Posted on October 2nd, 2010Before a content management system is added to your professional website, it is important to develop a content strategy. Content management systems are no long just systems to manage web content; instead they encompass web interface, design, workflow and content. With almost every organization large and small, private and public, on some sort of content management system, strategy is becoming ever so important for success.
As a technological society, we have entered the Content Era. It all began with the major increase in data before and after the Y2K scare. Since then we are drowning in data. It is all around us through major advertisements on television to short articles on our mobile devices and is always in our face. Therefore, the solution to maintaining this limitless data is content strategy.
One major point to keep in mind is that managing content is much different than applying content. The application of content can be found in:
• Invoices
• Engineering diagrams
• Spreadsheets
• Contracts
• Email
• Social media
• Documents
• Presentations
The management in content can help significantly reduce costs, improve efficiency through knowledge bases and automation and help businesses meet compliance and regulatory standards. The primary area where businesses have difficulty in applying a content strategy is seeing how it aligns with corporate goals.
Content is becoming one of the most valuable assets in business. Organizations spend millions of dollars each year on data infrastructure, software technology, systems, storage, business intelligence, security and many other programs related to risk, compliance and performance. Despite all of these investments, companies tend to fail miserably in the content department. This occurs because of a lack of content strategy.
One example of a solution to a common corporate problem utilizing a content strategy is branding. When user generated content and distribution shift from the business to the end-user, profits are lost. The content strategy solution is to gain the support of users and embrace them. Ignoring this issue will not make it better.
We are living in a highly competitive content-heavy world where the management of content is more important than ever to be successful. As more businesses jump on-board with innovative content management systems, those choosing not to embrace and manage this will be left in the dust. A solid content strategy goes along way and will help organizations of all sizes have one leg up on the competition.