The Elements of Content Strategy - Erin Kissane [16]
Finally, there is the question of content development. In its purest form, content strategy does not produce content. It produces plans, guidelines, schedules, and goals for content, but not the substance itself, except inasmuch as examples are required to illustrate strategic recommendations. But if you have the ability to create good content, you’ll have a real advantage over content strategists who do not.
And now, enough of theory. It’s time to take a closer look at the ways in which all these abstractions play out in the real world.
1. The long URL: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Take_point [↵]
2. Kristina Halvorson, Content Strategy for the Web, (California: New Riders, 2009), 75. [↵]
3. Arthur Plotnik, The Elements of Editing, (New York: Collier Books, 1982), 25. [↵]
4. The long URL: http://predicate-llc.com/media/presentation/the-day-2-problem-a-tour-of-editorial-strategy/ [↵]
5. The long URL (subscription required): http://www.oed.com/viewdictionaryentry/Entry/45960 [↵]
6. The long URL: http://www.artlies.org/article.php?id=1655&issue=59&s=1 [↵]
7. The long URL: http://blog.braintraffic.com/2010/06/curation-nation/#comment-57973136 [↵]
8. Hans Ulrich Obrist, A Brief History of Curating, (Zürich: JRP|Ringier & Les Presses du Réel, 2009), 179. [↵]
9. John Walsh’s essay, “Pictures, Tears, Lights, and Seats” includes an astute analysis of presentness as it relates to curation. John B. Cuno, Whose Muse: Art Museums and the Public Trust, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004), 84. [↵]
10. Obrist, A Brief History of Curating, 173. [↵]
11. The long URL: http://www.alistapart.com/articles/indefenseofreaders/ [↵]
12. The long URL: http://www.leenjones.com/2009/02/rhetoric-mix/ [↵]
13. The long URL: http://www.webanalyticsdemystified.com/content/ [↵]
14. The long URL: http://wpcandy.com/presents/a-look-at-wordpress-market-share-numbers [↵]
THE DAY-TO-DAY WORK OF CONTENT STRATEGY confuses people for a reason. The things we do change from project to project and run the gamut from the purely analytical to the highly creative. In an industry in which the efforts of visual designers, information architects, front-end developers, and content creators can be seen center-stage when a new website launches, content strategy is a fundamentally backstage discipline.
You can’t see it or click it. It’s unusual for a website visitor to be able to point to a feature and say “that’s the result of smart content strategy!”
Perhaps because of this opacity, I’m tempted to define the practice of content strategy primarily in terms of what it produces. But although lists of deliverables and methods can be useful, they’re not enough on their own to explain how the practice works in real life.
Throughout this section, I will introduce a series of tools and techniques that I and others have used on content strategy projects, but I will also try to dig deeper and talk about the practical reasons for doing things in a particular way, and about the invisible aspects of the work that don’t show up in deliverables.
All of which is a roundabout way of talking about methodologies. (Insert Jaws theme here.) So let’s discuss them for a moment.
Methodologies
Because our discipline is new, and because we often work with user experience and web development teams with their own methodologies, the last few years have produced a host of discussions about the best way to do content strategy. Content strategy is sufficiently diverse that nearly all content workers must specialize to some extent, and our methodologies tend to reflect that specialization.
A content strategist primarily concerned with marketing communication usually focuses on branding and messages, effective cross-channel outreach, the creation of persuasive content, and the development of sustainable publishing processes. Her methodology will need to support these activities.
On the other