Content: A Reusable Business Asset

Content is everywhere; in ad campaigns, in user guides, in work instructions for a product build, even in internal training materials for a business. Everywhere we look, we are bombarded with some form of content trying to sell us something or teach us a process or even shape our opinion about a topic. This content obviously works for its intended purpose, otherwise businesses would find different ways to reach their respective audiences. The fact that all of this content works makes it a highly valuable business asset, meaning that the content adds value to the bottom line of businesses’ balance sheets. Imagine now that such content is reused across multiple platforms and on multiple channels. Such content just reached a broader audience which will most likely increase revenue even more.

Content reach isn’t the only way that content reuse creates a highly valuable business asset. Content that can be and is reused can add to increased revenue in the form of cost savings in time, material, and/or labor. Instead of creating brand new content for every use case, reusing the same (or similar) content for multiple purposes reduces the time needed to publish the content, reduces the materials needed to create the content, and reduces the cost of labor needed to create and publish the content. Benjamin Franklin said it best when he said “a penny saved is a penny earned.”

From my perspective, especially in this day and age, content is the most valuable asset that businesses have. Reusability only increases the value of content assets.

Content Strategy: Management Consulting

Every asset that is managed properly can be a value add for a business. Nothing can be managed without a good, well-thought-out strategy. Content as a business asset is no different.

Leaders at various levels of a business develop different strategies to optimize their business and increase profits. However, in some cases such leaders get stuck and need to reach out for help, sometimes to an outside source; a management consultancy firm or agency. A management consultancy firm can be called in when there is an issue with efficiency or to resolve a series of constraints in process or for a project. Foundational to management consulting are conducting a Needs Analysis and a Gap Analysis to identify any necessary changes a business must make to reach their defined goals and the space between where a business is currently and where a business wants to be in reaching their goals; what is the gap (O’Keefe, Pringle, & Swallow, 2019).

So, how does management consulting apply to content? Content strategy is becoming more and more recognized as a specialty within management consulting as a field (O’Keefe, Pringle, & Swallow, 2019). The same processes are deployed to identify changes a business must make regarding content management and development to achieve desired goals and the gap between the current state of content and the desired state of content relating to business goals. Developing a good content strategy is the difference between content increasing revenue and content being a bottomless money-pit. The whole practice is about strategically leveraging business assets to drive increased profits for the business or even shareholders of publicly traded companies.

No matter the industry, a business’ number one goal is to turn a profit. A strong business strategy typically leads to increased profitability. Since content is the most valuable business asset that a business has in this day and age, developing a strong content strategy will lead to the same result as a strong business strategy.

Content Strategy as a Career

Since taking a course on digital literacies last semester, I have been excited by the prospect of entering content management as a career. My understanding of content management includes content development/writing and content strategy as subfields within content management. As I work through the project for this course, I’m even more interested in content management as a career field. I truly enjoy solving the puzzle that content management is in a way that helps a client achieve their goals. As it stands right now, I may not know enough about content strategy to jump straight into it as a career, but I am willing and eager to learn the skills it takes to be a professional content strategist in the future.

References

O’Keefe, Sarah, Pringle, Alan, & Swallow, Bill. (2019). Understanding Content Strategy as a Specialized Form of Management Consulting Download Understanding Content Strategy as a Specialized Form of Management Consulting (PDF) from Scriptorium and also Technical Communication, 66(2).