In today’s communications landscape, the demand for new content is high: websites expand, social channels require constant feeding, campaigns launch, and newsletters land in inboxes.
What needs time and thought within all this productivity, however, is how to create a clear thread that connects all those activities. A content strategy provides that direction: it helps your teams understand who you want to reach, what you want those people to think, know and do, and the content that can support those goals.
With a content strategy in place, messaging becomes more consistent, more relevant, and more compelling in your call to action.
Specify your audiences
A content strategy only works when you focus on delivering specific organisational goals – like growing membership or income, increasing engagement, strengthening retention or relationships, supporting campaigns or building influence with key stakeholders.
Since all these goals rely on asking people to ‘do’ something, the foundation of any content strategy is a strong understanding of who you're trying to reach, why you’re trying to reach them and what would make them pay any attention to you.
At Agenda, the organisations we work with each have a broad range of audiences. The principles around content, however, remain the same: finding relevance to each audience’s priorities; being responsive to their needs; focusing on providing suitable information to build trust and encourage action.
For membership organisations and trade unions, audiences range across prospective members, existing members, engaged members, stakeholders and decision-makers. Each group has different priorities and all expect content that feels relevant to them.
If you work in a charity, you're likely communicating with diverse groups of supporters, volunteers, beneficiaries, funders and partners. Responding to what each audience needs from you – before you tell them what you need from them – begins engagement.
In the tech-for-good sector, you're looking to reach a mix of investors, policymakers and clients or consumers. Content needs to overcome technical jargon to inform, build trust, and then encourage action.
Understand your audiences’ needs
Now you know who you’re trying to reach, it’s time to understand their priorities and why they might want to hear from you.
You can start by analysing your data for clues about what matters to them. What questions are your audiences asking on social platforms or community fora? What information are they looking for via your on-site search, downloads or calls to your helpline? What issues or offers motivate them to donate or sign up?
You can also supplement your data with qualitative research. Dig deeper on what they want from you and what they're prepared to do for you by reviewing frontline conversations, focus groups and surveys, for example.
For every piece of content you create, you should be able to explain:
Who it is for
Why it matters to them
Which of your organisational objectives it supports
What action it encourages
The answers help you make better decisions about where to focus time and resources – and help shape your content plan, from key messages and tone of voice to channel selection and formats.
Use the Think, Know, Do framework
When it comes to creating content that connects with your audiences, one of the most useful planning tools is a simple three-stage model:
Think: What is the audience thinking about before they hear from you?
Know: What understanding or insight should they take away about how you can solve their problems?
Do: What’s the next action they should take?
Answering these questions gives every piece of content a clear purpose – no matter whether it's a website page, video, campaign, newsletter or social media activity.
Build a consistent narrative
Despite having to reach different audiences, successful organisations tell a coherent story across all their communications.
This story should reflect your organisation's purpose, values and impact, helping all your audiences understand who your organisation serves, what issues matter, and how change happens.
During our work with Nautilus International, one of the key challenges we faced was creating a consistent story across three international branches that served a global membership. Our response was to develop a "One Union" narrative that brought together diverse audiences, priorities and communications under a shared framework. This gave their comms teams a clear foundation for creating content that felt connected, regardless of channel, topic or audience.
A consistent story creates a sense of continuity – a golden thread – across channels and campaigns. Individual pieces of content can explore different topics while still contributing to a bigger picture.
Consistency helps audiences recognise your organisation’s voice, and understand your priorities, regardless of where they see or hear your content.
When we worked with Sapphiros, a fast-growing diagnostics innovator, we developed a unified narrative that brought together multiple technologies, teams and audiences under a single brand story. The result was greater consistency across communications channels and clearer articulation of the organisation's purpose, capabilities and ambitions. Read the full case study.
Make content easy to navigate
Content that’s well-organised offers a better user experience, which brings stronger engagement.
No matter what format, practical principles include:
Use plain English
Write concise paragraphs
Break up copy with headings and subheadings
Explain specialist terminology
Prioritise the most important information
Use imagery, video and case studies where they add value
Create clear journeys
Every piece of content should help your audience understand what comes next – whether that’s joining, renewing, attending an event, accessing support, signing up for updates, or participating in a campaign.
Calls to action are most effective when they flow through the ‘think, know, do’ framework – where the content presents the issue/opportunity on the audiences' terms, shares common ground to build trust, and then makes the ask.
Review and refine
Content strategies benefit from regular evaluation. Just as your organisation’s priorities change, so might your target audience, ways to get involved and therefore your ask. Your content strategy needs to adapt at the same time.
It’s important to set out a content review process , where teams have a list of webpages and other channels they must regularly review for updates, accuracy and timeliness. This prevents old information remaining in circulation, keeps content fresh, relevant and engaging, and allows the most useful and responsive content to take centre stage.
Content strategy as organisational strategy
A content strategy is more than a publishing plan: it is a framework for how your organisation communicates with the people you serve, engage and influence.
By combining clear objectives, audience insight, relevant messaging and well-designed journeys, your organisation can create content that supports your goals and strengthens audience relationships.
The result is a more focused, coherent approach to communications, with every piece of content contributing to a clear and shared purpose. Through this approach, your organisation gets better insight, increases influence, and ultimately makes a stronger impact.
