Why Content Modeling Is So Important

Published in

Content Mines

5 min readJan 29, 2018

Content Modelling can save you a ton of time, effort and nerves.
Here’s how.

Everyone who’s involved working with content — be it either creation, planning or managing it — knows this: There’s few things that are as frustrating and time consuming as a feeling of disconnect within or across teams. More often that not, this results in broken processes, missing deadlines or just plain confusion.

Let’s say you’re working on relaunching a section of your website and you’re responsible for developing a strategy for engaging content formats that tell your brand’s story. You do your research, come up with concepts for videos, blogposts or news formats, produce a production calendar. You’re ready to go and want to present your ideas in the next meeting, only to find out the proposed design will not accommodate your deliverables, your managers are fighting over what topics are the most important and your writers are not willing to work with the new Content Management System (CMS) IT has decided on. The whole thing goes completely off the rails, costs skyrocket, everyone’s frustrated and you’re back to square one.

Sounds familiar? Get ahead of it — Try Content Modelling. It’s not a new technique, yet it is still incredibly useful. Here’s how to get started.

What is Content Modelling?

Another fancy term you can use at your next networking event? Maybe. What’s behind it though is a holistic plan for the production of content, looping everyone involved in the process in — from editors to designers to IT and management — ensuring you’re all clear on requirements and goals. It’s what you want when you’re working as a Content Strategist. Rachel Lovinger goes as far as saying:

“[Content Modelling] allows me to represent content in a way that translates the intention, stakeholder needs, and functional requirements from the user experience design into something that can be built by developers implementing a CMS. The content model helps me makes sure that the content vision becomes a reality.”

Content Modelling Is All About Asking Questions

As opposed to just diving headfirst into producing deliverables, Content Modelling takes a step back and firstly asks questions. Avoid everyone going off in different directions and ask yourself:

What types of content (e.g. articles, videos, posts, quizzes etc.) are required or are already in use for my project? “It’s important in the initial draft to ensure that you capture all the different types of content and any relationships so don’t worry too much about whether it really is a new content type or not — you can fix it up later” is as Chris Knowles puts it. If you want to know how to identify content types, I encourage you to read his article here.
How are my content types connected? Can they refer to one another? We’ve all seen the “related articles” blades when we consume content on the web. Well, these suggestions don’t come out of nowhere. Ask yourself if you can make meaningful connections between content types to provide a richer experience for your audience.

A simple flowchart on how to show relationships between content, by Rachel Lovinger

What elements and attributes are my content types made of? What metadata is required? Are there reusable elements to it? E.g. Does my press release include only text or pictures as well? What metadata needs to be added to improve findability? Define the parts of your types as closely as possible! Editors will thank you when you give them guidelines to work by and developers will know what requirements you have for the CMS.
What does the design of deliverables look like? Help designers help you. Keep them close to your editors to make sure designs and content work together, not fight each other.
And of course: What’s the job my content helps the audience do? Of course keep in mind your organization’s needs and goals, but don’t forget the people who are consuming your content. Make sure what you deliver helps them achieve what they are trying to do. They’ll eventually tell you what they want if you’re willing to listen.

What You Get From It

Answering these questions will give you a clear view on how content is being produced, how the deliverables relate to each other and where you can address gaps in the process.

To recap, Content Modelling will…

… give you the ability to map out responsibilities and requirements (for content as well as technical details) and tell you where you need to bring people together.
… help you develop styleguides for deliverables and link them to your goals.
… avoid duplication and unnecessary effort by showing connections between various content types and possibilities for re-use. The modules your content types are made of can be tailored to display correctly on many devices.
… improve UX massively by thinking the process through before you get started. Your creators will have an easier time creating content while your content will become more useful to your audience.

As always, models are always subject to change. Many people will influence it through over time. “The lines can get fuzzy”, Rachel Lovinger says. But it will at least give you and your team a framework. Keep your model, be it a spreadsheet to categorize content types and requirements, a flowchart to show connections or templates for your deliverables as a working document. Share it internally. Educate relevant stakeholders on it and develop it even further if needed. Use it as your North Star, and your next meeting will go from this: