The Art & Science of Preparing a Content Strategy

Content Marketing is both an art and a science.

It's difficult and dare I say, nearly impossible, to succeed in content marketing without injecting both into it.

The problem, though, is that much of what people see or assume we (content marketers) do is the art alone.

By art, I mean the creation and organisation side of it. Figuring out which words go where and how. Figuring out what colours and shapes go where and how and much more.

We are the strange breed of people sitting on that grey area fence between pure breed writers and pure breed graphic designers. And let's not forget - we also straddle the web design/ website management borders. We are the people always calling the web guy or girl asking them to delete, shift or change something that is not quite right on that site.

That's us every day, or every other day.

Artists.

On the other hand, we are scientists.

We can't just create and sit and wait, Van-Gogh style. Nope. We have to experiment. And experiment. And experiment some more. Every day.

So when it comes to creating a content strategy, it also helps to play both roles. It's important to view the process from both perspectives.

Here's how I view each step of the process:

Problem/Project discovery

A science - because I have to analyse the data and make conclusions. I have to come up with theories about what's not working and what might work.

Synthesis into a list

Both an art and science - because when I am Googling, or heading to Wikipedia to flesh out the main topic, I'm not just creating a joystick for content creation, I am figuring out which sub-topics make sense and why and which ones don't. I am creating a set of theories around that pretty joystick.

Laying out an editorial calendar and the goals

An art - because the arrangement and distribution of sub-topics is more about balance rather than pure rationalisation.

Coming up with goals is not exactly artistic, but since it is not entirely predictable using empirical data and is subject to the whims of the fickle Internet world, I consider it an art.

Creating an Overall Strategy

An art - because it seems to be 60% arrangement and distribution and 40% theory and rationalisation.

The work

A science - because it's all about experimenting and learning from empirical data.

At this point, much of the art is being directed by the science. It is a tough pill to swallow for us artistic types, but, that is how the digital world works. The numbers determine the future. I wish it wasn't so but it is. We can't all be Seth Godins, can we?

That's just how I see it. That is how I view the process of preparing a content strategy.

How do you see it?

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