How do you quickly and efficiently update and revise content?

1 Audit your content

Before you start updating and revising your content, you need to know what you have, where it is, and how well it performs. A content audit is a systematic review of your existing content, using data and criteria to evaluate its strengths and weaknesses. A content audit can help you identify content gaps, redundancies, inaccuracies, outdated information, and usability issues. It can also help you prioritize your content updates and revisions based on your goals and user needs.

2 Plan your updates and revisions

Once you have a clear picture of your content inventory and quality, you need to plan your updates and revisions. This means setting clear objectives, scope, and timeline for each content project. You also need to define the roles and responsibilities of your content team, and establish a workflow that ensures collaboration, communication, and accountability. A content plan can help you align your updates and revisions with your content strategy, and avoid scope creep, delays, or conflicts.

3 Use content templates and guidelines

One of the challenges of updating and revising content is maintaining consistency and coherence across your content ecosystem. Content templates and guidelines can help you standardize your content structure, format, style, tone, and voice. Content templates are pre-defined layouts that specify the elements and attributes of each content type, such as headings, subheadings, images, links, metadata, and calls to action. Content guidelines are rules and recommendations that guide your content creation, such as brand voice, grammar, spelling, punctuation, word choice, and readability. Content templates and guidelines can help you save time, reduce errors, and improve user experience.

4 Use content management tools

Another challenge of updating and revising content is managing the content lifecycle, from creation to publication to maintenance. Content management tools can help you automate and simplify some of the tasks and processes involved in content governance and workflow. Content management tools can include content management systems (CMS), content collaboration platforms, content editing software, content testing tools, and content analytics tools. Content management tools can help you create, store, edit, review, approve, publish, monitor, and update your content more efficiently and effectively.

5 Test and measure your content

Updating and revising your content is not a one-time activity. It is an ongoing process that requires constant testing and measurement to ensure that your content meets your objectives and user needs. Testing and measurement can involve user feedback, usability testing, A/B testing, content audits, content analytics, and content performance indicators. Testing and measurement can help you evaluate the impact and value of your content updates and revisions, and identify areas for improvement or optimization.

6 Learn and iterate

The final tip for updating and revising your content quickly and efficiently is to learn from your testing and measurement results, and iterate accordingly. Learning and iterating means applying the insights and lessons from your content evaluation to your content strategy, and making changes or adjustments as needed. Learning and iterating can help you keep your content relevant, useful, and engaging for your users, and aligned with your business goals and industry trends.

7 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?