As marketers, our paramount duty lies in ensuring the optimal vitality of our content.
Although words and graphics lack the ability to respire like plants, content still demands its own form of nourishment and refinement to yield the outcomes that sustain and invigorate brands. The apprehension of disappointing and inadvertently extinguishing this vitality resonates deeply, as I cannot fathom a single marketer who aspires to bear the responsibility of a flawed content strategy.
This concern becomes even more personal when we contemplate the countless hours and resources invested in crafting top-notch content. We aspire for more than mere moments in the limelight before embarking on the arduous process anew.
Do not despair: possessing a green thumb is not a prerequisite for content marketing. By adeptly managing the lifecycles of our content, we can ensure the maximal realization of its potential and savor all the accompanying rewards.
What precisely is signified by the content lifecycle?
In the realm of digital content, traversing the stages of ideation, creation, and distribution is an undeniable imperative. These stages collectively constitute the vibrant content lifecycle, embodying its inception, progression, and culmination. However, it is crucial to acknowledge that the intricacies of this narrative diverge across various content types. Although the archival and deletion of content may occasionally prove essential, it remains an everlasting cycle, driven by the ceaseless urge to forge novel creations and the immense value inherent in revitalizing existing content.
Consider this blog as an example. It emerged as a mere notion and gradually transformed into a more concrete concept through meticulous content planning and meticulous keyword research. Subsequently, it assumed the form of a blog and underwent publication on our website, followed by strategic promotion across multiple platforms. Over time, we may introduce fresh ideas and incorporate high-performing keywords to revitalize its appeal and recapture your attention. In fact, it may even extend its reach to encompass social media posts and compelling graphics, thereby encompassing the entire content lifecycle topic. Should our readers harbor a vehement distaste for it, we might entertain the possibility of removing it from our site in due course—though naturally, we sincerely hope such a decision won’t come to pass in the foreseeable future.
How does this factor into our content management strategy?
Content lifecycle management can be likened to tending to a garden in your professional domain. It involves overseeing and guiding the progression of every piece of content through its various stages. Achieving this entails meticulous coordination to determine the path to content realization, including setting timelines and identifying the key stakeholders involved at each step.
For organizations that produce content at a large scale, establishing a repeatable and centralized process becomes paramount. In fact, this is where enterprise content management comes into play. It enables sizable enterprises to establish a unified business workflow for content lifecycle management that aligns with strategic objectives, brand guidelines, as well as regulatory requirements, and security concerns.
Irrespective of a company’s size, a robust content management strategy emerges from collaborating with teams well-versed in strategic marketing approaches and leveraging appropriate technology to automate a significant portion of the process.
The Stages of the Content Lifecycle
Irrespective of the excellence of your content management strategy, the absence of a clearly delineated content creation process would render it futile. This process is not only indispensable for attaining your marketing objectives, such as enhancing website traffic, establishing brand recognition, fostering engagement, and garnering audience confidence, but it is also a vital aspect of your content management endeavors.
Undoubtedly, you will customize the processes to align with your unique requirements and brand identity; however, your content workflow is likely to encompass the following stages:
Stage 1: Cultivate the Potential
Familiarize yourself with the established procedure: Conduct thorough research, ascertain your objectives, formulate a comprehensive content strategy, and engage in ideation once a clear direction has been established. Prioritize the needs and preferences of your target audience from the outset, allowing you to craft content that effectively addresses their inquiries and arouses their curiosity.
Stage 2: Create
Summon the writers, designers, and videographers forthwith, for the hour has arrived to nourish the seeds and commence the implementation of your strategy. The phase of content creation serves to breathe life into your website, incorporating a captivating amalgamation of diverse content formats, impeccably infused with the distinctive brand essence and aesthetic that elicit both user recognition and unwavering confidence.
Stage 3: Publish
Once the content attains its state of preparedness, promptly allocate it a domicile within the confines of your esteemed website. Prudently note that certain digital assets possess the capacity to reside concurrently on multiple platforms, exemplified by a graphic tastefully integrated within a blog post and subsequently disseminated across various social channels. Upon accomplishing the laudable act of publication, your content shall, with any luck, burgeon magnificently and duly stimulate the coveted levels of interaction.
Stage 4: Promote
The presence of your digital content on your website notwithstanding, it is imperative that your esteemed audience is duly cognizant of its existence. At this juncture, deploying your promotion strategies shall undoubtedly yield prodigious results, including but not limited to the dissemination of email newsletters and the propagation of social media posts, both of which shall elevate the visibility and recognition of your novel content.
P.S. We would be remiss not to mention that our esteemed blog boasts an entire section exclusively dedicated to the intricacies of content distribution, wherein an abundance of knowledge awaits your perusal.
Stage 5: Analyze
Leverage sophisticated analytical tools such as Google Analytics to assess the efficacy of your content. Evaluate vital metrics encompassing page views, web traffic, conversion rates, and newsletter subscriptions to discern effective strategies and identify areas that require fortification. Moreover, this pivotal stride within the content management procedure can enlighten subsequent courses of action to be pursued in the ensuing phase.
Stage 6: Repurpose, refresh, repromote
It is now imperative to adopt a “Lion King” approach to your content strategy. This pivotal stage demands that you unfurl the full potential of your content, enabling it to inspire a subsequent surge of exemplary blogs, captivating graphics, and other esteemed content marketing luminaries. Content marketing is not a mere set-it-and-forget-it endeavor. To extract the utmost value from your dedicated time and exertion in content creation, a paramount content repurposing workflow assumes primacy. Allow me to elucidate a few illustrative instances:
- Imbue blogs with rejuvenated keywords to bolster their search ranking.
- Transform esteemed blog posts into captivating videos, enlightening podcasts, captivating social media entries, informative infographics, and other forms of distinguished content.
- Artfully infuse statistical data and impactful assertions from extensive content pieces into concise social media entries, duly linking to their original source, as a matter of course.
- Refresh and disseminate updated content across multiple platforms.
- Aggregate content into comprehensive compendiums.
By embracing the practices of refreshing, repurposing, and repromoting, you will unlock the potential for continued impact and relevance, thus fostering a lasting resonance within your target audience.
Stage 7: Prune
It is now imperative to adopt a “Lion King” approach to your content strategy. This pivotal stage demands that you unfurl the full potential of your content, enabling it to inspire a subsequent surge of exemplary blogs, captivating graphics, and other esteemed content marketing luminaries. Content marketing is not a mere set-it-and-forget-it endeavor. To extract the utmost value from your dedicated time and exertion in content creation, a paramount content repurposing workflow assumes primacy. Allow me to elucidate a few illustrative instances:
Imbue blogs with rejuvenated keywords to bolster their search ranking. Transform esteemed blog posts into captivating videos, enlightening podcasts, captivating social media entries, informative infographics, and other forms of distinguished content. Artfully infuse statistical data and impactful assertions from extensive content pieces into concise social media entries, duly linking to their original source, as a matter of course. Refresh and disseminate updated content across multiple platforms. Aggregate content into a comprehensive compendium. By embracing the practices of refreshing, repurposing, and repromoting, you will unlock the potential for continued impact and relevance, thus fostering a lasting resonance within your target audience.
Let your content live on
The key imperative at hand is to acknowledge the profound impact your content can yield throughout its existence. Refrain from permitting the content’s life cycle to languish once it has been disseminated. Rather, cultivate a meticulously devised content management strategy that incessantly scrutinizes, revitalizes, and reintroduces your content. By doing so, both yourself and your esteemed audience shall extract the utmost value from its untapped potential.