.Com…
Ecommerce…
Email…
Facebook…
Twitter…
Instagram…
YouTube…
Snapchat…
Etc…
Etc…
Etc…
SO. MUCH. CONTENT. TO. CREATE.
So now what? Let’s role play a bit…
You’ve worked closely with your creative agency to develop channel strategies, pushed through implementation meetings, generated creative briefs, and facilitated intense creative reviews for the combined team goal: to ensure that creative assets are delivered on strategy, on time, on budget, and ready for deployment.
Another agency you’ve selected takes the hand-off and publishes each piece, while your media agency takes the assets and deploys cross-channel media. At the end of the month, you get a report that immediately points out what went “well,” while glossing over what didn’t.
The next month is up—rinse and repeat.
Was it worth it?
What happened? Did you meet your goals? How did you test and optimize to make your content, working media budget, and strategy work harder AND smarter? A meeting of all parties (internal teams and partner agencies) occurs to discuss wins and losses, but competing opinions, selfish motivations, and a general lack of transparency block you from getting to the heart of the issues, which, in reality, is right there in front of you.
Why, in today’s times, would it make sense to assembly line your content strategy, creative concepting, content production, publishing and deployment, and analytics? It doesn’t. For example, social media platforms are all unique, and anyone who has ever been at the helm of one knows that there’s a certain rhythm you get into when posting. It’s the combination of managing, analyzing, and optimizing (in real time) that truly makes a platform thrive. This isn’t possible when four parties look at a central editorial calendar and then instantly move back into their silos to take action.
Now we get to the climax of this fantastical (but actual reality) scenario.
After each month, you get that feeling. You know, the one that eats at you saying, “Maybe I could’ve done more.” Why is that? Because the plan of attack lacked two things: investment and ownership.
Enter the Content Studio…
In short (and we’ll get into more of this in future parts of this series), the Content Studio is a team comprised of next gen creators, strategists, and analytics experts. Each member of the studio comes to the table with at least two of the three skills.
For example, the creative person of tomorrow (well really, today) knows both graphic design and has a sense of purpose (strategy) for what they’re creating and why they’re creating it. Today’s strategists can read and analyze data to inform optimization efforts. No longer are you waiting for an end-of-month report or for another department to deliver to take action or execute.
A true Content Studio moves and shakes like a typical newsroom environment. It utilizes all forms and channels of communication, but one thing sets it apart from traditional agency models: WE TALK TO EACH OTHER ON A SECOND-TO-SECOND BASIS. It’s organized chaos, but it gets content delivered on budget, on time, and on strategy. Consistently.
Now that we’ve called out the problem, let’s move forward with solutions. Over the next few parts of the Content Studio series, we’ll go over team structures, outline studio capabilities, and show examples to ultimately declare that the future of content development is now.
