing exactly what that CEO recommends and even offers as a service. Is this the standard we are aspiring to?
Sadly, the moral compass of many “creators” has stopped working. But I want to remind those of you whose ethical constraints haven’t evaporated yet: integrity still matters.
I am not saying you shouldn’t use AI writing assistants. Far from it. I have even written Success with AI Content to help you extract stellar quality. But use them to support your brainstorming, outlining, and editing, not to plagiarize other people’s work.
If you want your own best-performing posts:
- Get inspired by discussions in your field and add your insight;
- Use your customers’ and prospects’ questions as a foundation;
- Build from customer success stories and case studies;
- Weave your mission, values, and origin story into the content.
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Anyone can become one of the plagiarists. If you want to build trust, stay true to your values.
Stop Believing This Myth #2
13th March 2025
Myth: “Generative AI does a great job. We don’t need writers.”
You need a content writer to do the heavy lifting.
Research shows that people who are dependent on generative AI for assignments lose their ability to express their thoughts and viewpoints over time.
To me, a writer with a linguistic and journalistic background, this isn’t surprising. I know that writing a text from scratch involves the most important step in the process: doing the thinking. When you skip this step, you hand in your thinking to someone else, in this case, to the company that built the Al.
The more you outsource your thinking to AI, the more your authentic voice and critical thinking skills atrophy.
There is also evidence that Al-assisted articles on a given topic tend to be less diverse than those independently written by humans. Sure, your Al-generated blog post “10 Ways to Leverage AI for Your Social Media Strategy” might tick all the SEO boxes, but it contains no fresh hooks or surprising facts. People will click away quickly: the dreaded high-bounce, low-conversion scenario we all fear.
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I am not saying you should abandon Al content generators. They can be your crutches in brainstorming, outlining longer pieces of content, summarizing, filling gaps, and editing.
But for research integrity, interviews with subject matter experts, pre-writing, and fact-checking, you still need professional writers.
Stop Believing This Myth #1
14th February 2025
Myth: “Our competitors are doing it, so we will too.”
Stop following. Start connecting.
It is 14 February, so let’s talk about love… and content.
If your competitors launch a podcast, should you? If everyone posts on TikTok, does that mean you must? If the biggest company in your industry replaced their writers with AI agents, should you too? No.
Because like love, effective content marketing isn’t copying others out of fear of lagging behind. It is building an authentic connection.
I am not saying you shouldn’t keep your finger on the pulse of the latest trends. Observe what works and what doesn’t. Experiment. But let your customers’ needs be your guide.
If your audience isn’t on TikTok, why are you? Why are you bragging about your best of the best product or service on a podcast instead of answering real customers’ questions in your email inbox through case studies?
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To build trust and love with your audience, first get attuned to their needs and then provide that value to them. “If it is trending, we need to jump on it” isn’t a smart long-term strategy.
Happy Valentine’s Day. And remember, building brand love is an everyday thing.
Don’t let myths cost you leads. Email me: I would love to help you achieve content marketing success.
