It’s time for some Content Therapy

“Content is a complex, hairy beast that depends on a myriad people, technologies and processes”- Kristina Halvorson & Melissa Rach

Since starting my own business, clients contact to get help with their website copy after they’ve paid another copywriter to write it. Why contact me? Because they realise the copy is a mess. Anyone building a new website will understand that the copy needs to reflect the design and branding, so it’s integral to have a content strategy in place to begin the process.

When a client first contacts they ask if I can ‘clean up the mess.’ Sure but when I suggest they need a content strategy, the most common misconception I hear them say is: “I don’t need it - I only need the copy.” This is where it gets tricky, because they don’t really understand the value of a content strategy plan.

Remember a copywriter produced the mess (copy) in the first place, without a plan in place. What the client fails to see is that planning your website takes a lot of work to do it correctly to really conceptualise the branding that speaks directly to your niche audience(s). It's incorporating the branding, website design, the build and the copy together. 

What is content strategy?

Although content strategy is believed to be a relatively new concept, its’ actually been around for decades and has been applied by marketing and communications specialists, like myself.

Content strategy defines how you plan to use content to fulfill users’ expectations and meet your business needs including website layout, pages, and SEO. It also guides decisions you make about content, sets benchmarks to measure success and guides your plans for the creation, delivery and governance from inception to deletion. So what is the difference between a copywriter and a content strategist?

Let’s define the two creative areas

Copywriters are fantastic as they generally write in broadcasting to help create direct mail, taglines, jingle lyrics, script writing and intriguing web page copy. They work quickly and write appealing words to pull in your audience.

Content strategists will:

• Spend hours researching user analysis, content audits, and competitor analysis.
• Write a strategy that incorporates branding such as voice and tone, concept, website architecture and content planning.
• Manage the website including metadata, taxonomies, content management, and migration; and are
• Responsible for copywriting, SEO, proof reading, editing and publication of work.

We all know that great content meets user’s needs and supports key business objectives. It engages and informs. If it’s well-written and organised, it keeps your audience coming back for more. However when content is overwritten, redundant or irrelevant, people leave and never return. 

Here are some key points to help:

#1 Strategy first, tactics later

You need to get a clear and succinct document that outlines the vision, business drivers, objectives, scope and long term strategy for the website content, from which a detailed content plan and business requirements list (and other tactics) can be developed.

#2 Content Execution

Content takes time and effort. If you’ve ever worked at a magazine you will know they have full time employees dedicated to planning, writing, editing, publishing and distributing content. If you’re looking to produce more than one piece of content per week, it can easily be a full time job. Don’t rely only on your marketing team for the content. While they may be good writers, it takes talent to write compelling copy for your target audience.

#3 Content integration

The content needs to be integrated into everything else that’s happening in the company. From social media, product and sales the content being published should benefit their efforts as well. Likewise the content strategist or manager needs to understand what is going on in these departments so that they can help solve problems and provide value.

Who can clean up the mess?

Someone that does both. Like myself.

Being a copywriter and content strategist is a great job—one that large organisations definitely need. This creatively challenging role allows me to work closely with clients, designers, developers, project managers, and marketing teams on medium to large projects for national and international companies, using my years of branding, communication strategy and writing experience.

But get ready: It’s not for wallflowers. You have to really understand branding, marketing and the objectives of your clients to win in this industry.

Want someone who can speak the language of your business and technical stakeholders? Know you should have better content governance but not sure where to start? Got a big content mess that’s needs sorting out?

Let’s talk.

WHO AM I?

I'm Caria Watt. I create compelling words for digital marketing. Clever content strategist. Fast turnaround.

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Learn more: www.cariawatt.com