Whether you are planning content for your website, blog, or social media the first step is research. In order to create content that will garner the interest of your audience, you must understand what your users want and aim to fill that need.
Content Strategy is a process that requires a team effort. Designers, User Experience, Development, and Marketing & Communications teams all need to be involved in the planning and implementation of content strategy. The process for developing a content strategy follows a three part workflow: plan, create, manage.
In the planning stage you get to know your audience, identify goals and objectives, and document and share all information collected with the entire team. Your tool kit consists of interviews with users and other stakeholders, metrics, and a competitive analysis identifying what competitors are doing well and where they are falling short.
Take the information gathered during the planning phase and use it to identify the type of content you will create in the next stage of the process.
Start by defining what the content creation process will be and identifying and educating the content creators on the content strategy. Next put a process in place for creating content and how it will get approved be maintained.
Content management is an important part of the overall strategy. An editorial calendar and the use of a content management system (like HootSuite) makes the content management process more efficient. The management phase is a time to review and revise the strategy.
Content strategy is an ongoing process. You will need to continually re-evaluate your goals and make adjustments to reflect changes in the organization and in the competitive landscape.