How to create a content strategy in 30 minutes

Don’t misunderstand‌ — ‌maintaining an effective content strategy for any organization is an ongoing, collaborative process. But primarily, content strategy comes down to having a plan. You have to make sure your organization considers the content it produces along with its intended audience.

With the right approach in place, you can develop a core framework to support a long-term content strategy. You can get started in three steps:

1. Assess your organization’s content maturity

You can’t establish and implement a content strategy overnight. And before you begin, you have to identify where your organization currently stands and where you would like to go.

At Four Kitchens, we developed an interactive content strategy self-assessment to help you get started. By answering these 10 multiple-choice questions, you can quickly understand the current state of your organization’s content strategy.

For example, do you have a documented content strategy? Is it widely adopted? Have you identified your audience? It’s possible you or your team never asked these questions, especially if you inherited a content process when you started this position. Whatever your answers, the quiz isn’t meant to be judgmental. The results should inspire food for thought.

The quiz scores your responses on a one to five scale. And almost no one scores a five. It’s not as if your organization’s goal should be to level up and be “done” with content. Think of the assessment as a visit to the doctor to get a checkup on your organization’s editorial process.

In the end, the quiz reveals your biggest pain points around content creation. And, just as importantly, how to make a plan to address those issues in a meaningful, incremental way.

2. Craft a core content strategy statement

In the same way businesses use a positioning statement to inform their marketing, a core content strategy statement guides content creation. Summing up your organization’s publishing goals in a few sentences is another exercise that becomes expensive when working with consultants.

But for our purposes, think of the work on a core content strategy statement as a Mad Libs exercise. You and your team should fill in the blanks to complete statements such as: “We publish this kind of content for that audience” and “We do not produce this kind of content.”

As you work through the exercises, you’ll develop guidelines for what to say with your content, who you’re communicating with, and what you want them to do. That said, a core content strategy statement does not need to capture your entire organization in just a few words. For example, the statement for our creative team is as follows:

We publish values-driven, actionable, and uniquely art-directed content that sets knowledge free while establishing ourselves within the industry as a topnotch creative team. Our content makes our peers, clients, and prospects feel inspired, confident, and motivated to connect with Four Kitchens, improve their processes, and make informed decisions.

Whenever your team considers creating a new content item, a statement like this provides a baseline for all you produce. And, just as importantly, what you don’t. If a proposed blog article doesn’t align with your strategy statement, your team shouldn’t invest the time to create content that doesn’t suit your organization’s identity, audience, or goals.

3. Add page tables to your content workflow to support your strategy

Once you have a core content strategy statement in place, you can use page tables to apply it to your organization’s website content. A page table adds a vital additional layer to your content workflow. Along with providing a way to verify that your content adheres to your strategy, it also enables you to better plan how your content is created and its lifecycle.

A page table is simply a framework to define the information you need for the content you produce to be effective. There’s no right or wrong format for a page table, but in some respects it can mirror the building blocks of your CMS. What is the title of the page? What is the H1 and the meta description of the article?

Additionally, a page table can include fields outlining your content’s audience, the core takeaways it should deliver, and how long it should exist on your site. For example, if you’re posting about an upcoming event, you should make sure the blog item expires (or is updated) after the event passes.

Ultimately, building and maintaining a content strategy for your organization takes longer than 30 minutes. You need to ensure that your strategy consistently reflects your organization’s goals. But these three simple steps enable you to create a website that empowers content creation going forward.

If your content is very text-heavy, your design can reflect those priorities with a layout similar to a media outlet or journal. If compelling, illustrative images are your focus, you can lean into those strengths with fewer text blocks and large photo boxes.

An effective content strategy provides a way to make sure your organization’s digital presentation reflects your goals. If this sounds like an approach that would benefit how your team approaches publishing, let’s talk about it.