GUIDE 2024

What Does a Content Strategist Do?

The core duty of a content strategist is to draft a strategy for content based on the company’s product, services, and business goals. A content strategist targets the end-user needs in preparing the strategies for content creation.

The typical responsibilities of a content marketing strategist involve managing content marketing data to generate leads.

In addition to that, content strategists are also responsible to analyze user engagement metrics by deploying various content strategies on different social media platforms.

This article provides a detailed guide on the content strategist’s job description and their typical duties in the content marketing industry.

What Does a Content Strategist Do?

What does a content strategist do

A content strategist is responsible to create engaging content by developing and testing various search engine marketing strategies.

Also, as good content presentation skills and content monetization skills increase brand awareness, thus a content strategist ensures productive output through content creation.

Here we have provided a list of the day-to-day duties of a content marketing strategist. Read for more details:

1. Analyzes User Engagement Metrics

The content strategist job description includes the responsibility to analyze user engagement metrics.

User engagement metrics are a measurement of how much time a customer or visitor spends on a page of your website. These measurements provide a clear idea of the user’s interest. Hence, a content marketing strategist analyzes user engagement metrics to calculate the performance of a product and a web page. And if the data shows negative results, then content strategists are responsible to come up with a content strategy to enhance these metrics.

Furthermore, it is clear that for a landing page’s success, the user interest matters the most. Thus, an experienced strategist can easily point out those pinpoints that catch a user’s attention, and at the same time, they can catch the flaws that retract a user.

Daily Active Users (DAU) and Monthly Active Users (MAU) are two terms that enable content strategists to understand the user metrics over some time. A content marketing strategist then uses the gathered data to come up with an even better strategy.

2. Manages Social Media Campaigns

A content strategist also manages social media campaigns. By definition, a social media campaign is a marketing strategy that content marketers use to promote a business through various social media platforms.

As the task involves planning a content strategy to successfully target the business goals, thus this duty is also present in the content strategist job description.

They are responsible to come up with a unique content strategy to promote the business’s product and services in a way that generates leads. As the main target is to increase sales, a planning careful content strategy is a mandatory job requirement of a content strategist. In addition to that, they must know the metrics obtained from user research to attract a customer. Later, they use these metrics in their social media campaigns.

An experienced and successful content strategist must be aware of how to turn potential customers into a fan base. The task is not as easy as it seems.

In addition to that, content strategists are responsible for managing content marketing campaigns and analyzing content marketing data.

A content strategist works to identify specific goals and then works on content creation with a content strategy that aligns both with the business objectives and customer’s goals. Later, they are responsible for spreading the content through various social media platforms. After a specific period, they analyze the results and then fine-tune the content marketing strategy if required.

3. Researches and Drafts Specifications for the Brand’s Target Audience

A business generates more leads if they successfully identify audience metrics. It is the general duty of content marketing strategists to put their efforts into researching user specifications.

User specification entails the details of what a user requires from a specific business. A content strategist’s job description includes the duty to carefully research user behaviors. On top of that, a content strategist is then responsible for drafting the specifications of the brand’s target audience.

When they gather the content marketing data, they write user specifications without any ambiguity. A good approach most of the content strategists use to go with researching one user requirement at a time. This way, specifications become detailed and more useful.  In addition to that, this step-by-step process allows the stakeholders and SMEs to see the testing and development of each step.

Then, based on the gathered user metrics, content strategists implement a plan to prioritize those requirements that benefits them the most.

4. Prepares Content Marketing Strategies

The most important duty in a content strategist’s job description is to prepare content marketing strategies.

Content marketing strategy is a content strategy that attracts, engages, and sticks the target audience with the business products and services. This approach entails the need to draft articles, review posts, podcasts, and other content types. Furthermore, a content strategist is responsible to come up with a content strategy that promotes the awareness of a business and keeps the customer’s trust in you. So that, whenever the need to purchase a product arises, the customer keeps your business in mind.

As clear from the name, these are marketing techniques that a content marketing strategist has to adapt in content creation. The main goal is to generate more revenue through these marketing strategies.

Furthermore, a content strategist is not just limited to preparing the written part of a content strategy, but also the graphics and infographics. For such tasks, they collaborate with the UX designers to achieve the goals.

5. Works on Content Promotion

Content promotion is another major duty listed in the content strategist job description. Content promotion is a process of promoting content like articles, and blog posts through various resources. The target is to bring inbound traffic to the content that can generate more business leads.

Again, this duty falls under the marketing campaign tasks. The promotion resources are various, and in fact, generate more leads.

One of the most useful resources is influencer marketing. Content marketing strategists are responsible to connect with influencers to market the content. In addition to that, they also promote the content through typical advertising.

Furthermore, a content strategist is also responsible for cold emailing and marketing. After all, the main goal is to drive as much traffic as possible to generate maximum leads.

Thus, the content strategists are primarily responsible to promote the content in the business’s favor.

6. Sets Up Style Guides for Writing Tone

Style guides and writing tones are crucial from the user’s perspective. A content strategist job description entails the task of writing style guides for a business concerning analytics obtained from user research.

A style guide is defined as a file or template with some specific layout settings and fonts. In the world of content creation, a standardized look at the content is necessary. Thus, this task is also among the duties of a content strategist to come up with such a style guide that is both professional and looks appealing to the user.

In addition to that, the writing tone plays a huge role in the success of content. If it is a written piece, then identifying the writing tone based on user attributes is another major task. When content strategist drafts con strategies, they are also responsible to identify the writing tone. This way, a content strategy is empowered and is expected to generate the expected results.

7. Deploys the Editorial Strategy

Editorial style and writing style are two different terms. Deploying the right editorial content strategy is also among the content strategist job description.

Editorial content strategy is a set of instructions that experienced editors follow to make the content more consistent, engaging, and readable.

For your clarification, know that a writer mainly works following the writing style, while an editor works by following an editorial content strategy.

A content strategist is responsible to draft both these strategies keeping in view the customer’s needs and business goals.

This task ensures that the content is reviewed properly, and generates the expected results based on thorough user research.

8. Ensures Consistency in Content Deliverables

After writing the content strategy and content plans, a content strategist works to ensure consistency in the content deliverables.

Generally, content strategists automatically achieve consistency if the writers and editors properly follow the writing and editorial guides.

However, they always review the work before the final submission of deliverables. Content strategists are responsible to cross-check the contents for their consistency. This consistency ensures authority and build’s user trust in a business.

In addition to that, consistent content strategies build business credibility in the eyes of users. Furthermore, content marketing strategists build a brand’s voice and awareness through consistent deliverables. On top of that, consistency leads to better sales as the traffic and web flow increase.

Thus, it is the main duty of a content strategist to ensure consistency in content creation.

9. Analyzes Data and Metrics to Spot Trends

Another main duty of a content strategist is to analyze the user data to catch any trends. Trends provide a great benefit in concluding the results.

A trend is defined as a pattern observed in the user data sets over a specific period. A content strategist should be experienced enough to spot such trends, as they either directly point towards negative or positive aspects.

This practice allows a content strategist to carry out thorough research on user engagement metrics. Once they can spot a trend, they either use it to simplify future research, or either eradicate certain time-consuming research steps.

Thus, when content strategist is working to draft a content strategy, they keep such trends in mind to achieve the maximum positive results.

10. Performs Content Audits and Content Gap Analysis

Content audits and content gap analysis are two different technical duties mentioned in the content strategist job description.

A content audit is a detailed process of deeply analyzing the complete content to check for its performance. A content strategist performs audits on the business’s content, whether it is on a website or some other digital app.

These audits enable them to optimize the benefits for business. In addition to that, content strategists perform audits on the complete content to check how well a business is performing, and how accurately the target goals are achieved.

On the other hand, content marketing strategists are also responsible to carry out a content gap analysis.

In simpler terms, know that content gap analysis is a process of identifying the holes in content. From holes, we mean where content lacks, and what parts are missing. Thus, they are responsible for performing content gap analyses to check whether there are any missing pieces of information that a business needs to address to customers or not.

In technical terms, content audits enable a content strategist to compare the desired and achieved goals. Later, they use this data to come up with new content ideas and strategies in favor of business.

Content strategists also handle ongoing and upcoming projects through their project management experience. For this purpose, they also use content management systems to execute content strategies.

Above, we have provided the basic job duties of a content strategist. The job duties are not just limited to the above-mentioned few tasks, but the role mainly revolves around the above-mentioned tasks.

FAQs

Here are answers to some of the frequently asked questions:

What is a Content Strategist Salary?

According to Glassdoor, the average content strategist salary is $89k+ per year in the United States. However, not all content strategists have the same salary. The salary ranges from $36k to $248k per year. Keep in mind that this range is valid for the 25th to 75th percentile for the available data.

However, according to Payscale, a content strategist has a base salary of $63k+ per year. The lowest recorded salary on Payscale is $44k, while the highest recorded salary for a content strategist is $101k according to Payscale. These results are based on 1,222 salary profiles in the United States.

So, from the above two resources, we can easily develop an idea of how much content strategists are paid according to their experience.

We can conclude that an average content strategist earns a base salary that falls somewhere between $63k-$89k per year. However, there are exceptions for highly experienced and beginner-level roles.

Summary

A content strategist is responsible to plan and develop strategies for content creation. The ultimate goal of these strategies is to generate leads and user visits.

In addition to that, a content strategist is responsible for analyzing content marketing data and user engagement metrics to calculate their interest in your business’s products. Furthermore, they are also expected to manage multiple social media campaigns to drive inbound traffic.

On top of that, user research is also a basic duty of a content strategist. Later, they use the research data to develop user specifications.

A content strategist also works on the promotion of content through social media marketing, influencer marketing, search engine marketing, and other resources. In addition to that, they also compose technical writing and editorial style guides for writers and editors. These style guides then enable them to ensure consistency of the content.

Furthermore, content strategists are responsible for performing content gap analyses and content audits on the content knowledge base. This way they judge how well the business is performing, and where are the gaps should be addressed.

In addition to that, they also draft content strategies for their business. And for this purpose, they use content management systems and execute content strategies.

Read the above-mentioned points to completely understand the detailed content strategist job description.

If you think that you are skillful with these tasks, and have the necessary qualifications, then we encourage you to apply for a content strategist’s job. Content strategist career is a good career choice and is rewarding both in terms of salary and experience.