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Content Tree
Content Tree
opinion
content tree
Leor Franks looks at content marketing and This article originally appeared in PM magazine.
“C
ontent may be king, but for whom content is being developed.
it’s all in the marketing” Here we seek to get buy in from the
stakeholder to put their time into the
Focus on the outputs
once said Gerald Levin,
then CEO of Time project. We strive to elicit their thoughts
Warner. His maxim translates well to the from the content, on whatever timely topic or issue is
objectives and
and internally. preferred channels to market we will later
One model to address the content use to output through – the ‘branches’ of
marketing challenge in professional serv- resonate with the the ‘tree’.
target audience.
ices is a derivative of the ‘content tree’ Normally, a 30-minute meeting is
concept used by many. A five step sufficient. We ask the stakeholder simply
approach, it has phases to get buy in, to talk about their key clients: what
create and deploy content. It begins with matters to them, and what’s happening in
the ‘seeds’ of an idea, lays down ‘roots’, the outside world right now that weighs
develops into ‘shoots’, grows into a solid on their minds. Questions around who
‘trunk’ and ends mostly importantly in the clients are, what media or channels
multiple ‘branches’. Bear with me! This they consume and what outputs would be
approach is not ground breaking, but appropriate can help ensure focus. We
hopefully it is simple to follow and aim to capture the essence of the discus-
communicate to stakeholders and sion and before ending, confirm this in
colleagues. the meeting to ensure all are on the same
The ‘content tree’ helps to make the page.
most of time and effort, of partner stake-
holders and of the marketing and other 2 Roots
team members managing the project. At The ‘roots’ are laid down by the marketer
all points, we focus on the outputs from developing a hypothesis for the stake-
the content, considering how these meet holder to confirm or edit. At this stage,
business objectives and resonate with the we aim to detail the ideas to be tested. We
target audience. The steps below mention look to succinctly explain the situation
various roles – stakeholder, marketer, clients find themselves in, why this
analyst, writer and designer. Of course matters, and what can be done about it.
sometimes, others can be involved or the We test whether this topic is fresh and
marketer can wear more than one hat! timely, or has already been done to death
by close competitors in their own content
1 Seeds marketing. We then detail the most rele-
The ‘seeds’ are sown by the stakeholder vant outputs and channels given the
4 pm | September 2016
opinion
pm | September 2016 5