Over the past few weeks, I watched The Defiant Ones, a four-part HBO documentary about Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre, a few times. It’s fantastic; I am sure many of you have seen it, if you haven’t, you should.

The Defiant Ones is entertaining content.

The Defiant Ones is also incredibly well-crafted marketing for Apple Music, Beats by Dre, and HBO. It was the reason I finally activated my subscription to the music service, it made me feel that Beats products are more considered and of higher quality than I originally suspected, and it reinforced my belief that there is value in my subscription to HBO.

Entertainment or media companies like Netflix, HBO, and Gimlet create and distribute content. They sell that content in different forms directly to consumers. We call these films, TV shows, podcasts, and books.

Marketing or adverising companies like 72andSunny, Droga5, and Grey create and distribute content. They’re engaged by organizations to create content for them. We call these advertisements and marketing campaigns.

Both are strategic thinkers, crafting content to specifically appeal to a demographic.

The form of the content is the same: video, audio, photographs, and the written word.

The intent of the content is the same: to engage a community and share an idea.

Entertainment and marketing have become indistinguishable. They both are just combinations of creativity and distribution from different perspectives.

What does this mean to you?

Consumers, especially those under the age of forty, don’t watch commercials anymore and don’t pay attention when they are being sold to.

Those same consumers have an insatiable appetite for quality content and more ways to consume it than ever before.

Individuals and organizations have only one way to connect their ideas with their community; making honest, meaningful, entertaining content and then doing everything they can to get it in front of the right eyes.

We are all media channels.