By Gini Dietrich

We’re going to try something new here today. I am giving the keynote at Content Jam this morning at 9:00 CT and you are invited to attend right here on the blog!

My topic is the future of content marketing so I whipped out my crystal ball (er, magic 8 ball) and looked into the next few years.

We’ll first talk about the history of content (as it turns out, it’s not a new thing), then go through some stats, and then I’ll give you four things to be thinking about for your communications plans in 2014 and beyond, along with case studies and examples of how it all can work.

Attend My Content Jam Keynote

Here’s how it will work.

Jason Konopinski will be in attendance and he will herd the cats in the comments here. All you have to do is open Spin Sucks just before 9 a.m. and scroll down to the comments.

If you’ve ever attended one of our Livefyre Q&As with an author, you’ll be familiar with the process.

If you haven’t, it’s easy to join in.

To prepare:

• Make sure you have a Livefyre account or be ready to sign in with one of your social networks.
• Set a reminder for 9:00 CT today.
• Create a list of questions. If there is time, Jason will choose one or two to ask at the end of my speech.
• Come back here, scroll to the bottom, and join the conversation in the form of comments.

You’re a Guinea Pig

Jason will post the brilliant things I’m saying as comments and you’ll have the opportunity to agree, disagree, and discuss.

It’ll be a little bit different than attending live because there will be a fury of discussion, but it should be a good time.

We’ve never done this so you’ll all be guinea pigs and I hope you’ll attend.

If you can’t attend, or didn’t see this blog post in time (we didn’t give you much notice), never fear! I will blog about what I see as the future in the coming weeks.

And, you can always come back and check out the comments to see what was discussed here.

Hope to “see” you later!

P.S. Marti Konstant asked all of the speakers to write one thing about content they think is important. You can see the compilation in an eBook here.