A significant increase in customers’ demands, business activities, and permanent cooperation between different spheres of social life leads to a necessity of providing more and more content of any kind: from educational to entertaining and promotional. Companies worldwide deal with the challenge of producing and updating relevant content for different types of audiences to successfully operate on local and international markets. Businesses have a particular position known as content strategist for that purpose.
A content strategist is responsible for planning, creating, editing, publishing, and updating content depending on a company’s goals, needs, and objectives.
And here is a detailed description of a content strategist’s job scope.
Who Is a Content Strategist?
A content strategist is engaged in the marketing processes and responsible for providing, editing, designing all types of content vital for a company’s goals and interrelations of customers and business. It is far more than just writing and updating content; it is working out and following a long-term plan to help a company achieve its goals.
In most cases, a content strategist obtains special education, very often in the sphere of marketing. It helps a content strategist understand the target audience’s needs and work most efficiently.
The primary goals of a content strategist:
- Lead generation
- Increased brand awareness
- High conversion rate
Content Strategist vs Content Manager
Very often, people confuse a content strategist and a content manager. It’s understandable, as their responsibilities look similar, but though have differences.
Both a content strategist and a content manager are people responsible for working with content, its creation, and updating. But it is important to understand that content managers mostly deal with daily tasks and operations while a content strategist defines the whole content strategy. In other words, a content strategist chooses the area of work for the content manager. They do it by analyzing the market, trends, and communicating with business owners.
Content Strategist vs Copywriter
Some people may confuse a content strategist and a copywriter. The similarity is the same as with content managers since both a content strategist and a copywriter are responsible for content creation, but they do it differently.
A copywriter works with texts mainly. They use persuasive language to attract the attention of customers and convince them to buy a product, start using a service, or book a demo, etc.
A content strategist is not responsible for particular tasks. They have a view of the whole content strategy and ways of following it.
What Does a Content Strategist Do?
A content strategist is commonly a person who analyzes the market, customers’ behavior and needs, explores new trends, communicates with different teams and departments to find the best way of creating and updating content. Here are the most typical tasks for a content strategist:
- Market research
- Defining the target audience
- Finding content gaps
- Using and testing different channels for content delivery
- Choosing the right ways of achieving the goals
- Making the content production process consistent
- Defining the set of tasks and processes for content writers, designers, SEO experts, etc.
- Implementing best practices for content creation
- etc.
All the functions may be briefly described by the infographics below:
Content Strategist Skills
A content strategist is a person who has vast knowledge in the sphere of marketing. Here we can also add the ability to analyze market data and good communication skills to cooperate with different departments and teams.
A content strategist is always a storyteller. They are telling brand stories. That requires being consistent and systematic. Moreover, empathy is a must-have as well. You should understand your target audience and its pains. All these skills will help you develop a strong content strategy.
There are many online conferences and webinars for those who work in the sphere of marketing and content strategy. They help people share experiences and talk about the most effective strategies and trends. It is a great idea to take part in events like that to gain new skills and become a real expert.
Content Strategist Career Path
How can one become a content strategist? First of all, you should understand that all the skills and abilities come from many years of work in the sphere of marketing: marketing manager, copywriter, content creator, etc. It is important to go through all the content creation processes to be able to organize them efficiently. This experience can help you advance the career of content strategist. You will be responsible for the entire process of building a content strategy.
Content Strategist Salary
The range of responsibilities and skills leads to the question of how much a content strategist earns. The US statistics say that the minimum rate is about $45 000 per year (for beginners or those who work in small companies), and the maximum gained by the most experienced and successful content strategists is about $105 000 per year. Statistics also say that the median is about $65 000 per year, so this is what most content strategists may count on.
Content Strategist Job Description
The best way to find out the complete and correct description of a content strategist’s job scope is to find any vacancy from any company.
Here are the responsibilities and requirements of a content strategist along with all the degrees and experiences they have to obtain.
As for the responsibilities, here is the list of the most common ones:
- Analyze the market and define the audience’s interests;
- Make periodic auditions of the content’s performance to understand if it is effective;
- Do special checkups to understand if there is a necessity to add new content or remove it;
- Give instructions to the content management teams and copywriters;
- Create a content plan – a schedule for publishing content.
Such a range of responsibilities inevitably requires special skills and background, such as:
- Proven experience in working as a content manager or writer (no less than several years);
- Understanding the principles of the market, businesses, management systems, and principles of content creation;
- At least a bachelor’s degree in marketing, journalism, business analysis, or other related fields.
These are the most common requirements for a content strategist position, but they may differ from company to company.
Conclusion
Becoming a content strategist is not an easy task. It requires certain skills and self-organization. But at the same time, if you have enough experience, you’ll cope with that – practice makes perfect. Persistent work will help you gain all the required skills.
Good luck with your technical writing!
ClickHelp Team
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