Content Strategies That Create More Outcomes
In between coordinating family gatherings, shopping for great deals, and managing end-of-year rushes, marketing teams across the country are preparing for the new year and building a plan that they hope will lead to success. If you wait until January to tackle your approach for 2026, you're going to be left in the dust.
One of the central tenets of these plans is the content. Companies are building calendars to stay organized, trying to predict what will be relevant in six months, and (if they're smart) making sure whatever is happening aligns to their overall business objectives. These are valuable weeks of strategizing and organizing that have a massive impact on the months to follow. We're going to give you some insights to get started and ways to ensure you're setting yourself up for success.
Story + Logistics
A successful content strategy requires planning and execution on two fronts: story and logistics. Think of these as the wheels and engine of your car. Both should be weighed equally and must ultimately work together because you can’t get very far with just one.
The message being articulated is as important as the channels in which it’s being displayed. And in many instances, the context in which the message is delivered should influence the messaging itself, and vice versa. Each comes with its own set of questions to solve.
When it comes to story, ask yourself questions like:
What are our messaging priorities?
How do those messages evolve with the audience?
What is the balance between brand and offerings/capabilities?
The logistics side requires a focus on questions like:
What channels will we use to push our content?
Who is receiving our messaging and when?
How will we measure success?
Once you have those questions answered, here are some tips for getting the most out of your content.
Make Your Customers the Focus
People still largely let emotion guide their purchasing decisions. They’re hungry when they see an ad for a cheeseburger. They are envious when their colleague strolls in with a pair of shoes they wanted. They want to treat themselves after a particularly stressful week. So your product or service might be the best at this or that, but why would they buy now?
What you’re selling is important, but so is what that product does for your customers. This can be especially challenging for brands in highly technical or regulated industries to articulate. More technical or financially minded marketers are more prone to focusing on the specs and ensuring all of the numbers and red tape are covered. They will home in on speed and savings but forget to mention what that afford their customers. This also comes into play when talking about success and results. Stats are important, but it can’t be the whole story. Because it’s hard to put yourself in the shoes of stats. So what else is there? Relevance and emotion.
Talk to Your Customers
Yeah, we know, how insightful, right? But when was the last time you got your customers’ input, either on your products or about themselves? It’s one of those things that everyone agrees you should be doing but few actually follow through.
Here’s the thing. You don’t have to just do a survey or look at reviews (though those aren’t bad methods). You can use your content to do the talking. People like talking about themselves, and they like sharing with friends. So let them. Instead of just offering 10% off or a giveaway, let them participate in the conversation and then capture that data.
Dive Below the Surface
Before you get your audiences to engage and give their preference data, you first need to train your marketers to extract it. Without getting into any age/societal/ technological discussions, many marketers are satisfied with what they’re given (they’re not alone, by the way). Too many agency marketers receive their project briefs without many questions. Brand marketers choose not to follow up on answers. Product marketers take what their developers say with it without a second thought.
What we recommend is training your marketing team to think and act like an investigative journalist. Or, if you’d rather go the PI or spy route, that works, too. But we’ll stick with an investigative journalist for this example. Journalists come into stories with an outcome, little other information, and a deadline. Finding who to talk to, figuring out what’s real, and corroborating that information is all on them.
Your Source for Content Strategy
If you want to make sure you're delivering the best possible content you can, it starts with the foundation. We created our Content Strategy Kit to help you get on the right path and focus on both the overarching strategies that keep you aligned and the right tools for tactical execution.
Along with our insights, we've included a number of assets (templates, assessments, etc.) for you to copy and help you get off the ground quicker.
But remember, this can get you 90% of the way, but for the greatest impact, you should take this framework and tweak it to best fit your company’s marketing needs. This could be anything from adopting your own posting schedule and limits to customizing template fields. We’re providing you with the best practices to resonate. You just need to make it your own. And if you don't have the time or resources to do this alone, we can help there, too.