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Home > Insights > New Thinking: Brain Traffic’s Content Strategy Quad
The content strategy quad has been the guiding cornerstone of our practice for years. But
as with anything, thinking changes. Here is Brain Traffic’s new take.
The practice of content strategy has evolved a lot over the past few years. We’ve seen several newly defined
specializations (like UX writing, content engineering, and product content strategy) popping up all over in
blog posts and job descriptions. In fact, there are literally thousands of content strategy jobs in the
marketplace today! Love it.
But with change comes, uh, change. As conversations have progressed in the field, we’ve found that
our original content strategy quad hasn’t quite held up in terms of capturing what content strategy is today
and where it plays in both project processes and operational frameworks.
For example, it’s next to impossible to separate out workflow from governance—one can’t (or shouldn’t) exist
without the other. We also recognized that we needed a component that demonstrates the need to integrate
content planning along the user journey (versus assigning it as a static component of, say, a web page or
PDF). And so on and so forth. So much thinking.
As a practice, content strategy helps to define, prioritize, integrate, systematize, and measure content.
The two areas of focus that intersect in content design are editorial strategy and experience design.
How will design patterns shape our content on mobile and beyond?
More than anything else, effective content design requires knowing your audience—their needs,
preferences, and expectations. When you balance these with your business goals, you can identify content
design requirements that deliver that useful, usable content people love.
The two areas of focus that intersect in content systems design are content structure and process design.
Who is responsible and accountable for content? Who needs to be consulted and informed along the
way?
What standards and metrics will we use to measure our content quality and performance?
You’ll see that we’ve rotated the quad 90º so that systems design can sit in the lower half. This was a
conscious choice, as we believe content systems provide the foundation for successful content design.
What Is Content Strategy? Core Strategy vs. Strategic The Truth About Content:
Connecting the Dots Between Priorities: Which Is Right for Broken Dreams and the Big
Disciplines You? Fix
How you define content strategy for your Sometimes, a compact, one-sentence At her 2018 SXSW talk, Kristina Halvorson
organization depends a lot on what you’re content strategy statement simply isn’t shared a smart strategic framework that
trying to accomplish. Let’s take a look. enough to cover all your bases. You need to will finally help you manage content with
set strategic priorities to stay focused. confidence, now and in the future.
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