The Future of Content Belongs to the Tastemakers

Polished copy is easy now with AI. You can quickly write blog posts, social campaigns, video scripts, thought leadership essays, white papers, and podcasts at scale across every imaginable format and channel. And yet, after the content is published, it’s quickly forgotten.

What now separates authentic, smart content from forgettable (and sometimes regrettable) non-strategic content is taste.

When every piece of content imaginable is easy to make, deciding what not to make becomes the real work. The brands pulling ahead of everyone else are the ones making taste a core element of their content creation process.

Taste describes the ability to consistently distinguish what fits from what doesn’t. It’s an exercise in judgment about what deserves to exist in the first place. Taste is a skill that enables content teams to determine what’s worth an audience’s time from what merely fills a content calendar.

The Judgment Call

It used to be that content teams, measured by their ability to produce faster, more efficiently, at higher volume, had the advantage. But this edge has dulled as content has become a commodity. It’s simply not good enough to have “good enough” content.

Content that can be easily produced by tools and systems is competent and fluent by default. What’s often missing is judgment.

Judgement can’t be commoditized. Judgement is thinking. It’s like when a content team takes a dozen viable ideas and chooses only the three worth pursuing. When a person instinctively reframes a piece and trims it down so that what’s being communicated is genuine and advances the message, they’re making a judgment call.

Editors have always known what’s worth making and what’s best left out. The sharpest content teams are taking their cue from editors and gaining a competitive edge.

More Content Isn’t The Same as More Impact

Most organizations default to pursuing more content. More blog posts. More thought leadership. But publishing everything without taste doesn’t necessarily lead to better results.

Brands also risk diluting their message when they overload their audience with content. According to Accenture, 74% of empowered consumers walked away from purchases simply because they felt overwhelmed. Content overload works the same way. What readers want is clarity. If they get that from the content they read, they stay and reward brands with their trust. Bore or bombard them with content, and they often leave quietly.

The trap of producing more content is seductive because the metrics lag behind the damage. Publishing more can keep the pageviews and open rates looking fine for months, even as readers slowly lose interest. By the time the decline shows up in the numbers, the problem has been compounding for a long time—because nobody was asking whether any of it was worth making.

What “Taste” Actually Means

Taste sounds inherently subjective. You either have, or you don’t. But in practice, it’s far more concrete than its reputation suggests.

Content guardrails tell you what to do or not to do. For example, brand guidelines tell brands how to sound. Taste takes on a harder question: What’s actually worth making?

Creative taste involves a clear sense of what fits and what doesn’t. Organizations that have it know their own voice well enough that they don’t need to watch what other brands are doing (though your content is also competing for a spot in AI-generated answers).

Brands using taste to their advantage accept that not every audience segment will be served by every piece. They also know that there’s a payoff to being opinionated when it serves the strategy, because the safest content is often the least memorable.

Codifying Taste Without Killing Creativity

Taste can be scalable when shared, but avoid the temptation of turning “taste” into a checklist or formula. How can you define taste in a structured way so that creativity flourishes?

First: Show, don’t tell. Nothing communicates taste faster than showing people what good looks like and what it doesn’t. Collections of the brand’s best work, annotated with notes on why it works, give teams a reference point far more useful than abstract principles alone.

Second: Set clear principles. Principles can help lock in content teams to what taste is, as long as the principles are clear. An example, “We explain, we don’t lecture,” sets a standard while allowing for interpretation. Principles point content teams in a direction. But they also need freedom to experiment and adapt messaging without going off-brand.

The balance that works is shared standards plus human discretion. The system provides the framework. The people provide the judgment.

Editors Were Right All Along

As the volume of potential content grows, the need for experienced judgment grows with it. Senior editors and creative directors are filters. They’re the members of the team who look at a week’s worth of planned output and ask whether it actually says anything new.

Senior editorial leaders don’t just catch errors or enforce style guides; they decide whether content is worth sharing with the world. They set the standard for what makes sense while serving as a bridge between strategy and creative execution.

From a business standpoint, investing in strong editorial leadership helps manage risk. Any piece of content that falls short costs the company something, such as audience attention, brand reputation, or internal resources. Leaders who prevent mediocre work from being published help protect the value that’s hard to recover once it’s lost.

Taste Offers A Real Creative Advantage

The future of content belongs to teams who can say, with confidence, this is us, this isn’t, and this is worth your time.

Content creation will get easier as tools get better. Taste remains the throughline that keeps brands coherent, credible, and distinct.

The volume of content will keep increasing. But the organizations that treat editorial judgment as a strategic asset will be the ones whose content still matters five years from now.

Building that kind of editorial capability doesn’t happen by accident. It takes experienced leadership, shared systems, and a commitment to quality over quantity. Connect with Contently to work with expert managing editors who can help your team develop the taste and judgment that turns content from output into advantage.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs):

How do I build “taste” into my team if we don’t have a senior editor?

You may not have a senior editor yet, but you can still take key steps to establish “taste” guidelines for your team. First, gather five to ten pieces that your team thinks are their best work and note why each one succeeded. This will be your “taste” reference set. Next, create two or three clear editorial principles to guide decisions, but flexible enough to encourage creativity. Keep updating the reference set and refining the principles over time, revisiting them every quarter.

How do I convince leadership that publishing less content is the right move?

Leadership will likely want more. So offer a new perspective—too much content can weaken the brand and reduce trust. Also, producing too much can stretch resources thin, resulting in team burnout. Then connect the idea of less content to real results, such as the pipeline, engagement, or earned media generated in the last two quarters. Compare that data to the total output. Usually, a small portion of content drives most of the results. This data helps make your case.

How long does it take to see results after shifting from volume to judgment?

Plan for one full quarter. In month one, review past work and set standards. The team uses them on new projects in month two. By month three, expect results: better engagement, fewer revisions, and clearer priorities. This information will give your team a stronger understanding of what’s worth creating. Be sure to agree on this timeline with leadership before starting.