What a content strategist does (and why you need one)
You know your website or intranet isn’t working the way it should. Users complain that they can’t find information, that content is out of date or doesn’t answer their questions, that search doesn’t work (or more precisely, that it sucks!). You’ve been tasked with yet another redesign, but your colleagues complain that this didn’t fix the problem in the past.
You know what’s wrong, but you don’t know who fixes it or how to fix it.
When you have these problems, that people can’t find information, search doesn’t work, or content is out of date, you have a content problem. A content strategist will address this problem with you to make sure your website or intranet is up-to-date, has good navigation, and that search works (or that it doesn’t suck!).
There are a few different kinds of content strategists and this article will cover those different kinds. At the end of this article, you’ll know what a content strategist does, what kind you need, and what their work includes.
What is a content strategist?
On almost every website or intranet redesign I’ve worked on in the last 20+ years, content is always the hardest part of the work. The effort is constantly under-estimated, under-staffed, and its delivery is under-whelming. A redesign is treated more like a technical problem instead of a content problem, and the content flounders, neglected and alone, until someone has that “oh sh*t” moment.
Content strategists define the content problem and then create a solution to the content problem. They detail out how to solve the problem, and collaborate with other specialists to make the solution a reality. This actually is a big deal, because very few people really understand how to make content “work.”
Here are a couple useful definitions:
“Content strategy guides the creation, delivery, and governance of useful, usable content.” (1)
“The content strategist can orchestrate the creation, delivery, and governance of assets that will reduce friction in targeted areas to help solve business objectives.” (2)
Here’s what we mean by different terms. In content strategy:
“Guides the creation” means planning what content exists and why.
“Guides the delivery” means how the content gets onto the website, what structure and page layout are used, how people find it, and how it is written in audience-specific language.
“Guides the governance” means establishing rules and processes to make sure content has an owner, is accurate, and maintained over time.
A content strategist connects all the dots when it comes to how content can support business goals, user needs, and make its way into the new site.
Content strategy relies on other skills, such as writing, editing, marketing, user research, content management, and software development, to put all the pieces together.
Signs that you need a content strategist for your project
You may have experienced this kind of website or intranet redesign in the past:
“Redesigns fail when they’re not treated as business initiatives. The pattern repeats: Teams start with looks instead of purpose, rely on assumptions instead of data, and stop iterating once the new site goes live.” (3)
Some of the reasons clients contact me for content strategy work include:
Panic! They’ve been working on a website or intranet redesign and now they have problems with the content. It won’t be ready in time and they don’t know what to do with it. They’re looking for a “quick fix” so they can launch and fix it later. (If you’re in this spot, I’m sorry! The best thing to do is to prioritize sections of content for launch and make a longer term plan.)
They’ve done redesign projects in the past, and the projects didn’t go well and they don’t want to do the same thing again. The content was the hardest part of the work and they’ve since learned content strategy is “a thing.”
They know what content strategy is and are proactively seeking the skill and planning for a website or intranet redesign.
For your content, you might find that your content has grown organically over the years and you’re not sure what you have and whether it should stay or go. You might be in a deadlock over what the navigation should look like, how the pages should be structured. and what should be on each page.
You want to make your site user centred, but you’re having a hard time with the research and balancing internal needs. Users are still complaining about your site and you don’t know how to go about figuring out what they want.
One of your goals for the new site might be to create consistency between different teams that all create content, and make sure that they keep their content up to date. You don’t want another bloated and confusing website again.
What a content strategist actually does on a project
A content strategist helps you step back and see the big picture. This is, after all, a strategic role.
“Before sketching a single layout, clarify the role your site plays in that larger picture. Who are the audiences that matter most? What actions signal business value? And how will you measure whether the redesign moved those numbers?” (3)
How do you clarify your site’s role? How do you know the audiences or how to make the site valuable to the business? How does a content strategist work with you to get this all done? As mentioned above, a content strategist doesn't usually write all the content. They design the system that makes content work. (1)
The typical process requires research and asking a lot of questions. The research and discovery phase includes these tasks:
Talk to internal people one-on-one: We do stakeholder interviews to understand what your organization wants, what’s not working, and where disagreements are.
Talk to external users one-on-one: There are a lot of ways to do user research, whether it’s asking questions, testing a current site, doing a survey or using another kind of research method. We start with assumptions about who your users are, find those kinds of people, then ask them questions to find out what they really want. User research results give us concrete evidence of how people use the site and what information they need. We can stop speculating.
Audit the content: We look at all your content to see the structure, how it’s written, what’s out of date, duplicated, or missing.
Talk to internal people all together: Based on the stakeholder and user interview findings, we bring people together to set a mutual and achievable website vision. This isn’t a pie-in-the-sky vision. We talk about where people disagree, what we want to achieve, what the users need, and what’s needed to achieve it.
Create the content strategy and roadmap: This outlines who the users are, what they need, what the organizational goals are, and the guiding principles to get to your goal. We talk about quick wins, next steps, and tasks to get to the redesigned content. We talk about when they will be done, who will do them, and if you need further help.
In the redesign phase, you’ll start solving the problems and do the things set out in the strategy and roadmap such as:
Create the new structure: We design the information architecture for the site which is the page structure and labeling system for storing the content. In the user research, we found out what’s not working for users, so now we can solve those problems.
Create governance: You need to figure out the workflow and processes to support the content on your new site. Because we did the internal interviews, we know what issues people are having and can start designing new approaches.
Content migration: This details how you’ll get the content from the old site structure to the new structure, where it will be stored in the structure, and how it will be rewritten.
Create the content: Here’s where you get down to writing new content and editing content. You take it through the governance workflows and then put it in the new website.
Timing
How long a project takes depends on a few things. In the research and discovery phase, the timing depends on:
The number of pages on your site. This would include PDFs, documents, spreadsheets, HTML pages, etc.
The extent of your user research. If you don’t have any research, it takes at least 3 months to get this done.
The number of stakeholders to be involved. The more people involved, the longer this process takes. The number really depends on who needs to be consulted, how many people create content, how many departments you have, etc. You can expect this to take at least 3 months as well.
The content strategy and roadmap could take a month or two to create and come to an agreement. The redesign phase really depends on what you discovered in the research and it can be hard to estimate before you know what your content strategy is.
At this point, if you’re in the panic stage and looking for a content strategist to “just fix the problem,” you have probably concluded that this isn’t the skill a content strategist brings (or would want to bring) to the table. Without user research and talking to stakeholders, there won’t be an obvious fix for the problem. It’s a tough spot to be in.
What this looks like for websites and intranets
Website redesigns and intranet overhauls are common triggers for hiring a content strategist. If you have a lot of content, you need someone to stickhandle all that content. A content strategist will help you create a site that is structured around user needs, meets business needs, and is well-governed after the site is launched.
Moreover, it will move you away from the “lift and shift” you may have done in the past: you’ve implemented a new content management system only to find yourself with the same content problems.
One of the biggest successes a content strategist can bring to a project is to get all (or most!) of the internal stakeholders in agreement on what the website is for. Ultimately, this is change management. You’re taking people along for the ride instead of surprising them in the end.
If you need help with this work, please reach out to me. This is exactly the kind of work I do.
In sum…
If you didn’t know what a content strategist does, now you do! A content strategist figures out what content your users and stakeholders need, how it should be organized, and how to make sure it’s curated in the long term. While there are many roles to play in a site redesign, the content strategist ensures the content is well taken care of.
If you're heading into a website or intranet project and want to make sure you get the structure right before anything else, let's talk.
You can also read Why nobody can find anything on your intranet.
References
Brain Traffic — "What Does a Content Strategist Do?" https://www.braintraffic.com/blog/what-does-a-content-strategist-do
MarketMuse — "What Does a Content Strategist Actually Do?" https://blog.marketmuse.com/what-is-content-strategist/
Fast Company — "Why Most Website Redesigns Fail" https://www.fastcompany.com/91446650/why-most-website-redesigns-fail-and-how-to-get-yours-right
Content Science Review — "Using Content Strategy as a Benchmark for a Redesign" https://review.content-science.com/using-content-strategy-as-a-benchmark-for-a-redesign/