Operationalizing Your Content Marketing
Ahava Leibtag (@ahaval) from Aha Media Group and I recently finished a new white paper called "Three First Steps to Operationalizing Your Content Marketing".
In the white paper we discuss the huge gap between strategy and execution. While marketing organizations often think about strategy, business results are achieved through sustained execution — not short term initiatives like task forces and website redesigns. This goes back to a theme that I have been talking about for years: your website is not a project. Back then I liked to talk about a website as a "product" that needs to be continually maintained and improved. Given that product management is not a common strength in organizations (why can't more people just follow the "make it suck less" philosophy?), I have started to talk about the web and other forms of digital communications as a "program." Still not great, but at least it sounds less cheesy than to say "it's a journey."
No matter what you call it, it takes time and effort to build the trust and attention of an audience. And the only way to do it cost-effectively is to be operationally efficient. You need to be able to prioritize your goals and commit to a plan; then have the team to execute it. This white paper has three parts:
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Obstacles that stand in the way of organizations establishing effective content marketing programs.
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Getting started. How to identify audiences and develop a strategy to reach them.
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How to baseline where you are right now so you can measure the effectiveness of your activities.
You can get it here: Three First Steps For Operationalizing Your Content Marketing Strategy. If you are intrigued and want to learn more, you can email me directly here or hit me up on any of the social networks that I participate in.
Also... stay tuned for a sequel white paper about building a content operations program.