Content Driven Marketing

A strategic source of competitive advantage

20 March 2012

By: drs Vincent Hooplot RM

Senior Vice President

Group Director Marketing & Business Support

Agenda

• Introduction• Context• The Case• Lessons & Key Insights

Goal

The goal of my presentation is to answer 3 key questions with regard to content strategy and content driven marketing:

1. Why is Content Strategy of importance for marketers?

2. How to approach this big, hairy project?

3. What to expect in the process?

Why is this important for you?

Conversation

Content

About?

Role marketer?

ReactiveProactive

OperationalStrategic

Client

Key challenges marketer:-Commoditization

-Clutter-Differentiation

People

Process Systems

Today’s marketing challenges

Commoditization & clutter: due to an environment of low entry barriers, abundance of suppliers, products and clutter it has become essential to ‘mine’ the differentiating capacity of your firm.

Role marketers: you have to lead the way, but be aware this means that you will have to apply all the charm and fight that you have, since many companies are not waiting for the involvement of marketers. Many organizations see the marketing department as a promotional department.

Preconditions for successfully selling content management as strategic differentiator:

- a marketing function that has gained thrust through adding strategic value

- a marketing function that gets relevant air time in the boardroom

- clients and prospects value knowledge

The Case

An organization that produced a tremendous amount of proprietary content. However the organization was not fully

equipped nor ready to consistently and coherently deliver relevant and differentiating content that will help it achieve its

strategic goals of delivering superior customer value.

4-step approach

• Get the topic on the boardroom agenda • Scan the current situation• Develop a blueprint• Start implementing

Be prepared for a fuzzy process

…and expect

• Resistance• Power play• 16 types of “yes”• Being challenged most of the time• Over engineering

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• Link content to company strategy• Get key players behind the idea of differentiation• Assess which role content plays in your current organization

We formulated the assignment as follows:

Develop a thorough and efficient

content management organization model (Blueprint)

that will help Robeco to achieve its strategic goals’.

Step1: Landing the Topic

Step2: Assess current situation

People Systems

Processes

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Findings: Content Management is not centrally organized and lacks essential expertise and content instruments and more content is being produced than can be maintained.

Expertise

- Content policy

- Chief editor

- Traffic Management

- Information management and control

Content instruments

- Workflow tool

- Planning tool

- Content database

- Content architecture (e.g. definition content type en metadata)

Interviews and content assessment

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Refined company-specific goal for Content Management Organization

‘Systematically identify and gather relevant news, facts, opinions and pro-actively convert this into client centric, differentiating and creative content in the tone of voice of the recipients’.

Critical success factors – Continuity, consistency and coherence of process and content– Credibility and accessibility of content

Refine your goal

- Roles- Governance- Responsibilities

Maintenance and improvement loop

Mine Set Order Create Distribute/ Publishknowledge subject assignment content content

Step3: Develop Blueprint

Productinformation

(Product)campaigns

CommentariesProductnews

Education

RFP’s, RFI’s, DDQ’s

Expert opinion Science

Commercial thema’s & strategic themes

New roles

Set new marketing & communication roles with clear mandate, tasks & responsibilities:

• Chief editor• Expert• Information Specialist• Content Information Officers• Traffic Managers• Principal• Implementation Manager

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New governanceContent Board • Creates buy in for the Content Management Organization en its

tasks and responsibilities • Steers implementation of content policy• Consists of the key stakeholders

Content Alert Meeting • Decides which content will be developed for which

channel/content type, based on the news/actuality• Discusses longer term subjects• Assigns capacity within own departments

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New preconditions and support

Content management: coordination of all content with clear insight and oversight about who has created which content and when. And how it can be recycled. Documented!

Quality criteria: Quality criteria and editing formulas have to be defined. And KPI’s for content, content development and content management. Effectiveness of content has to be measured (satisfaction, client demand analysis)

Content architecture: Develop a structure that stipulates how content types look. Metadata has to be added structurally, to ensure that content can be found. Develop a policy that stipulates which content types may be applied.

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Database/registration system: Implement a central database or registration system. Recycling content will be possible, and current content can be used as inspiration for new content. Creating content about the same subjects by different people within the firm will be improves. More consistency.

Content instruments: Content instruments like content planning and workflow are implemented for the entire organization. These instruments facilitate that tasks within the entire content chain can be done in a more efficient and manner.

Client interaction: Organize good fit of content with interaction with clients. 1st and 2nd line.

New preconditions and support

Step4: Implement

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Lessons content implementation

Setting up a content management organization is a strategic change program

• There’s no quick fix program• Don’t expect an open invitation to get on the agenda • We (marketers) have to get out of our comfort zone• The road to success is paved with failure• Align the right people behind your ideas

Get out there, claim the subject and make your company competitive

Above all: be pragmatic in the process

Key messages for marketers

• Earn the right… to take on a strategic role• Know your clients… better and then the rest of the organization

(that’s your added value) Sales people are out selling…• Help the organization to differentiate itself against competition• Have a tangible impact… on client acquisition and retention

(add value in all stages of the sales cycle)• Think, act and live with the awareness of the value chain