How to Create a Better Work Environment for Your Content Marketing Team [Tools]

A few years ago they talked about making the workplace more suitable for everyone. Today, in light of the changing role of the physical office, the conversation turned to the workspace.

A successful work environment works like a community, with consistent communication, responsiveness and flexibility. The challenges of working effectively in individual roles and as a team remain whether or not your content team works in the same location.

This list of transition tools helps my team's writers and editors work well across locations and time zones.

1. Guides and key resources

Make sure your team members can quickly get to know those of your company Content marketing strategy and implementation steps so that everyone works from the same page.

The guides and documented processes we share include:

• Brand voice and messages
• Society style guides and general optimization of keywords, design and other details
• Personal style guides for content tactics

Dedicated guides for each content format ensure everyone is on the same page. We have specific style guides for:

• Landing Pages – Documentation on how to create a combination of written and visual content that converts.
• Blog articles and guest posts – detailing keyword inclusion, title tags and content structure.
• Email copy and newsletters – display templates based on objectives such as features, content distribution and other promotional offers. (We use send to all optimize our emails and improve open rates.)

These documented guides are in shared resource folders on Google Drive to make them accessible to anyone on the content team.

Dedicated process and style guides for each format keep #Content team members on the same page, says @Shane_Barker via @CMIContent. Click to tweet

advice: we use loom An application for recording short videos that refer to common errors and fixes. These videos can reinforce the areas where your team should pay more attention to your style guides.

2. Detailed task summaries

We write a detailed brief for each task to maintain transparency and minimize the need for corrections.

This example of an abstract created for a planned guest post has three columns – Details, Description, and Writer's Notes (if applicable). The left column lists the post type, title, whether the title has been reviewed by the editor-in-chief, description offered to the client, word count, target site, target site guidelines, and target audience.

3. Project management using Teamline or ClickUp

To create a content workflow, we combine team line with Slack. The project management tool allows us to optimize all tasks and track progress.

Teamline allows users to create tasks in project channels, assign them to the “person of concern”, add due dates and add custom labels. We use custom labels to identify the priority of tasks – medium, important, urgent, etc.

When working with freelancers, we use ClickUp Assign tasks and track progress. ClickUp has hundreds of customizable features that help me simplify my workflow and save time. And it keeps independent tracking outside of Slack's internal channels.

We create a separate ticket for each task. We can then quickly move individual task cards to lists such as “Assigned”, “For Review”, “Approved” or “Published”. This allows us to track the progress of each assignment and better determine its publication date.

It also allows us to see which independent tasks are on the approved list so we know which invoices are due.

ClickUp also helps us plan, track and create a workflow for our content marketing campaigns. This screenshot of the ClickUp interface shows a list of tasks separated by type (issues found, reviewed, and ready). Assigned, due date (if assigned), phase (initiate, plan, execute) and priority details are also listed for each task.

4. Availability tracker integrated with notification tool

limp Is an excellent platform for team communication. We added the Mesasix Time Tracker A tool for this, which allows us to see who has connected, is on hiatus and available for discussion.

With this information, we interrupt people in the middle of something important. This can help you improve employee satisfaction and, in turn, the efficiency of your team.

The Mesasix integration can also help track total employee time to inform payroll processing by accounting.

Add the @Mesasix Time Tracker tool to @SlackHQ to track #ContentMarketing team availability, says @Shane_Barker via @CMIContent. Click to tweet

5. Google Docs for easy collaboration

We use Google Docs to collaborate and work as a team to create content. Several writers and editors can work on the same document at the same time. We can also track who made which edits and when. If necessary, we can restore older versions of the document at any time.

The Google Docs tool lets you automate the table of contents, add notes, and assign action items to the person responsible to ensure smooth team collaboration.

6. Communication tools for messaging and meeting

Transparent and seamless communication between members of your content team helps you maintain strong and lasting relationships within your organization and with freelancers.

As I mentioned, we use Slack to communicate. We have created separate channels for announcements from large companies, specific project guidelines and writing tips. It helps team members quickly get the information they want, ask questions, and get quick feedback.

When we bring the team together close up (You can use one of these Alternative tools for video conferencing), We record work-related meetings for future reference and for anyone who can't make it.

Create transparent and seamless communication between your #content team members, says @Shane_Barker via @CMIContent. Click to tweet

start working

Managing a content team has its own challenges. But no matter where they work, you can expand your content marketing success with the right arsenal of tools.

What tools are helpful for your content team? What questions do you have about choosing the right tool? Please share in the comments.

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All tools mentioned are recognized by the author. If you have another tool to suggest, please add This in the comments.

This article has been updated from an article originally published on July 8, 2020.