sergiosantos.info

blog and works

Content Strategy

22.Dec.2008

There’s an old field emerging under a new name: Content Strategy. After a long time of focus on web design and usability, the attention has shifted to the content itself, the foundations of any website. A content stategist should work with everyone involved in a website development (coder, designers, bosses, ...), to construct and assure that the content is relevant, and it’s presented in such way to maximize the readers gain. A List Apart presented an article on the subject recently: Content-tious Strategy:

It’s an open secret in our daily work how often the challenges posed by content elude our collective talents and acumen. We’ve all been there. For me, lorem ipsum makes it personal. It personifies the proposition at the heart of what content specialists do and mocks how often the manifold complexities of content can get the better of all of us.

But there is some contorversy on the subject. Many still argue whether the field professionals will be able to associate real business value to their actions, like usability specialists did before. A quote by Peter Merholz:

How will businesses benefit from content strategy? By making that case, content strategists will not be the poor shmoes asked to replace “lorem ipsum” on wireframes, and will instead be involved in the planning and strategy discussions.

An example company working just on this field is Brain Traffic. The word says they have been quite successful so far, which should mean there is the need for such specialists. Is there a company alike here in Portugal that anybody know of? Or are all content professionals diluted in bigger companies?

If you enjoyed this post, consider subscribing to my RSS Feed