The Entire Content Creation Process in 17 Steps and a Single Flowchart

Hi there!?? Thanks for stopping by. We share expert, practical advice on content marketing and web design. If you're new to our community and would like to get better results from the web, click the "subscribe" button above.

From first inspiration to the final draft, this is the process for content creation. It’s a lot of thinking and planning, outreach and research, writing and editing.

We laid out all the steps in order, with all of the little decisions involved, into a single flowchart.?

This diagram reflects our content strategy here at Orbit. Yours may be different. But browsing through this single, simple graphic may remind you of tactics that might work for you if you aren’t doing them already.

Here it is, for all of our readers and subscribers. Detailed notes, links to resources and input from experts are included below.

Enjoy!

-Andy and Amanda

You can see that our process includes updating past content, original research, keyphrase research, visuals and collaboration. But we don’t do everything every time.?

1. Inspiration

This comes from all directions, from content audits and bike rides. Every topic must fit within your content strategy, but beyond that, it’s all fair game.?

Some sources are better than others. The best are focused on the audience and often come directly from conversations and meetings.

Answers to questions your clients and customers are asking you

• An original take on a topic your audience is talking about
• Analytics-driven review of what your audience is engaging with

If the well is dry, here are?our best tips for finding blog posts.?

2. Consider rewriting an old article

There’s often greater glory in rewriting something old, rather than writing something new. Older content often sits on URLs with strong, unrealized benefits:

• They may already rank, but not yet rank high
• The research and writing process has a huge head start
• You already may have feedback on the topic from your readers

Rewrite an old post that needs love, following the process here. Once done, you’ll re-launch it just as if it was new. Send it as a newsletter and put it back on top of the blog.?

The key is to not change the URL. If the URL has been linked to by other websites, you can leverage that authority and target more competitive phrases.

Once we learned?the power of updating old content, it became central to our content strategy. Here you can see the entire history of my own writing and the changes over the years:

Alina Petrova,

Semrush

“When it comes to developing an editorial plan, the first impulse might be to create new content. However, updating or repurposing an existing copy can help you achieve your goals by spending less time and resources on content creation. This approach also has SEO benefits, as an updated page takes less time to rank higher than a new piece of content created from scratch.

Here are some simple steps that you can include in your content audit workflow:

• Combine different pieces of content covering the same topic to create a long read or a white paper.
• Turn an article into an infographic, a slideshow, or a video.
• Refresh your content with new statistics, examples, trends, and relevant links.
• Improve your article’s structure with subheadings, lists, and visuals.”

3. Socialize the topic with your network

What do people think about this topic? Is this likely to trigger discussion??

Continue to the full article.