NOTE: The article below originally appeared on my site RecessionSolution.com in a post titled Content Marketing’s Connection with “Small Business Saturday” + 3-Day Sale.

I am sharing it here today because I thought you would enjoy the content marketing ideas that it reveals.

The Little-Known Origin of “Small Business Saturday”

Small Business Saturday is an American shopping holiday that’s held on the Saturday after Thanksgiving.

It hasn’t been around very long.

It was only first celebrated just five years ago on November 27, 2010.

It’s basically a take-off of the concepts of “Black Friday” (encouraging retail spending) and “Cyber Monday” (encouraging e-commerce).

Instead, Small Business Saturday encourages people to shop at their small, local, brick and mortar businesses.

So what does this have to do with the main secret of effective content marketing?

Simple.

It’s proof that focusing your content on helping others works.

Why do say that?

Because of how “Small Business Saturday” got started.

You see, its origins might surprise you.

Here are the origins of “Small Business Saturday” from Wikipedia:

“In 2010 the holiday was conceived and promoted by American Express via a nationwide radio and television advertising campaign. That year Amex bought advertising inventory on Facebook, which it in turn gave to its small merchant account holders, and also gave rebates to new customers to promote the event.”

Did you catch that?

“Small Business Saturday” was originally conceived and promoted by American Express!

They came up with the brilliant idea to help small business owners in this way and then got others to promote it!

The Result For Small Business Owners?

According to National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) and American Express 104 million shoppers “shopped small” last year.

The Results For American Express?

They have 3,416,185 “likes“ on their “Small Business Saturday” Facebook page.

They receive tens of thousands of tweets under their #smallbusinesssaturday hashtag.

Are their motives in doing this purely to help others?

I honestly don’t have any clue.

But even if they’re not purely to help others, their motives at least include others!

And the content they have created and that they’ve encouraged others to create (tweets, likes, articles, and posts like this one) have all had MUCH more influence and inertia than if they only created content about themselves.

Examples of Content Marketing Focused on Others from American Express

Check out all the types of content they’ve created for this on their site:

• They provide an explanation of what “Small Business Saturday” is all about.
• They have a section to help small business owners promote their business.
• They have a section on how to rally support in your community.
• They include a map with qualifying small businesses in your area.
• They provide editable tweets, posts, and emails that can be used to spread the word.
• They provide videos that explain what it is, give case studies, and more.
• And mixed in with all of that content are offers from American Express.

Go to the special section of their site dedicated to this to see these examples for yourself.

The Content Marketing Lesson We Can Learn from American Express

I think the most valuable lesson that we can learn is that when we create content marketing focused on helping others, then it has a residual impact on us and our business.

(Most importantly, it makes you feel better!)

Who/what can you help with your content marketing?