Now is the perfect time to plan your 2023 content strategy

Tanya Alden-Zeter

Not because it’s Q1, or even because it’s 2023, and your customers want to connect with you more than ever before. But because there is no time like the present to bust out of that perfectionism, procrastination, paralysis cycle.

So often, multiple demands and responsibilities can leave any marketing, communications or founding team feeling too pressed for proactivity when it comes to content. But starting the thinking behind a few foundational points will ensure that your messages start to move away from a sprawled post-it note, and towards your customer and their world.

Read on for The Contented Agency’s 5 A’s for getting started this side of spring:

1. Articulate your organisation’s mission. Say it out loud – discuss with colleagues, tell your family and friends, write it down. Getting the team aligned on exactly what your purpose is, within 2-3 lines of copy, is a stellar bedrock for all ongoing content and communications.

2. Audience. The focus of all of your communications must stay on their challenges and needs. Create a persona to help hone who you’re targeting; what are their passions and pain points, interests and intentions? Bringing the potential customer to life in this way means that brands can personalise their content, making for a much more engaging and impactful experience when your audience discovers you!

3. Audit; your existing comms, that is. Trust us, no brand is ever starting from scratch with content. You’ve got something, even if only a scribbled business plan or a first draft of a website. A brief audit will highlight what you have that boasts real potential, and where the gaps are. 

4. Ambition is key. Placing your comms efforts within the wider picture is paramount to making good content that works hard for your brand. What are the commercial goals that your content marketing strategy needs to help achieve? Whose magical mind do you need to make it happen? How creative can you possibly be? Aiming high with your content plans will help enlist the buy-in (and budget!) required from other areas of the organisation to make it a roaring success.

5. Analysis – let’s not forget, the point of creating fantastic content is to encourage customer engagement. What are your benchmarks for interaction with your audience, how will you measure it and over what timeline? Knowing this will be a huge help when planning your content topics, formats and distribution channels.

Keen for further guidance on creating a content strategy in 2023? Our Content Tracks can be tailored to fit exactly where you are in your content journey – find out if our planning and production services, as well as our key messaging workshops, could work for your team by getting in touch:

team@thecontentedagency.com