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Year after year, hundreds of marketers report increased efforts and spending on content marketing — or the intention to do so.

But great content is wasted if your audience doesn’t know it exists.

Content distribution is integral to your content strategy, if not the most essential part.

This guide will equip you with the tools you need to distribute the content you create. By the end, you’ll be able to build a content distribution strategy that gets your content in front of — and consumed by — your audience.

Today, social media plays a huge role in content distribution — let’s take a moment to review what this entails.

No matter which type of content distribution you focus on, the distribution process will happen after you create your content.

However, you should know where and how you’re going to publish and promote your content before you put the proverbial pen to paper. Otherwise, your time and resources could go to waste.

Take a look at these content distribution statistics:

60% of marketers create one piece of content each day.
8,726 tweets are posted to Twitter each second.
Google processes over 8.5 billion searches per day.

As you can see, in recent years, we’ve seen a rapid influx of content met with dwindling demand. With almost 4.5 million blog posts published daily, we can consume only so much content. Marketing influencer Mark Schaefer argues that because of this “content shock,” content marketing may not be a sustainable strategy for every business.

While I won’t agree or disagree with this theory, I will outline everything you need to know to distribute your marketing content successfully.

Various content distribution channels through which you can share your content include:

eBooks
Podcasts
Videos 
Infographics
Case studies
Webinars 
Blogs

Content Distribution Channels

Content distribution channels are the channels through which you share and promote the content you create. The channels you use to distribute your content will vary based on your audience and resources.

Three overarching content distribution channels cover several more specific distribution channels: owned, earned, and paid.

The following diagram illustrates how these three content distribution channels overlap and how you can combine them to enhance their impact and reach.

Owned Content Distribution

Owned channels are the content properties your company owns. You can control when and how content is published on your owned channels. These include your website, blog, social media profiles, email newsletter, or mobile publishing app.

Earned Content Distribution

Earned channels (also known as “shared” channels) are when third parties promote or share your content. These third parties could include customers, journalists, bloggers, and anyone who shares your content for free — hence the name “earned.”

These channels include public relations, social shares and mentions, guest articles and roundups, and product reviews. They also have forums and communities like Reddit or Quora — while posting on these sites is free, the content is owned by these third parties and therefore falls under earned channels.

Paid Content Distribution

Paid channels are when your company pays to distribute your content on specific channels. This includes pay-per-click (PPC), paid social advertisements, and paid influencer content.

Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Ads

With PPC, an advertiser pays when people interact with their ad through impressions or clicks. PPC falls under search engine marketing (SEM) and, when done right, helps you earn quality leads.

PPC ads are most common in search engine results pages (SERPs) but are also used on social channels. When paired with an SEO strategy, PPC can be integral to your inbound marketing efforts. One of the top platforms for PPC is Google Ads.

Sponsored Content

Sponsored content is promotional media paid for by an advertiser, created and shared by another person, brand, influencer, or publisher.

Sponsored content is most effective when it includes a person or brand that already targets your audience and buyer personas and already aligns well with your brand.

As a result, sponsored content feels natural rather than invasive or disruptive. You can use sponsored content in various ways, including images, videos, podcasts, social media, and any influencer content.

Paid Influencer Content

Paid influencer marketing requires you to employ leading content creators in your business’ niche to help you improve your brand awareness, traffic, and conversions among your shared target audience to your target audience.

Influencer marketing is effective because it taps into powerful strategies such as word-of-mouth marketing and social proof, which — for today’s buyers — may feel more trustworthy and believable than the marketing a company does for itself. Brands are expected to spend up to $15 billion on influencer marketing by 2022.

Paid Social Ads

Paid social ads can include PPC, sponsored, or influencer content. Paid social media ads share your marketing messages and campaigns on social media platforms such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram, while targeting a specific sub-audience on those platforms.

PPC advertising, branded or influencer-generated content, and display ads are all examples of paid social media. A paid social media strategy will likely incorporate tools native to specific social media channels, like Facebook Ads or Instagram Ads, to create, schedule, and share ads to reach your target audience.

Next, let’s review what a content distribution strategy is and why it’s so important.

A content distribution strategy is important for a few reasons:

It boosts your content impact past curation and creation. As I said above, great content is useless if nobody reads it. A content distribution strategy gets your gorgeous content in front of the right eyes.
It aligns your team and the teams you collaborate to create and share the content. Depending on the size of your company, you may have several cooks in the content marketing kitchen. (I know we do at HubSpot.) A content distribution strategy aligns all these parties and ensures you collaborate efficiently.
It sets goal benchmarks against which you can measure your distribution performance. Content distribution can be vague — a simple press of the “Publish” button, and you’re done. A content distribution strategy helps you set benchmarks and challenging goals to chase while publishing and promoting your work.

Here’s how to build a content distribution strategy for yourself.

1. Research your target audience.

Content distribution is about getting your content in front of your audience — not just any audience. You can’t do this properly if you don’t know where they are and what they like to read. Before you build your strategy any further, research your target audience to know precisely who will consume your content.

Start by collecting demographic data from your website visitors, email subscribers, social media followers, and customers. Look at your audience’s gender, age, income, location, education, and related categories. You can pull this information from Google Analytics or your social media analytics tools.

Next, collect feedback directly from your customers, email subscribers, and social media followers. Ask them about their pain points and needs, as well as how they feel about your current content and distribution efforts.

Use these two data points to create your buyer persona. Your buyer persona(s) act as models of your ideal customers and content consumers and represent their pain points, information preferences, and motivations as you build out the rest of your content distribution strategy.

2. Audit your content.

You may already have some published content, such as blog posts, videos, social media content, and more. While your new content distribution strategy doesn’t involve removing that content, you should audit it to understand if it’s helping or hurting your distribution efforts.

Auditing your current content will also remind you which topics you’ve already written about and which ones you can expand on.

A thorough content audit is comprised of three main parts:

Logging your content. Logging your content can be done manually or with a tool. (We recommend the latter, especially if you’ve been publishing content on multiple properties and channels.) Tools like Screaming Frog can help you crawl and collect your content, listing each URL, title, and description in a spreadsheet. The free version crawls up to 500 URLs. If you opt for a manual content audit, follow the steps in our blog post here.
Assessing your content impact. If you crawl your content with SEMRush, the tool will also list content length, social shares, and backlinks. This information can help you assess the impact of each piece of content, alerting you to anything that needs to be updated, rewritten, or erased.
Identifying your content gaps. You can also identify gaps in your content using the Ahrefs Content Gap tool or by performing keyword research to discover new keywords or phrases to add to your content, thus helping it rank higher and for more terms.
Check out
this blog post
for 30+ more content auditing tools.

3. Choose your content distribution channels.

Your content distribution channels are arguably more important than your content itself, hence why this step comes before content creation and after target audience research. Once you know your target audience, you’ll have a better idea of getting your content in front of your followers and customers.

Depending on your analysis, you may post on forums and communities like Reddit or Quora — and pay to promote your content on those sites, too. Alternatively, you may choose to share content on social media channels exclusively, or perhaps you find that traditional PR is your best route.

Regardless of your content distribution channels, ensure they align with your audience’s preferences and behaviors.

Also, optimize your owned distribution channels — your blog, email newsletter, and social media profiles — as these are relatively inexpensive and in your control. Even if research shows that your audience prefers forums to social media or news sites to company blogs, never neglect your owned properties, as these reflect on your brand and product.

As you work through this step, set aside time to optimize your blog-to-gain readership, brush up on how to send email newsletters (or start sending them), and learn about organic social media marketing.

4. Decide on your content types.

After determining your distribution channels, consider what types of content you’d like (and have the resources) to create.

Many companies choose to publish all of their content on their blog and then repurpose and re-publish it. Blog posts are universally consumed, easy to repurpose and localize (i.e., translate into other languages), and simple to share — not to mention that almost 50% of buyers read a company’s blog while making purchase decisions.

For these reasons, we recommend building a business blog and then expanding your content types to share on other channels.

Consider the content types we discussed at the beginning of this guide, and think about how you’ll repurpose and distribute them.

5. Set your content distribution KPIs and goals.

Goals help us recognize where we’re going and what success might look like when we get there. Your content distribution strategy should involve setting goals for your content key performance indicators (KPIs) and their subsequent metrics:

KPIs related
related metrics

Traffic/each unique
Unique page views by channel and source

Engagement
Bounce rate, average time on page

Top content (and falling content)
Top page views, top exits

Impact
Click-throughs, conversions, backlinks

Sentiment
Comments, social shares

These metrics may vary based on your distribution channel (i.e., you can’t track comments on your email newsletter or top exists on your social media ads), so be sure to choose the metrics that correspond best to each channel. Establishing a baseline for each channel might take a few months, especially if you haven’t used it before.

Set SMART goals for your content using these metrics. Here’s an example:

Specific: I want to increase our blog’s organic traffic by boosting backlinks from other reputable websites and blogs. This will increase our search engine ranking, thus bringing in more organic traffic.
Measurable: I’d like 30 new backlinks to our blog.
Attainable: We’re already generating 10 new backlinks each month without an intentional strategy, so I believe 30 new backlinks with our approach is feasible this month.
Relevant: This goal aligns with our broader organic content marketing strategy and could boost our earned media as we get mentions from press outlets and third-party bloggers.
Time-bound: I’d like to receive these backlinks within the next month.

6. Build an editorial calendar (and include distribution).

Content marketing and distribution require lots of planning to be successful. This is where an editorial content calendar can come in handy. You can create one in Excel or Google Sheet, or even use Google Calendar. Tools like CoSchedule, Asana, and Trello are helpful, too.

Your editorial calendar, like your content distribution strategy, helps your team stay aligned and work towards common goals. It also gives your writers and editors a roadmap for what they’ll be working on in the coming weeks and months.

Here’s what your editorial calendar may look like (using this post as an example):

Your editorial calendar is the perfect place to include your content distribution plans and goals. Here’s what that may look like on your editorial calendar:

See how the right-hand columns now include categories like “Publish Destinations” and “Repurposing Plans”? Your editorial calendar shouldbes your hub for all content creation and distribution plans.

Manage and plan your social media content with a free Social Media Content Calendar Template.

7. Create your content.

After you research your audience, audit your content, decide on your distribution channels and content types, and build your editorial calendar … it’s time to create your content.

Content creation will vary based on your resources, team size, industry, and brand, so to get the most pointed, applicable advice, check out our Guide to Content Creation.

As you work on your new content, check out these tools:

AnswerthePublic, which can help you flesh out topics and understand what your audience is searching for
Canva, which can help you build gorgeous infographics and images
Vidyard, which is a video hosting and publishing platform made for marketers
Anchor, which is a free podcasting tool for beginners

We’ll talk more about content distribution tools in the next section.

8. Distribute and market your content.

You’ve created your content … now it’s time to put it out in the world. Following your editorial calendar and chosen distribution channels, publish and market your new content. As for any marketing channel, follow rules to optimize your posts on each channel.

For example, our HubSpot team paid for Reddit ads and found that it was helpful to organically engage with Redditors and found that it was useful to organically engage with Redditors as well as pay for ad space. Alternatively, if you’re posting on (or paying for) social media, follow the guidelines for the best times to post and share content — the same goes for sending emails.

9. Measure and analyze your results.

As always, keep an eye on your content distribution results. Remember those KPIs, metrics, and SMART goals you established in step five? Time to pull those out.

After you’ve published your content, look at Google Analytics, your social media analytics dashboards, and your blog performance — depending on where and how you distributed the content. Make sure you set a routine time to measure and analyze (weekly, monthly, or quarterly) to establish a baseline and know which numbers you can beat the following week or month.

Whew! So, that’s what it takes to build a content distribution strategy. Be sure to iterate on this process; these guidelines may change as you expand your content efforts and scale your team.

Now, let’s discuss the tools you need to get it done.

Content distribution can be an arduous process, but thankfully there are many content distribution tools out there to help you get your work discovered and consumed.

These tools help you publish your content on additional networks and forums to reach broader audiences.

1. HubSpot

HubSpot is an all-in-one CRM for small to enterprise companies. It includes a Marketing Hub, meaning its useful for email marketing, analytics, content creation, social amplification, and more.

You can monitor, schedule, and post content to your social networks. You can also access information from your email marketing campaigns so you have the big picture of your readers and customers.

Price: Free and paid

2. Medium

Medium is a content platform that individuals and businesses alike use to publish content. You can use Medium in addition to or in lieu of your traditional blog. (We recommend this  in addition to your blog as this will give your content the broadest reach.)

Medium is where thousands of readers consume content. It’s a one-stop-shop platform for all kinds of content … kind of like Amazon is for products. For that reason, consider publishing to Medium to increase the number of people who see your content.

Price: Free and paid

3. PR Newswire

PR Newswire is a press release distribution network. The platform helps you target and contact journalists and outlets by specific industries, geographic areas, and topics. It offers packages for state and local, regional, and national press.

Price: Paid

5. HARO

HARO stands for Help a Reporter Out, an online platform connecting journalists and sources. In this case, you’d be the source.

When you sign up for HARO, you’re sent daily emails with journalist queries. Respond to these queries to be potentially featured in an article. This is a reactive content distribution tool that helps get press mentions and backlinks.

Price: Free and paid

6. ClickToTweet

ClickToTweet is a tool that equips your readers to share soundbites of your content on Twitter with a single click. You create your content soundbites, and ClickToTweet provides a link. When readers click that link, the tool opens their Twitter with the content soundbite already ready to post.

It also links to your Twitter account and content — allowing your readers to distribute your content for you.

Price: Free

7. GaggleAMP

GaggleAMP is a social amplification tool that allows you to aggregate your employee’s social networks and post company content directly to them.

Employees can review and improve content before its posted or allow it to go through automatically. This is a great alternative to constantly bugging your staff to post about your business.

You can also use this tool to link to social networks from partners, customers, brand advocates, and more.

Price: Free and paid

8. AddThis

AddThis is an on-page social sharing tool. It allows your readers to share your content without bouncing from your page (and potentially getting distracted). You can also integrate AddThis share buttons into your email newsletter and other assets.

Price: Free

These tools help you measure and analyze the impact of your social posts and other distribution efforts.

9. Mention

Mention is a social media monitoring tool that provides social media listening, publishing, crisis management, and more. You can use Mention to monitor any mentions of your brand name, content, or social networks and respond accordingly.

This is an excellent tool for measuring the impact of and engagement around your content and seeing who is promoting it for you.

Price: Free and paid

10. SharedCount

SharedCount is a tool that helps you measure the engagement of your social media posts. Simply input a URL, and SharedCount will report its likes, shares, comments, and other engagement measures.

While it can’t help you distribute your content, it can alert you to which pieces are performing well and which components may need to be updated or scrapped.

Price: Free and paid

11. Outbrain

Outbrain is a paid amplification tool aggregates your content at the bottom of other articles. You can set up content campaigns with an RSS feed or specific URL(s), and Outbrain will place them under related content, encouraging readers to click and read yours.

Outbrain works with an impressive network, including digital publications like NYT and Mashable.

Price: Pay-per-click

12. WiseStamp

WiseStamp is an email tool that allows you (and your employees) to share your latest content in your email signature. Your email signature is often a forgotten but essential piece of digital real estate that practically everyone who opens your emails will see. WiseStamp helps you make the most of that space.

Price: Paid

Distribute Your Content to Grow Better

Amazing content is a waste if no one is consuming it. Content distribution is a critical piece of the content marketing puzzle. It’s is also the key to boosting your brand awareness, collecting loyal followers, and encouraging your readers to click, act, and become customers.

Put these content distribution tips and tools to get your content in front of your audience.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in July 2019 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

If you’re leaving your job, you’re not alone.

The workforce has revolutionized into “The Great Resignation.” Some experts have renamed the recent spikes in employee resignations as “The Great Reimagination” or “The Great Realization.” People are reevaluating how they work, where they work, and why they work.

Even though millions quit their jobs every month, we understand that telling your boss that you’re leaving the company is never an easy conversation. A respectful resignation letter can mean the difference between an awkward goodbye and a chance for a long-term professional connection.

Ideally, you’ll provide a resignation letter two weeks before leaving the company. It lets you officially announce your termination at the company and offers essential housekeeping information, like your last day and other details about your departure.

An effective one helps you ensure a positive conversation with your boss and a smooth transition to your next journey.

But how do you write a good resignation letter? What should you include and exclude?

Writing a resignation letter can feel like a daunting task, so we’ve created a professional resignation letter template to get you started and included examples for inspiration.

Resignation Letter Format

The letter should be detailed but brief. You should want to inform your manager of your decision, but keep it professional if the reasons are less positive.

The format of a resignation letter typically goes as followed:

Date and salutation: your letter should start with the date along with a formal salutation to your manager. 
A statement of resignation: use the opening paragraph to state what role you’re leaving, and when. This is known as a statement of resignation.
Body paragraph: the body paragraph can be used to express gratitude for their your time at the company, as well as your exit plan.
Closing paragraph: although optional, you can use the closing paragraph to list your contact information. This is especially encouraged if you plan to use your former employer as a reference.

In the next section, will go into more detail about these key elements and look at a few examples.

What do I include in a professional resignation letter?

Writing a professional resignation letter starts with understanding each of its components:

1. Statement of Resignation and End Date

Begin your letter by stating your position at the company. This might seem redundant if you work at a small company and your boss knows you well, but it’s essential to include it since the letter is your official termination. Along with this information should be a simple statement of your resignation.

Also, providing an end date in the first paragraph is helpful since that’s one of your employer’s first questions.

Here’s what this first paragraph may look like in practice:

I would like to inform you that I am resigning from my position as [Position Name] for [Company Name], effective [Date].

2. Gratitude

Take the time to consider how you’ve grown or what you’ve appreciated most about your time at the company. Be as specific as possible. Perhaps the company provided professional development opportunities. Maybe you’ve enjoyed the environment the company fostered and the supportive atmosphere.

It’s also nice for your employer to receive a thank you for the time and resources they’ve used in supporting your career growth. Here’s an example of what this may look like:

I appreciate the opportunities for professional development that you have provided me over the past two years. I have enjoyed my tenure at [Company Name] and feel honored to have been part of such a supportive team.

If you’d like, you can include where you’re heading. For example, if you’re switching industries to pursue a passion or going to graduate school, it might be appropriate to include that. For example:

I accepted a position as a [New Job Title], and I’m looking forward to [pursuing my passion in [X] or continuing my work with a focus on [Y].

However, if you’re leaving the company for a competitor, it’s better to omit such information.

3. Transition Details

In the third paragraph, mention your willingness to make the transition easier. For example:

If I can be of any help during this transition, please let me know. I am available to help train my replacement and ensure that all my reports are updated before my last day of work.

This sentence might look different for you. But regardless of what you write, it’s good practice to include specific details regarding how you’ll help.

As an optional follow-up paragraph, briefly review the work you’ll be surrendering when you officially leave the company. Although it’s technically your manager’s responsibility to pick this work up and determine how it will continue, it’s helpful to list all the projects and tasks you’ve been in charge of to make the transition even easier on the company in the interim.

If you didn’t serve in a managerial capacity or collaborate with other departments, you could skip this part.

4. Personal Contact Information

This last paragraph is optional and doesn’t need to be included all the time, particularly if you have no desire or need to use your former employer as a reference. However, many candidates choose to maintain their professional networks. A closing may look like this:

Thank you again for the opportunity to work at [Company Name]. I wish you all the best and look forward to staying in touch. You can email me at [Email Address].

What Not to Include in a Resignation Letter

1. Future Career Moves

While you can mention where you’re going next, you don’t need to tell your employer about your new position or salary at length. Keep things professional. You can acknowledge how the current position helped your advancement within your industry. Your letter should be direct and reflective in tone to your employer.

2. Distasteful Language

It goes without saying, but a resignation letter isn’t the time to use profanity and obscene language. You need to remain respectful and professional until your end of tenure. Although you may feel the urge to criticize your former job, the resignation letter isn’t the time to air out the dirty laundry.

3. Emotional Attachments

If you’re leaving a supportive work environment, it’s helpful to leave out emotional sentiments in the letter. Be as professional as possible. You can illustrate those emotions through face-to-face meetings with others.

4. Criticism of Coworkers

Your resignation letter doesn’t need to include negative comments about colleagues or managers at the company. The letter is meant to conclude your tenure, not blame others for incomplete tasks.

5. Projecting Bitterness

This is not the time to project your resentment towards your current job. You need to reflect on positive moments and how you gained useful knowledge about the industry and yourself. You don’t have to leave on a sour note with your employer.

Professional Resignation Letter Samples

With the above template in mind, let’s look at a few sample resignation letters for different positions, each taking a slightly different but amicable tone to their resignations.

1. Gracious Resignation Letter Sample

You can share why you’re quitting if they aren’t work-related reasons. The reasons should be positive or neutral. Its tone is thankful that the employer took a chance on you. Most offer an extended hand to train the incoming person. The letter includes a notice of resignation at least two weeks in advance.

2. Brief Resignation Letter Sample

A brief resignation letter will include two important things: your date of resignation and a formal notice to your supervisor. A good letter can also include a “thank you” line, but it’s not necessary. Although you’re ending your tenure with your current employer, you don’t want to burn a bridge without honoring your notice deadline.

3. Immediate Resignation Letter Sample

While the best way to quit a job is to give at least two weeks’ notice and offer to help with the transition, sometimes circumstances make that impossible. If you need to leave your job immediately without notice, you need an immediate resignation letter.

Here is a sample that can help you:

Free Professional Resignation Letter Templates

Download the Templates Now

Sometimes the nature of your position merits a more specific letter of resignation when you leave. Below are a couple of templates that help these more dynamic roles make a graceful departure from the company.

1. Contractor Resignation Letter Template

If you work freelance, you might need to adjust the focus of your resignation letter to address your final assignments and exactly how you’ll be parting ways with your client. This includes your current duties, tasks you won’t complete, and how you’ll accept your final payment.

Image Source

2. Executive Resignation Letter Template

A quick email or two-paragraph notice to your superior might not suffice as an official resignation if you’re in an executive- or senior-level leadership role.

Because these roles are harder to fill, you might play a more significant role in the transition period, especially since you manage more people and decide on the direction of more projects.

The example below separates the resignation into two sections. The first is the resignation itself, and the second is how (and with whom) the resigner’s work will continue. It’s just one of the different templates we have to offer.

Image Source

Ready to Write Your Resignation Letter?

Be polite in your resignation letter no matter your role, state why you’re leaving, and be clear on who you’re informing. Gratitude and support during your departure go a long way with employers, and the last thing you want to do is leave the company on a sour note — even if you’re leaving for unpleasant reasons.

By drawing inspiration from these resignation letter samples and templates, you’ll protect your professional bridges and keep your professional network intact as you start your next adventure.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in October 2018 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

Content managers build a company’s content strategy, create targeted and relevant content, and distribute marketing communications to audiences online. They are organized, well-versed in fostering a brand voice, and often know their way around a blog post.

You might just be learning about the content management role and want to know the basics. Or, maybe you know this is the job for you, but want to make sure you’re prepared to be successful.

Below, you’ll find everything you need to know about content managers, from what they do to how to become one. Let’s take a look.

Skip to:

What Is a Content Manager?
What Does a Content Manager Do?
Content Manager Skills
Becoming a Content Manager

What are content managers, and what do they do?

Content managers develop and distribute timely, relevant content for audiences. To do that, they have a deep understanding of their company’s brand voice and use it to communicate with customers.

In addition to creativity, being a content manager usually involves the management of projects and a content team. They also might collaborate across other teams for projects.

This role is not entry-level — content managers are generally expected to lead their team and foster growth, so it’s a job that’s filled by someone with a couple of years of experience in marketing, communications, and project management.

That was just an overview of content managers and the job role. Next, we’re going to talk about some specific duties of a content manager.

The role of a content manager can depend on company structure and size. For instance, a startup’s content manager might be their only marketer, while an enterprise company might have content managers assigned to multiple teams.

You might find a content manager taking the ownership over an editorial calendar, developing content topic strategy, compiling data reports, managing social media accounts, or writing long-form editorial pieces.

Alicia Collins, Global Brand Marketing Manager at HubSpot, says, “Content managers wear many hats. Their job consists of so many moving parts — managing blogs, managing social, managing offers … in some cases, they can be a one-person marketing team.”

Even so, there are common responsibilities that define a content manager. Let’s take a close look.

Content Manager Responsibilities

The responsibilities of a content manager include:

Audit the existing content on the company’s website for brand voice, relevance, and optimization
Research competitors to find content gaps and keyword gaps that your company hasn’t yet covered
Create a new content strategy that can help your company reach its traffic goals
Promote a consistent brand identity through the company’s social media profiles
Create a long-term and short-term content publishing calendar and social media calendar
Write the new content or manage a team of freelancers and writers to create the new content
Monitor the performance of the content through online tools such as Google Analytics, Ahrefs, and Google Search Console

What sorts of skills do you need to carry out these responsibilities? We’ll dive into more detail up next.

So, you know what a content manager does. What about some of the skills you’ll need to exceed as one?

Content managers are brand advocates and know that the way stories are delivered reflect their company’s brand and audience preferences. We’ve lightly touched on a few of the skills you need to be a content manager, including creativity, writing, data interpretation, and organization.

But it’s also imperative to have working knowledge of a few other things.

1. SEO Copywriting and Blogging

Content managers need to have a general understanding of SEO. That way, you can effectively reach audiences through organic search. In addition, you’ll also have to know how to be a storyteller using the voice of a brand, and how to connect with customers using that brand voice.

Take it from Senior Podcast Producer Matt Brown, who says, “Empathizing with your audience and telling a story worth listening to is always the greatest skill a content manager should have.”

In order to deliver those stories, you’ll need to be familiar with copywriting and editing. Writing skills would be applied to writing marketing communications and blog posts. You’d also use them when editing the work of others.

If you’re worried about the grammar and comprehension front when it comes to writing, check out Hemingway Editor or Grammarly. Hemingway Editor is a free website that checks your writing for technical errors and readability, while Grammarly is software that analyzes your work, spell-checks it, and offers suggestions on how to improve sentence structure.

2. Data Analysis

As a content manager, you’ll spend some time analyzing datasets. Data from past campaigns, SEO research, and audience behavior are all helpful numbers to look at in order to execute job functions, because they inform leadership decisions and collaborative projects.

You’ll want to get familiar with tracking the following metrics:

Pageviews and traffic
Impressions and CTR
Average position on Google SERPs
Conversion rate

If you don’t analyze the results from your content performance, you won’t know if your messages are accurately connecting with your customers.

3. Basic Coding

By no means do you need to be a code whiz to become a content manager, but knowing some HTML and CSS can help you jump in when you don’t have a web developer on hand. As a content manager, you’ll be tinkering around with your website’s content management system. That may sometimes necessitate inserting a line or two of HTML and CSS code.

4. Content Management System Proficiency

On that note, you should know your way around popular content management systems such as CMS Hub and WordPress. You’ll be directly editing the content on your company’s website, so you’ll want to know how to use a CMS.

CMS Hub offers a 14-day trial that can help you get acquainted with a top-of-the-line content management system in an intuitive drag-and-drop environment. Once you learn CMS Hub, you can try your hand at a more complicated system such as WordPress.

5. Marketing Tools

You’ll also want to know your way around a few other tools. Generally, knowledge of one or two marketing tools for every facet of content production and management will cover your bases. This includes programs to enhance content as well, such as automatic grammar check software or graphic design tools.

Mastering Google Analytics and Search Console is a must for properly tracking your marketing analytics. On the creative side, tools like Canva, will help you quickly create a variety of visuals from social media posts to infographics.

It’s also a good idea to know about how social media is used as a business tool, and when that applies to marketing campaigns for your company. To help with social media management, knowing how to use a tool like HubSpot would be beneficial.

6. Strategic Planning

As a content manager, you’ll spend ample time strategizing how to deliver targeted messages to your audience. That means you won’t throw out messaging willy-nilly, but very carefully and strategically craft the messaging’s wording and timing.

Justin Champion, Principal Product Manager at HubSpot, says, “An effective content manager needs to have a vision of what story they’re trying to tell. This will help them create a cross-platform content strategy that will give the best experience possible to their audience.”

7. Time Management and Organization

As a content manager, you’ll be handling various content calendars and juggling a wide variety of responsibilities. That makes organization and time management skills a top quality of the best content managers out there.

Luckily, you don’t have to be innately organized or a strict time-keeper. You can use project management apps to keep everything going along smoothly. Remember, as a content manager, you’ll likely be the leader of a team and the go-to person for status reports. As such, you’ll want to be as organized as possible. That way, you’ll have access to the information you need when you need it.

8. Leadership

A good content manager has some leadership skills under their belt — but this doesn’t necessarily mean that you need to be an extrovert speaking at the front of the room. You can be a leader by keeping the content management projects progressing smoothly, sending reports before higher-ups ask for them, and launching new campaigns to keep your company top-of-mind for leads and customers.

In some cases, you may need to manage a team of content coordinators or writers. That’s where more traditional leadership skills come in, such as being a great people manager and adopting a leadership style that helps your team grow. Pay close attention to the wording in any job listing for a content manager. You could be the only person in your team or the leader of your team.

So, you know what it takes to be a content manager. But how do you get there? Time to find out.

How to Become a Content Manager

As with most of life’s experiences, your career path may not be a linear progression. While everyone’s path to content management varies, there are a few steps you can take to prepare yourself for the role and set yourself up for success.

1. Take a content marketing certification course.

No matter your background or years of experience, if you’re shifting from another career into content management, you’ll want to re-learn the ropes of content marketing to ensure you’re up-to-date.If you’re coming from a completely unrelated field, consider taking courses on digital marketing for an introduction to the basics.

Take a course to help you strengthen your content marketing skills. I recommend starting with our certification course. Upon completion, you’ll get a certificate that verifies your comprehension of content marketing (plus, you can add it to your LinkedIn profile).

2. Consider higher education.

While a degree will not always be necessary to land a content management role, it can certainly be a useful foundation. A degree in marketing, communications, journalism, or a related field is common among content managers. Why? They provide the basics of media best practices and ensure practitioners have a good grasp of storytelling and written communication.

3. Get familiar with SEO.

At countless firms, content marketing is synonymous with search engine optimization or SEO, so you’ll want to have a firm grasp of the concept as you seek a content manager role. If you don’t know the rules of SEO, you might write content that’s not appropriately targeted or that doesn’t serve a purpose other than filling up your company’s blog.

You’ll need to know how to carry out keyword research and use the appropriate software to find “green space” for your company’s website. Green space refers to keywords with low competition and high potential for serving your audience’s needs.

4. Create a personal website.

There’s no better way to start content management than by building a personal website with content that you uploaded and wrote yourself. This website could be for your own personal brand, for a company idea you’ve had for a while, or simply for fun. Whatever it is that you create, you want to get familiar with creating a website from start to finish, so that when it’s time to manage your future employer’s site, you can do it easily.

You’ll learn a few things through this process, including how to upload content and media, how to manage that content once it’s been uploaded, and how to effectively structure your site. It’ll also teach you how to get around a content management system.

Use your learnings from this process to give thoughtful answers to your interviewers when you’re applying for content management roles.

5. Consider freelancing to gain experience.

In addition to creating a website to boost your personal brand, freelancing is an excellent way to gain experience and build your portfolio. Potential employers want to see proof that you can deliver on their campaigns. So taking on projects as a freelancer and displaying successful ones on your personal website will help you gain practice and credibility.

Sites like Media Bistro and Fiverr can help you find contract or freelance work to help fill your resume. The more work you can pick up, the better as each project will help you hone your marketing skills and gain confidence.

6. Apply for an entry-level marketing role.

It’s time to search for a role. Unfortunately, content management is a mid-level role, meaning that most content managers have been in the marketing industry for a few years. If you’re just now getting started with marketing, you’ll want to start with an entry-level role first, then move up into content management.

Your best bet is to apply for a marketing coordinator role. Marketing coordinators typically oversee the day-to-day responsibilities of running marketing campaigns. This entry-level role will help you learn how to run a successful campaign, in addition to getting familiar with all of the stakeholders that need to be involved.

Another entry-level option would be a social media coordinator role. Social media coordinators are responsible for curating content for a brand’s social media platforms. This role will still be within the marketing department and give you the opportunity and liaise with other marketing experts on the team.

Not all marketing roles are created equal. Look for the following words in the job posting to ensure you’re starting on the right foot:

SEO
Blogging
Writing

If the job posting seems too general or if it seems to concern more traditional marketing methods, such as live event marketing or advertising, you’ll want to avoid it. Content managers work almost exclusively on the digital side of marketing.

7. Take on content management tasks within your role.

In your entry-level role, you’ll want to take on the duties of a content manager without yet being a content manager by name. For instance, if your team is missing a content calendar, could you volunteer to create one (without stepping on anyone’s toes)? What about volunteering to upload the week’s new content onto the CMS?

It’s important to continue expanding your technical and practical content management skill set as you gear up to apply to an actual content manager role.

8. Apply for a content manager role.

Once you have enough experience under your belt, it’s time to move into content management — either by becoming the manager of a content team or taking on more strategic roles within a marketing team.

Remember to use every piece of experience you’ve gathered thus far to show how well you can communicate with an audience and how well you’ve distributed content in the past. Lead with the results of your actions and measure them in numbers. Content reach, organic traffic, and other engagement metrics are just a few data points you can use to show how effective you can be as a content manager.

Start Sharpening Your Content Management Skills Today

If you’re looking to become a content manager, it’s critical to deepen your knowledge of content marketing and SEO. Refining your skill set ensures that you’re staying up-to-date as the industry changes. This is a must for content managers. If you don’t know how the industry is changing, you won’t be able to effectively connect to your audience — and connecting to your audience is what will make you an excellent content manager.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in April 2020 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

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