A Fresh Idea for Your Content Marketing: Think Pain!
- samarahjohansson
- Sep 5
- 3 min read
Content marketers love talking about thought leadership.
It’s become a default goal for many teams: publish smart articles, post expert takes, share visionary insights. And while thought leadership has its place, it’s not enough to move the needle on its own. If your content doesn’t acknowledge the customer’s pain—what they wrestle with every day—it won’t convert.
This is something I’ve learned across a career that started in market and competitive research in the US, shifted into marketing communications and strategy, and eventually expanded into international markets like Stockholm.
No matter the geography or industry, the same truth applies: if you want content that drives demand and builds trust, start with pain.
Why Pain Belongs at the Center of Content Marketing
At its core, content marketing is about connecting the right message to the right audience at the right time. The goal isn’t just to be clever or impressive—it’s to make your customer feel understood.
And the fastest way to do that is by showing them you understand what’s hard for them right now.
Pain is friction: something costing them time, money, or sanity.
Pain shapes priorities: it decides which projects get funded or which products get purchased.
Pain creates urgency: it pushes prospects to act sooner rather than later.
Forget clever wordplay for a second. If your whitepaper, case study, or blog doesn’t answer the silent question—“Do they get what I’m struggling with?”—it risks falling flat.
B2B vs. B2C Pain: The Same Core, Different Faces
Not all pain is created equal, and the type of pain depends on whether you’re speaking to businesses or consumers.
B2B pain points are often hidden behind processes, inefficiencies, and optics:
“We’re wasting 20 hours every month on manual data exports.”
“If we miss this deadline, it’ll show up in the quarterly review.”
B2C pain points feel more personal and emotional:
“I just want to feel confident shopping for jeans online.”
“I’m tired of wasting half a Saturday dealing with home repairs.”
One is operational, the other is emotional—but both are real. And both are the hooks that make your content resonate.
How to Dig for the Real Pain
Most marketers stop at surface-level insights. But true conversion comes from uncovering what’s deeper. A few ways to get there:
Ask the sleepless-night questions
“What keeps them up at night?”
“What isn’t working with the tool/process they already use?”
Look for friction, not just gaps
Pain isn’t the absence of joy. It’s the drag, the frustration, the bottleneck that creates daily friction.
Spot the “nagging” pains
Sometimes the biggest opportunities aren’t emergencies. They’re the low-level frustrations people learn to live with—until a better solution comes along.
Turning Pain Into Content That Works
So how does this translate into actual content marketing practice? Here’s the playbook:
Website copy: Lead with the problem, not the feature. Your homepage headline should echo the customer’s pain before it ever mentions your solution.
Case studies: Frame customer wins in terms of the pain that was solved, not just the metrics improved.
Thought leadership: Still matters! But layer it with empathy. Big-picture insights only stick if they connect to the lived frustrations of your audience.
Demand generation campaigns: Ads that name pain points directly (“Stop wasting hours on manual reporting”) cut through better than generic solution-speak.
When your content acknowledges pain first, your solution feels like relief instead of a sales pitch.
Final Thought: Pain Is the Emotional Core
Pain isn’t just a checkbox on a positioning framework. It’s the emotional core of your pitch. Whether you’re selling to CFOs tired of messy spreadsheets or consumers tired of messy closets, your content should make them nod in recognition.
Because at the end of the day, good marketing doesn’t just show expertise. It shows empathy. And empathy starts with pain.
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