A content manager is vital to making the most of any digital content marketing team. But what exactly does a content manager do?

Digital content marketing has become essential for modern businesses looking to connect with customers to master. But you need proper organization in order to truly reap the benefits.

A content manager manages the day-to-day tasks of content production.

A content manager’s job is to create and effectively deploy marketing campaigns. They should have exceptional organizational, managerial, communication, and writing skills. They’ll need this diverse skill set in order to bridge the digital gap between your brand and your target audience.

The role of a content manager is broad and far-reaching and may differ in responsibilities from company to company. In some instances, a single person might handle all of the content production tasks individually. Meanwhile, other businesses may delegate certain tasks to or be supported by a wider team.

Expert Insights: For example, here at WriteForMe, our content managers work in tandem with the wider research and editorial team to ensure a consistent flow of top-notch content for all our clients. Similarly, the type of media they produce—blog posts, videos, podcasts, and so on—might change the contours of the job.

However you choose to structure your operations, your content manager is the glue that binds much of the process together. Let’s explore some ways in which this role boosts your content marketing efforts to the next level.

1. Upholds High Content Quality Standards

Content managers exist to ensure clients receive nothing but top-quality content. Content quality can make or break a business, as poor-quality content can drive customers away rather than attract them.

The mission-critical nature of this role means content managers must also be exceptional editors and effective communicators. The more equipped they are to relay constructive feedback to the digital marketing team, the faster content can be delivered in the future.

When reviewing content, a content manager must diligently monitor grammar, punctuation, tone, and veracity. They must also be knowledgeable about the most up-to-date SEO best practices so to best optimize your content not only for your target audience but for the SERPs as well.

2. Adheres to Writing Style Guidelines

A writing style guide is essential for maintaining a consistent voice across varied mediums. A writing style guide provides details about writing preferences and stylist choices to ensure that every content creator for your company produces consistent material, giving your business a unified brand image.

A business may have a pre-existing style guide to lean on, or the content manager may need to craft a new one entirely. Either way, once a proper writing style guide is established, it’s the content manager’s responsibility to make sure that all future content adheres to it.

When creating a writing style guide, the content manager should take the business’s nature into account first and foremost. After all, this determines what tone and language will be most efficient in the pending marketing campaign. This is even truer for companies operating in niche market spaces.

3. Keeps Content Up-to-Date

Your content manager should also be proactive in removing or updating content from your company blog or social media accounts. Updated and relevant content is important in maintaining brand image and customer trust.

Content managers should also be skilled in repurposing old content that may still have relevant elements. For example, you might have an old blog post with outdated information with the exception of one section. A content manager must be able to repurpose that viable section into a social media post or expand upon it to create a new blog post.

If you don’t have any opportunities to repurpose old content, at the very least you must update your content with the latest SEO strategies. What worked a year ago may not work today. Content managers should update content with the most current SEO strategies in mind.

4. Monitors and Measures Content Performance

A marketing strategy is only as good as the numbers indicate.

Tracking marketing KPIs (key performance indicators) before, during, and after a campaign is essential to understanding the day-to-day metrics—and the overall bigger picture when determining the effectiveness of a marketing strategy.

Some KPIs to pay particularly close attention to include brand awareness, page views, unique visitors, social media engagement, and inbound links. Content managers can use this information to determine how well the content performed across various channels ad with various metrics.

• Did the content reach the intended audience?
• How much time did each visitor spend on the website?
• Were they driven to engage further? And in what capacity?

Not every KPI is as relevant to every company. Your content manager will determine which metrics make the most sense for your business before committing to tracking them regularly. But regardless of which metrics you value, every digital marketing team must be able to adjust their strategies accordingly.

5. Refines Production Workflows As Needed

For content managers, soft skills are every bit as important as technical skills.

Your content manager bridges the gaps between each department; clear, constructive communication is essential in building a strong team. Communication is at the core when creating a marketing strategy, bringing it to life, and delivering the final product to the team. Content managers ensure that the marketing team maintains open lines of communication with all of the company’s other departments. In doing so, content managers are able to refine internal processes as bottlenecks arise and make adjustments when needed.

Content managers should also research content management and content planning tools that will best suit the unique needs of the business. These may include project management tools such as Trello or Asana to organize your editorial calendar and production processes.

6. Conducts Competitor Analysis

Competition is an inherent drawback of doing business. In order to stay at the front of the pack, you need to have a thorough understanding of your competitors’ positions, as well as your own.

Content managers should research your business and industry, target audience, and corresponding market keywords via SEO analytics tools when planning your marketing strategy. This information eliminates the fluff, allowing the content manager to propel your brand with an optimized strategy.

They should also study your competitors and what is working for them. Consider their publishing frequency, distribution tactics, tone, and messaging style. Doing so can also help you dodge the marketing pitfalls that other businesses have fallen victim to—saving face, time, and money.

Content managers should have a grasp on the tools necessary to track your site’s search engine rankings such as Open Site Explorer, be able to compare your site to those of your competitors using RivalIQ, and be able to find trending topics in your respective industry using Buzzsumo.

7. Maintains an Editorial Calendar

Without adequate planning, things can go awry for even the most competent digital marketing team. Though necessary, it’s no easy feat.

Research suggests that 61% of content marketing teams struggle with delayed projects. This is why a content calendar is necessary for digital marketing teams to plan upcoming content schedules.

To increase productivity, your content managers should also establish an editorial calendar and/or content calendar to plan on a long-term basis. With an editorial calendar, content managers can schedule content months in advance. This helps businesses avoid delays and improve productivity while guaranteeing a diverse range of platform-specific content. This allows businesses to cast the widest net possible to attract potential customers.

Content managers who can coordinate with their team to publish high quality content on a consistent basis will surely provide your business with a competitive edge. It’s no secret that modern digital marketing requires a higher output than ever before. When used effectively, editorial calendars help content managers drive businesses’ short and long-term goals via tailored digital content strategies. They also help content creators plan for the future, abide by deadlines, and preemptively build up a backlog of well-researched content.

8. Implements Content Strategy

Every digital content marketing campaign begins with a strategy.

As you can guess from the job title, the team’s content manager implements and may occasionally spearhead these efforts. Therefore, content managers must be skilled communicators, capable of problem-solving and collaborating with the entire digital marketing team.

Effective content managers should have a clear understanding of a business’s goals before designing a content strategy. They must also determine the key goals of a particular marketing campaign. Your content goals will typically fall within one or more of the following categories:

• Increase website traffic
• Build brand awareness
• Attract leads for conversions

Content managers must also have a keen understanding of the business’s target audience, as well as the ability to conduct thorough keyword research to determine the search intent of specific content that potential customers are most likely to resonate with.

Expert Insight: At WriteForMe, we use the pillar and cluster model to build effective content strategies. Pillar content refers to longer articles that cover topics relevant to your readers. Meanwhile, cluster content tends to be shorter articles that cover subtopics of the pillar. This structure is effective because it enhances SEO and connects all the content on your website.

The content manager is often responsible for preparing content briefs as a key aspect of content strategy as well. Content briefs detail the parameters of the piece of content for pre-production and give clients and writers alike a clear understanding of the content requirements and expectations. Preparing content briefs is a critical—but often overlooked—step in implementing your content strategy.

Partner With WriteForMe for All Your Content Management Needs

Establishing a content marketing strategy and successfully bringing it to fruition is far from easy. Here’s the good news: you don’t need to go it alone.

Our diverse team of content marketing experts at WriteForMe are revered by exceptional content managers at the center of our entire content production team

We help you stand out from the competition with top-tier original written content. With quality content and SEO best practices at our core, we help your business reach a wider audience—with fewer keystrokes.

Your company’s path to better digital content management begins with WriteForMe.

Our team is dedicated to learning all about your content goals and priorities. Request your FREE complimentary content marketing playbook featuring uniquely tailored marketing opportunities, a side-by-side comparison of your business and your competitors, and even a quarter-year roadmap of content strategy.

Contact us today to see how WriteForMe can accelerate your content efforts!