Recently, I’ve been feeling as though a lot of us have been straddling the line between really loving technology and really fearing it. Technology has given us so many things we love: social media, marketing automation, Netflix. But we also can’t help thinking about literally any episode of “Black Mirror” or looking over our shoulders, expecting a robot to come in and steal our jobs.
When it comes to making content marketing easier, though, it doesn’t look as if marketers are too hesitant to embrace tech. According to Content Marketing Institute, the most successful B2B marketers use an average of five different tools and technologies. Among their favorites are analytics tools, email marketing technology, content management systems, marketing automation software, and webinar or online presentation platforms.
The same report found that the biggest factor marketers say contributed to their success over the past year is higher-quality, more efficient content creation.
This all brings me to my point: If marketers say better, more efficient content creation is the key to their success, then why do so few of them — just 22 percent — report using workflow software?
I understand that having technology for every aspect of your content marketing strategy might seem a little … extra.
But as a member of a team that uses content marketing software designed for our particular process, I can tell you that it makes a major difference.
The Pros of a Killer Workflow Management System
There are lots of different tools for managing a content workflow, and each has its own features and benefits that make it unique. But at the end of the day, all workflow tech is designed to make it easy to communicate, collaborate, and create as a team.
At Influence & Co., we developed custom content software specifically for our agency’s approach to content marketing. ICo Core is tailored to our process and the ways we work alongside our clients and internal thought leaders to create content, communicate with one another, and analyze performance.
Our technology allows us (and our clients) to:
- Build content campaigns that align articles and projects around specific goals.
- Extract knowledge, insights, and expertise from thought leaders to create authentic content in the author's voice.
- Store and organize insights from the knowledge sharing process to fuel content creation over time.
- Create and collaborate on content in one central location — no Google or Word Docs required.
- Develop an editorial calendar and schedule content consistently.
- Assign tasks to team members and freelance writers and designers to ensure every piece of content keeps moving.
- Monitor progress of each piece of content through every step of the process to add transparency and keep team members accountable.
- Assess content performance by tracking social shares, engagement, and reach of content projects and comparing those against the average totals of other content in the same publications.
Without a tool to help you accomplish these things, most content marketing teams resort to piecing together a process that relies on some combination of Google Docs, email, and Slack. Sure, your team can probably make that work, but will your team be able to do its best work?
Not if more time ends up being spent on project management than content development — which is what typically happens when an easy content creation workflow is lacking.
The Right Tech + The Right Team = Content Harmony
Now, I know I just did a great job explaining all the great things technology can do, but honestly, tech is only as good as the team that uses it.
We don’t just give our clients access to our workflow system and expect them to take it from there. Yes, every client gets access to ICo Core, but they’re also paired with a dedicated team of experts that use the same software to create and evaluate content together.
After all, you can use the best analytics tools, content management systems, marketing automation tools, and workflow software, but without a talented team of strategists, writers, editors, designers, project managers, and social media mavens to actually use those tools, you aren’t any closer to meeting your goal.
No program or platform is going to do the work for you. It can’t solve your biggest challenges or make you incredible at content. You need a team of experts — empowered by the right technologies — to execute your strategy and achieve content marketing success.
If you want to learn more about our proprietary software, ICo Core, and how it can help improve your workflow, set up a call with one of our experts!
.jpg)
