What I’ve learned about content strategy

Photo by Mike Enerio via Unsplash. Pictured: Colorful fireworks.

There’s a lot to think about as we reach the end of the semester. On one hand, I’ve learned so much about the importance of strategy in managing content projects over the last eight weeks. On the other hand, I know there’s so much more to learn about putting it into practice. Some of that knowledge will come with taking more technical communication courses, but I think using what I’ve learned in this course and applying it to smaller, real-world projects will help me get some much-needed experience.

What to do when learning about content strategy

In my experience, it’s best to think of the ways what you’re learning about content strategy can be applied to content you’re familiar with, whether it’s a project at work or school, or content you regularly interact with that you think could be better (like a website or online help center). In Module 3, when we were just getting started learning about content inventories and audits, Dr. Kim discussed criteria like usability and findability and how content can be assessed in those categories. This made me think of the ways my department at work can assess how easy or difficult it is to locate content on our website as we plan our website redesign project. Having that real-world example in my head helped me understand what I’ve been reading and listening to in this course and it also made me enthusiastic about putting what I’ve learned into practice – both for our course assignment and for content projects at work.

As an aside, not only have I inventoried the types of entries we have in our metrics system at work as part of our efforts to improve it, I’ve also been using a Kanban board (a very rudimentary one in OneNote) to keep track of work goals. It’s really keeping me on track! I can’t emphasize the advantages of applying what you learn in technical communication courses to your work and life enough! (Even if you’re a librarian).

What not to do when learning about content strategy

When assigned a content strategy project for the first time, it’s important to remember to not give up trying to understand your clients problem or give up looking for a solution. Much of the course content, including the textbook by Paula Land, used website content as an example when explaining content strategy concepts. However, my team’s client presented a content problem that was a bit different from that. While watching the client interviews for the first time, it seemed very straightforward. However, upon discussing the project as a team, we realized there were a lot of things we weren’t sure about: what type of deliverable we needed to create, if the criteria described in our textbook and in lectures applied to this situation, how we should navigate the client’s content… We kept discovering things we were unsure about and we were a little frustrated. When doing our peer reviews, it was apparent that other teams with this client felt a similar frustration.

However, our project was probably not much different than any content project you’ll experience at work. As Dr. Kim said in one of our client meetings, “Life is messy, and I can tell you content strategy will definitely make you appreciate just how complex managing content is.” Even if you are working on a website redesign, you’ll still likely encounter a few frustrating problems. Things like stakeholders with contradicting opinions or requests for things that don’t seem possible, budgetary restrictions, changing timelines, or bureaucratic processes that temporarily stop progress on your project altogether. There’s always going to be something that makes your project kind of complicated, but that’s why it’s useful to follow a model like Kevin Nichols’ or Rahel Anne Bailie’s process for developing a content strategy.

Really taking time to listen your client or whoever is asking you to create a content strategy is another great way to work through a “messy” project and will probably save you from feeling like you don’t have enough information to move forward. This can also save you from the frustration of wasting time working on a strategy without truly understanding the content problem. When I was preparing to write my strategic roadmap, I went through and listened to each of the client interviews again, this time downloading the transcript and following along, highlighting the most important comments the client made. This made me realize that the client’s content problem was much clearer than my team and I initially realized. I have no experience working with a client, so the importance of listening very closely was a huge realization for me and one that could have saved me and my team a lot of frustration had I learned it sooner. In the same vein, asking clarifying questions is equally important.

The most meaningful thing I learned about content strategy

This is probably not true of all professions, but I think most people will encounter a situation in their professional lives where they have some stake in how content is managed. As a librarian, I’ve had the opportunity to assist with a lot of content management and design projects, from LibGuides, metrics systems, website redesigns, and content migrations. However, unless we’ve worked in another profession before, librarians usually are self-taught content managers and strategists. I’ve always just worked with other librarians to advance a project as much as possible to varying degrees of success, using nothing but our library experience and best judgment. Now I know that there are processes and models for the very thing we were trying to do, created by people who’ve spent their careers in content strategy. Having the tools to help make the content projects I’m involved with a success is very impowering.