Defining Your Content Framework with Processes and Systems

Once you've put your digital marketing strategy in place and know what type of content you need, you'll want to create a system you can count on to get the work done. This chapter also explores how content systems and documented procedures make everything easier.

Organizing the Content Process

Why should you care about developing a system for your content efforts? The best answer is that everyone benefits, even those who aren't directly involved in the process. You probably wouldn't consider launching any other kind of project in your organization without spelling out how things will work. The same should apply to your content system.

Of course, if you're a solo entrepreneur who doesn't use freelancers, you can probably get by without documenting anything. But as soon as you bring in another person, you need to let them know how things are done so they don't reinvent the wheel.

Benefiting from a Defined Framework

When you implement a documented content marketing process, you give everyone in the organization clear expectations about:

• Who is in charge of (and accountable for) each part of the process
• How long your various campaigns and tasks take to complete
• How to avoid bottlenecks and errors
• What the budget will cover and what resources are needed
• Whether you're meeting your content and business goals
• Whether you're complying with your legal requirements
• How security is implemented and maintained

On the flip side, here's a quick look at what can happen if you don't have your content systems in place:

Copyright violations: Protected images or content published without permission.

Spreading inaccurate information: Angry customers seeing incorrect information that no content manager checked.

Sloppy design: No sign-off obtained for design consistency, making your brand look amateurish.

Poorly written articles: Without editorial guidance, your posts could contain mistakes that will put off your audience.

Obviously, people make mistakes. Even with a content system in place, you'll still have errors. A content framework simply helps eliminate as many serious errors as possible, which is particularly crucial for professional content management systems.

Reviewing the Systems You Need

You can start by focusing on what's involved in putting your content system together. There's no magic involved. As with any project you create, you need to know what the tasks are, how to accomplish them, and what your budget constraints are.

It's important to make sure everyone on the team understands how you deliver quality content to the highest standards.

You should have a documented process that everyone can follow. According to the Content Marketing Institute, research shows that companies with a documented framework believe it helps them be more effective content marketers.

You should also pay attention to the office politics surrounding your project. Big projects usually stir up big emotions. Make sure everyone is heard.

Essential Framework Tasks

So now you're in charge of getting the system up and running. You have buy-in, and you need to get to work. What needs to happen next?

If your company has a formal Content Management System (CMS), that system should come with specific guidelines on how you must enter and manage your content.

You need to:

Assign roles and responsibilities: Everyone needs to know what they're responsible for and by when.

Establish governance rules: Governance rules must be created so people know how to make decisions.

Set up editorial guidelines: Editors need rules too. Don't forget to create them so everyone follows them.

Develop a resource system for writers: You need to identify where to find writers, how to assign them to specific tasks, and what and how to pay them.

Select and use an editorial calendar: Everyone needs to see what's being created. A calendar is also used to assign other project tasks.

Create content guidelines for authors: Writers need to know what's expected of them in terms of style and content.

Make sure you have visual guidelines for designers: Your content must be visually appealing and comply with all documented guidelines.

Make sure your taxonomy is in good order: Your keywords and other data classifiers must be kept up to date.

Develop the workflow for reviewing and approving content: Once the content has been written and has gone through the editorial process.

Publish content across multiple channels: Have channel guidelines in place for every social platform you publish on.

Make sure training is in place: If new people join the process, you want to be sure they can get up to speed quickly.

It's also critical to give all team members the opportunity to make suggestions and improve procedures. In fact, even people who aren't actual team members can benefit from understanding the content creation process.

Determining Roles and Responsibilities

In the average workplace, it's sometimes hard to know who's in charge. People often take on the mantle of authority even when they have no real power. But before you decide who's in charge, it's important to know how decisions about the project will be made.

Governance models typically come in three types:

Centralized: In this model, all decisions are made by a central committee that has the authority to consult anyone in the hierarchy. This model works best in small companies with a local editorial team.

Hub-and-spoke: This model lets different teams take responsibility for their own decisions. These teams can be spread across the globe.

Hybrid: This model is the most popular. It's more informal and lets teams use the best of both models.

Roles Needed for a Content System

Several roles need to be assigned in a content management system:

Project Lead: A corporate leader who approves the overall budget and goals and is ultimately responsible for the overall success or failure of the project.

Project Manager: Manages the budget, staff, guidelines, etc.

Content Managers: Decide which topics to write about and which formats to use.

Editors: Assign and schedule writers; evaluate the writing; oversee revisions; approve for publication.

Contributors: Write articles, ebooks and other content.

Designers: Create images and design layouts.

Content System Administrators: Review content to make sure it will display correctly; create pages; check links.

Web Administrators: Make sure content is formatted for publication and meets all web standards.

Managing the Workflow

Developing an effective workflow is a vital part of the content system. When you document your systems, you help yourself and others learn the process. You also make it easier for others to spot mistakes.

Here are several tasks to consider in your workflow process:

• How contributors are found and assigned
• How contributions are scheduled
• How content is reviewed and approved
• How content is published

Workflow documents should include visual elements. If you can capture screenshots, that's great. Flowcharts are also useful.

Finding and Assigning Writers

Your content is only as good as the people who create it. If, like IBM, you have subject matter experts (SMEs) in almost every technical and business field, your problem is solved.

But what if you only have a few people who can write, or worse, nobody who can produce content? You need to look outside your organization to hire writers and editors.

To build a team of content creators, you have several options:

Tap into your in-house talent: If you choose this route, you'll have to take on a lot of the management yourself. A major drawback is that you're stuck with the writing talent you have.

Hire individual contractors: This route gives you the potential to find good writers. You'll still have to manage their time. The major drawback here is that you may need to try out several writers. Sources for freelance writers:

• Contently
• WriterAccess
• Zerys

Hire a writing service: When you hire a writing service, you get someone else to manage your writers. Writing services:

• Internet Marketing Ninjas
• Express Writers
• Brafton

Reach out to influencers: To round out your content, you might want guest posts from influencers in your industry.

Pay a premium for special writers: You may know professional writers who would deliver exactly what you need.

Of course, you can mix all of these options and build the perfect system for you.

Using an Editorial Calendar

Would you plan a trip without looking at a calendar? Probably not. So why not use an editorial calendar when you schedule your content?

If you're wondering whether a calendar is necessary, you're not alone. Some content marketers don't want to be bothered setting one up and keeping it up to date.

Benefits of an Editorial Calendar

Look at the tasks a calendar helps you accomplish. When you have a calendar, you can:

See the big picture: A calendar gives you an at-a-glance view of the content in the pipeline and the content already published.

Make sure you have the resources you need: To avoid long gaps in the schedule, you want to line up writers in advance.

Develop content for specific promotions: Product managers, marketers and sales managers all want their campaigns at the front of the line.

Assign people to specific tasks: A documented schedule lets you follow up with the people you assign tasks to.

Avoid the problem of not knowing what to write about: A calendar lets you schedule topics in advance.

Vary your content formats: Scheduling in advance lets you review your content formats.

Help your team be more productive: People are more productive when they manage their own time.

It's critical to keep a steady stream of content ideas so you can plug them in and get them written. Keep a growing list of content ideas in online tools such as Notion, Trello or Asana (2025 update).

Calendar Tools

So which calendar tool should you choose? It depends on what's available to you:

If you use a formal CMS software platform: You may already have a built-in calendar tool.

If you want to use a standalone calendar: You could try the one from CoSchedule or Notion (2025).

If you use WordPress: Several plug-ins are available for editorial calendars.

Recommended modern tools:

• Notion: An all-in-one workspace with calendar templates
• Airtable: A flexible database for content planning
• Monday.com: Project management with calendar views
• ClickUp: A complete platform with advanced editorial calendars

Documenting Your Policies and Procedures

Documentation isn't considered a very exciting topic, but it's certainly very necessary. Documenting your content strategy can mean the difference between your project's success and failure. This is especially true for systems that require regular maintenance and security.

You need to ask several key questions about your documentation on an ongoing basis:

Does everyone know where to find the documentation?: It's great to have documentation, but if nobody knows where it is, it's useless.

Is there a way to let everyone know about changes?: Having a way to keep everyone in the loop about changes is key.

Are you protecting yourself against “walking documentation”?: Walking documentation refers to information that only specific employees know.

Types of Documentation You Need

Here's the type of documentation you need for each area of the content system:

Content managers: Taxonomy

Editors: Editorial guidelines

Writers: Style guides

Designers: Visual and brand guides

Content system administrators: Social platform requirements, CMS

Web administrators: Systems and security

Content Managers

In large organizations, content managers are different from editors. A content manager has a more strategic role. She is responsible for knowing the personas and the data collected about customers.

Editors

Editorial guidelines are critical for any editor. They explain to everyone involved what your publishing goals are. The guidelines tell your contributors who your audience is and what you want readers to get out of your content.

HubSpot provides a free style template that can be useful if you need to create guidelines from scratch.

Designers

Designers rely on the visual guidelines created for web properties. They can also refer to the brand guidelines if questions come up.

Content System Administrator

The content system administrator makes sure the CMS is working and refers to the CMS documentation when needed. They also maintain the social platform guidelines, with details on formatting content for other channels. For companies using advanced admin tools, this documentation becomes even more critical.

Web Administrator

The web administrator is the guardian of the important security guidelines for the company's web properties. She is also responsible for system maintenance documentation, which is especially important for maintaining the security and compliance of systems.

For online stores that require advanced monitoring, suspicious order analysis and Shopify process automation become essential components of the management system.

Training and System Adoption

Of course, you know that putting all the systems in place is only half the job. People need to be trained to use the systems effectively. Part of the training happens by using the systems and getting comfortable with how they work.

The technology you assemble for your system may include software tools for writing, designing and editing. That means you expect your team members to be well versed in the software skills needed for their work.

Intelligent Content and the Future of Systems

Lately, content marketers have been hearing about “intelligent content.” This term doesn't refer to content written for advanced users. Rather, it's content that is structured to make it more useful.

Scott Abel, The Content Wrangler, calls it “content that can be read by people and machines.” The value of making your content intelligent is that, by providing structure, the content can be found and used across the organization.

Emerging Technologies

New technologies are transforming content management:

Artificial Intelligence: Tools like GPT-4, Claude and Jasper automate content creation while maintaining quality.

Workflow Automation: Zapier, Make and similar tools connect your content systems.

Advanced Analytics: Google Analytics 4, Mixpanel and similar platforms provide deeper insights into content performance.

Real-Time Collaboration: Notion, Figma and other collaborative tools let teams work together seamlessly.

Is intelligent content something you need to consider for your business? It depends. If you're a small business with a limited amount of content, the answer is: not right now. If you have a large organization and many different forms of content, developing intelligent content will help you deliver the best content to all your customers.

Ready to Systematize Your Content Marketing?

Putting robust processes and systems in place isn't just for large companies. As a specialized freelance web developer, I help small businesses and startups:

Structure their content strategy with documented processes
Implement CMS systems suited to their needs and budget
Automate their workflows for publishing and management
Train their teams in best practices and modern tools

Need a content system that really works? Contact me to find out how to transform your approach to content marketing with processes that deliver measurable results.