1. The Beginner’s Guide to Content Marketing (Medium) Let’s take this slowly. First up we have: Content marketing – a beginner’s guide.
2. Moz’s Rand Fishkin on Why Licensing Content Is for Suckers, His Favorite Wizard, and the Future of SEO (Contently) Both Contently and Rand Fishkin from Moz are usually worth listening to. I particularly like the way he is honest enough to talk about what he doesn’t know too.
3. How IBM breaks through the noise on the Internet to guide 55 buyer personas through the funnel (Content Magazine)  Might sound a lot – 55 (as in fifty-five!) – buyer personas. But if you’re in B2B, this is a must.
4. The 25 Principles that Power Our Company Blog (HelpScout) Our notes on this link simply said “Brilliant 25x”.
5. Brands can create titles – or buy them [link no longer available] (The CMA) So how many brands choose not to start from scratch? Is that an option for you?
6. Tech buyers read brand content to inform purchase decisions (Brafton) We’re biased towards technology companies and marketers in that sector. This is about the most and least influential content for buyers.
7. ‘We Believe in Stories’: GE Reports’ Tomas Kellner Reveals How He Built the World’s Best Brand Mag  “World’s best brand mag”? It’s hard to disagree. Plus we love a good editor Q&A.
8. Brand storytelling: Connecting with your audience (Fast Company) All the way back from 2009, this is still relevant.
9. 23 Experts Weigh In On What Makes Content Lean (HeidiCohen.com) Definitions of ‘lean content’, including one from Heidi Cohen, the author of this post.
10. The 10 Commandments of Content (Fast Company) We often come back to this – FastCompany’s biblical take on content marketing. Amen.
11. The Top 7 Content Marketing Trends That Will Dominate 2015  And while Q1 is still with us, here’s a piece looking at trends across 2015.
We think this list needs little explanation. It comprises just the links and a short description from us. Some of the links stay the same each quarter – if we honestly think they should stay in our top 11 – though our blurbs might change.
Why 11? All the best amps go up to 11.
*photo credit: A Child’s Winning Medal via photopin (license)