This question on content strategy was recently pos(t)ed on an email list, with a link to an article called Content Strategy: The Philosophy of Data on Boxes and Arrows. Having written a content strategy, I felt the urge to respond on strategy writing as follows:
– A strategy is just another word for a plan
- The strategy could be: what we can do with the resources we’ve got; what we could do if we invested in this thing, or more likely both
- A strategy should include the who, what, where, when, how, and why.
- The strategy should include the following four elements:
1. what does the business want to achieve
2. what resources does the business have to achieve it (infrastructure, staff, finances etc)
3. what are the user needs, and
4. what content / services are available and who is going to manage the content.
- The strategy has to be used – will the strategy make a difference, and if so, how
Having written a content strategy which was left unfinished and is gathering dust, I would focus on the last question first and make sure the people at the top are engaged in this (you don’t write a strategy in order to get the top involved, you write a strategy because the top are involved)
Also, don’t fall for the old ‘how can we have a content strategy when there isn’t a business strategy’ routine. There is a symbiotic relationship between the two, so both can inform each other.
Jay Fienberg from Juxtaprose gave an excellent response on the content strategy role and content strategy deliverables (reprinted with permission):
A Content Strategist is person who paints a cohesive, usually far-reaching, compelling picture of what an organization’s content is and can be, how that content comes into being, and what are its key values to the organization, to clients / customers, to the world, etc.
A “Content Strategy” deliverable is a kind-of plan, but it’s more about a strategic path of development (across multiple projects / multiple time spans) than a specific project / time span.
A “Content Plan” would be more specifically at the project level– including who exactly does what, and how they do it. And, typically, the lead role for implementing a content plan would be the “Content Manager.” A good content strategy would provide a path that can span across multiple content plans.
A content strategist can be the person who creates a content plan, and/or can also wear the hat of content manager. But, in bigger projects, there can be separate individuals doing the content strategy and content management roles, and they’d likely collaborate on some or all of the content plans.
What are your thoughts on content strategy, content strategists, and associated deliverables?
Btw, notice how the original questionner demonstrates a good use of non-sexist pronouns – it is more important to write respectully than to respect archaic rules of grammar!
[...] Keith has taken his and my descriptions and posted them on his site. So, now there’s a nice public resource with a description of What does a Content Strategist do and what are their deliverables?. [...]
It’s interesting how the concept of ‘concept strategy’, both as a title and methodology, has quickly become the domain of the digerati, and in most cases appears to eschew any connections to traditional media. As a copywriter and strategist I feel fairly strongly that the term has a much broader application beyond the world of websites, and instead should be more broadly applied to all types of media. My experience bears this out in that, the concept of content strategy is most effectively applied on behalf of a client only when it embraces all media venues; any venue where perception creation and upkeep for brands, products or messaging is the ultimate goal. With the plethora of messaging options, the internet being only one, my definition of content strategist is one who can apply the techniques and disciplines cited above across all platforms, from traditional to emerging digital to off-base guerilla. Ultimately, it is simply a matter of consistency in messaging, and the ability to create effective content, no matter how you might want to define it.
I originally posted this question but JUST coincidentally stumbled across this re-cap now. I’ll let you know how it turned out for me:
I asked the question because as the IA/UX consultant on a project, I wanted to team up with the Content/Copy person because of the particular nature of the website redesign we were working on which was very focused on content and less on functionality.
We ended up collaborating on an overall UX strategy which included information on how we wanted to restructure the site and rework the content to meet the business objectives. Once this was signed off, we worked together on a matrix to show what the content strategy would be for each actual section and page of the site, which matched up with my site map and which I used to guide my wireframes. This collaboration and outcome was super helpful for both of us because I had a great idea of what we wanted to put on each page and I knew the content person and I were “on the same page”. When it came time to write the actual content, he was able to morph the ordinal matrix into his actual content matrix. We also used the original matrix to reference wireframes and templates for other folks on the team.
I think, just like with all disciplines, the deliverables should be catered to meet the needs of the specific project and its team members.