By Laura Petrolino

Content overload, content saturation, content exhaustion…whatever you want to call it, it is no secret that content is everywhere— and a lot of it is bad.

Really bad.

As more organizations make their way into the digital space, the amount of content may be going up, but the quality of content is going down.

And very few actually have a strategy behind the content they are throwing out into the universe.

It’s an epidemic we have watched spread in horror, and Ryan Hanley, author of Content Warfare, is no exception.

Thus is the inspiration behind Content Warfare.

A book written to help content marketers come up with a well-devised battle plan for content marketing success—and to learn to effectively use content marketing to “win the battle of attention.”

Ryan Hanley has built his business around helping content marketers learn to produce engaging content that matters to their audience that truly affects their business goals.

In addition, he crowdfunded the book so he could self-publish with the highest quality, making the book itself a case study in the power of community—one of the main messages emphasized.

Ryan brings together his knowledge and firs- hand experience gained through consulting, speaking, his podcast, blog, and crowdfunding campaign to provide readers the tools they need to create an effective content marketing platform.

What You Will Learn

This author Q&A will help you learn:

• How to use blog posts, videos, podcasts, and images to tell your story and connect with customers.
• How to figure out what content will resonate best with your target audience.
• Why you need to build your community first, and how you can do so.
• Where most content marketers go wrong and how you can avoid their mistakes.
• How to make sure your on and offline identity and message is consistent.

So, get your questions ready, and grab some Gatorade.

Our author Q&As go at a fast and furious pace and you won’t want to miss a second.

Today’s Author Q&A with Ryan Hanley

At noon ET (that’s 11:00 CT, 10:00 MT, and 9:00 PT for those of you who can’t do time zones), Ryan Hanley will be here to answer any and all of your questions.

In order to participate, all you have to do is:

• Make sure you have a Livefyre account or be ready to sign in with one of your social networks.
• Set a reminder for noon ET today.
• Order Content Warfare so you can support Ryan and improve your content marketing game.
• Create a list of questions.
• Come back here, scroll to the bottom, and write a comment in the form of a question. As soon as you hit “post comment,” Ryan will see it and reply to you. You can even join the conversation around questions others are asking, if you like.

We’ll be here for an hour so you can join us the entire time or step in and out during the hour. It’s entirely up to you; just make sure you’re here before 12:59 EST.

Win a Copy

Those of you who participate in today’s author Q&A with Ryan Hanley (even if you’re late to the party, but not if you’re an Arment Dietrich employee) will be entered into a random draw for a free copy of the book.

Don’t forget—you have to actually leave a comment, ask a question, or participate in the chat to be entered in the draw. Otherwise we won’t know you were here.

Get ready with your questions and join the conversation. And don’t fear! If you missed the live portion of this, we’ll keep the drawing open until midnight PT so you still have time to get in your questions.

Former Guests

For former guests, check out Margie Clayman, Sarah Robinson, Mark Story, Beth Hayden, Sarah Evans, Stanford Smith, Chris Brogan, C.C. Chapman, Mitch Joel, Danny Brown, Chuck Hemann, Michael Brito, DJ Waldow, Tom Martin, Ahava Leibtag, Jay Baer, Shel Israel, Mark Schaefer, Gini Dietrich, Rob Biesenbach, Steve McKee, Neal Schaffer, Ed Zitron, Ann Handley,Tim Frick, Tom Martin, Paul Roetzer, Diana Kander, Jeremy Miller, Hessie Jones, and Maddie Grant.

Who’s Next?

• May 13: Jim Mitchem with Minor King
• June 17: James Altucher with one of his 15 books, including bestsellers Choose Yourself and The Power of No
• July 15: Laura is in charge and she knows who I want (says Gini)