Break down the content walls

In my world having three unrelated conversations about the same thing is the signal of a trend.

Within the last week I’ve had three unrelated and unsolicited conversations about content. More specifically the conversations were about who owns the content in an organization. In each case, it was clear to me that silos still exist that are stopping these organizations from communicating effectively with their audiences.

As a PR person by trade, I’m biased. In our recently released eBook (shameless plug: you can download the eBook by clicking here), we explore the world of earned, owned and paid media. And since we’re a PR firm we obviously think content and content strategy should be created and executed by the public relations/marcom folks in any company/organization.

And while we realize each organization is different, at the very least you need to break down the silos between PR, advertising and IT to create and build an effective content strategy.

Here are some things to consider. And if I offend anyone in the following paragraphs then I offer my apologies before you read any further.

• Create a content strategy and the communicators shall lead it: Nothing against the ad folks but we’re not “selling” here. It is our job to take the brand you created and figure out the best content to continue a dialogue with the audiences so they will come back to us. The content will drive traffic back to the website or to a landing page. We will then hand the top-of-funnel leads back to you so you can then sell.
• IT folks should not create the content: You wouldn’t want me to code, I really don’t want you writing blog posts or 140-character tweets. I do want you to help me make our website the best it can be so that when someone reads our post they can easily navigate to other places on the site and learn more about us.
• Just because you buy media doesn’t mean you know how to buy social advertising: The marriage of content and amplification to the right audiences is becoming extremely sophisticated. It has gone way “beyond boosting.” It is a full-time job to keep up with the almost daily changes in social ad platforms coming from Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. In addition, you have to be extremely nimble to adjust the ad targets and spends on the fly. Siloed marketing doesn’t always allow you to do that.
• It needs to tie back into a broader communications strategy: That’s where the EOP piece comes in. It should all flow from storylines that you are pitching on a parallel path to media to gain third-party endorsements. It is best if all of those efforts start in the same place.

I realize this is all a “perfect world” scenario and as much as I try to make it otherwise the world isn’t always perfect. If your organization just can’t make it work the way I describe above, please consider creating a true cross-disciplinary team that crosses departmental boundaries and works together on content to take advantage of each group’s strengths.

I’d love to hear some examples of how your organization is breaking down the walls to make your content efforts more effective.