Model Thinking
Whether you’re an executive who wants a content management system that enables business growth or a content professional looking to improve your content strategy and content modeling skills and grow your career, Model Thinking will help you learn, connect some dots, think differently, and get actionable tips.
Content engineer: genius, myth, or marketing magic?
Issue 22 Fair warning: This is the longest newsletter issue I’ve published. Buckle up! TL;DR Content engineering started as structure, semantics, and systems to make content scalable and reusable. Marketers now sometimes use it to mean AI-powered content production. Both definitions are valid, but mixing them can cause confusion, mis-hires, and undervalued foundations. Traditional content engineering is still essential for scaling, personalization, and managing enterprise-level content. The...
Where content strategy, content design, and content engineering overlap
Issue 21 Imagine one day you stroll into your content strategy job at Acme SaaS Corp, ready to run some audits, lead a workshop, and pop into some weekly meetings, but first you join the company all-hands meeting and you hear about the company’s new “premium” offering that will bring additional functionality to higher-paying customers of your SaaS software product. With your most strategic hat on (is that a helmet? A fedora? Interesting side trail …), you immediately start thinking that...
Where content ops and content engineering overlap
Issue 20 No doubt you’ve had an experience working in something like Microsoft Word or Google Docs, and you’ve had no formal connection to the company style guide. Maybe you knew the content you created would be useful to an audience but you didn’t know how to—or who could—publish the content where the intended audience could use it. These scenarios are essentially content operations issues. More specifically, they are governance concerns. Often there is someone in the organization who cares...
6 content modeling mistakes I made (so you don’t have to) – Part 2
Issue 19 Structure Quick thoughts about how content lives in systems When content lives in a content management system (CMS) where there’s an underlying model that gives the content its structure. That structure—a content model—forms the core of creating meaningful content that can be applied in websites, apps, chatbots, and more. It allows the content to be created and managed at scale. Last issue, I introduced six mistakes I’ve made in modeling content. There’s not a lot of strong guidance...
6 content modeling mistakes I made (so you don’t have to) – Part 1
Issue 18 Structure Quick thoughts about how content lives in systems Whether or not we realize it, content has a shape and structure so that it can be applied as information and knowledge. Sometimes that structure is informal, set through headings and how the author organized their writing in a word processor like Microsoft Word or Google Docs. Other times, the content lives in a content management system (CMS) where there’s an underlying model that gives the content its structure. That...
Are we selling ourselves short as content strategists?
Issue 17 Recently, I’ve been part of several conversations that revolve around a concept that might sound nerdy to some, but to those of us who care deeply about the meaning of words, it's a fascinating discussion. It may seem like a trivial debate at first, but I think it’s one that holds more weight now as we navigate the age of artificial intelligence (AI) and how we position our work among colleagues. Let’s start with something simple: We talk about content management as a field. We use...
AI just raised the cost of outdated content
Issue 16 Strategy Quick thoughts about the importance of thinking strategically about content Inertia is hard to overcome. The world of content is a good place to observe this. The inertia of content is to keep creating, keep churning out more. Occasionally, a content strategist will come along and attempt to get rid of content that is outdated, incorrect, or somehow obsolete. Rarely does this get buy-in from the business; instead, it’s a side project done on Friday afternoons, and I suspect...
I built a tool to help you choose your CMS (and avoid blind spots)
Issue 15 Personal notes A couple quick updates This newsletter issue would normally have been sent last Friday, but I postponed it due to the American Independence Day holiday. No doubt you’ve seen the news coverage of the horrific flash flooding that occurred in Texas. It’s been an emotional weekend. My oldest son just finished working at a camp in another part of the state, and I can’t imagine if he had to go through something like this. The worst flooding, in Kerrville, was a...
Governance is about roles, not just rules
Issue 14 Help with research? I’d love your feedback on two topics: What should I teach about content? Tell me about your learning budget (if you have one)—or if you don’t! The surveys close on Monday, June 30, so act now! Thanks if you’ve already answered. Please share with colleagues if you don’t mind. Strategy Quick thoughts about the importance of thinking strategically about content If you’re in an enterprise, a non-profit organization, or a government agency, is there any one person who...
The four primary roles in content
Issue 13 I realized that some of you may not be familiar with the framework I often use to explain content roles. It has resonated with many, so it’s worth sharing again. I first wrote an article in June 2021 in response to a debate about content job titles. The article got a lot of engagement, led to several podcast appearances, was cited in a founder keynote at a CMS vendor conference, was syndicated in Japanese, and is cited in a book (and another book coming soon). Read more about the...
Whether you’re an executive who wants a content management system that enables business growth or a content professional looking to improve your content strategy and content modeling skills and grow your career, Model Thinking will help you learn, connect some dots, think differently, and get actionable tips.