It wasn’t very long ago when the core marketing team used to be the king of every business — decision-maker, royal, and filthy rich, but not much progressive. 

Fast-forwarding to a few years back, it began to transform, hitting the jackpot for businesses. The value-based new process was slow but totally worth it. They called it Content Marketing.

The content marketing team today is the lifeline of businesses. Nothing says growth acceleration louder than a perfectly built Content Marketing team (having the right blend of skills, creativity, executability, and self-assessment followed by performance optimization) in a company. No wonder, businesses are seen almost knocking themselves out in search of the right fit. 

But why must the process be this exhaustive with no guarantee of results at all? Could you be doing it wrong all along?

We wish we had *No* for the answer, but you have exerted special efforts to hear a *Yes* for this. 

Your perfect content marketing team is just a bunch of considerations away.

Yes, easy peasy, not even lemon squeezy!

Let’s dive into the most important considerations making the process a cinch to you, the way it actually is.

Know the trends

Knowing industry trends for Content Marketing teams helps you paint the big picture & compare all the possibilities, choosing yourself the most appropriate one.

People are switching (from Pro-Bono work, free samples, and exploiting other teams) to building their dedicated teams for Content Marketing. This important piece of information can help make up your mind to venture out on another crucial front fully prepared.

Know that the process and strategy widely varies with different businesses

Each business has a different set of requirements, financial situation, targets, goals, even work ethics, hence, a different strategy.

Your business needs are unique, as are those of your competitors. So, you can’t simply jump on the bandwagon. Neither can your Content Marketer rely on the strategy your employee followed on his last job.

Know your output

Keeping an eye on the output of other businesses is a helpful skill for gaining a competitive advantage but not as much as is keeping an eye on what is your own desired output. 

Here’s how this helps.

Being mindful about your potential results would help you develop a strategy, hire staff accordingly, and alter the strategy to optimize results.

House of Quality [Quality Matrix] & Quality Function Deployment [QFD]: A simple guide

Know your limiting factors to take a turn around them

Outside the dream world, there is the real world that our business actually has to run in. Not that the goals in the real world can’t be achieved, but there are many limiting factors there gradually limiting our performance.

However, carefully planning well ahead of time and taking into account the changing market conditions, you can avoid a limiting factor getting in your way to success.

Compare and contrast In-House team Vs. Content Marketing Agency option

Well, we have a detailed guide to understand the subject, here. Reading the post can help you figure out which door to knock at based on the pros and cons of each option.

As a piece of general advice, however, it is feasible to begin with outsourcing the content creation for small to medium-sized companies (to keep a mix of creativity, affordability, and variety). 

For large-sized organizations, you have many avenues open right before you. Keeping a small core content marketing team along with a bunch of freelancers is a soft option, ensuring the benefits of both an in-house team and freelancing.

Assess outsourcing options: Freelance Vs. Agency

Quora creative has a detailed article on the subject by Ali Butt, showing you a clear route to follow based on the category your business falls in. 

Here’s the abstract.

An agency typically has an edge on freelancers for the most obvious reasons.

The workload management of an agency is strategic, thus reliable, even if you are scaling up with increasing content requirements. An agency can handle a variety of tasks with a vast number of dedicated employees. Agencies usually are extremely heedful of meeting deadlines, out-turning the quality you are bound to appreciate. Their strategy and analysis as well as the flexibility, are incomparable because one bad review could take them down. 

A freelancer has a limited capacity and no brand name to be defamed in case of low quality. However, it is totally a bargain-basement for small chores with good quality in most of the cases.

Take time hiring.

Hiring occurs once in a blue moon, yet a significant decision that your brand’s future counts on. There are many important considerations due before and during the process.

Let’s look into some of them:

    Start small to manage finances

This is quite self-explanatory. Right?

Why can’t a Jack of all trades be your pick if you have a small business that has an itsy-bitsy budget and targets a small audience?

The marketer doesn’t have to be a past master at all the required skills but command over the crucial ones are surely mandatory.

Go big, based on the needs

If you think your business needs a whole content marketing team, brainstorm and analyze the most critical roles, you need.

Don’t just hire someone for SEO simply because that’s the role a Content Marketing team should have. Hire one if your writer (or anyone else on the team) can’t handle the SEO services you need. 

Good news!

Our guide here can help you figure out the most important roles your content marketing team needs.

    All-rounders hit the mark fast

It is nice to have a writer with in-depth SEO knowledge. If you have a single go-to person for all video-related tasks (strategy, shooting, editing, and delivering the final product), you have found an eternal bliss.

A step further, content marketing agencies either hire all-rounders or build the expertise of employees across a broad range.

What that means, in theory, is that your content marketer could also be your video editor at some point of time.

Now, this is insane, you say.

But the results are mind-blowing, you’ll see.

    Make use of referrals

While the hiring process is a difficult task, a referral could be a better alternative. In most cases, you can expect being referred option to be good enough.

    Negatively count the available samples

As easy as it sounds, analyzing one’s skills with given samples could be very misleading (and well, difficult).

So do we close our eyes, wishing & awaiting God’s direct consent?

No, taking a live skill-test is a better option.

    Check their take on leveraging Metrics and measuring results

Significant traffic with an equally high bounce rate could suggest that you just got lucky with your keyword choice. But if your content manager only boasts the traffic rate ignoring the bounce rate, you need to find yourself a better alternative.

So, ask them all the relevant questions to know what different metrics mean to them. After all, you do want to avoid the need for hiring again after a while. right?

Prefer the options with the most useful skills

If a single person can handle many areas initially, that would be a massive tension off your mind and burden off your pocket.

If you have a number of such options, choose the one with the most preferred skills.

Expand the team strategically

You need to expand your team. Hell, you HAVE to, especially if your business calls for it with increasing demands.

But you don’t hire randomly, like anyone coming your way next.

Look for the capacity your team still holds. Look for the areas that need more assistance or the areas that are more rewarding to focus on. 

Here, you just found the area that needs further staffing.

Know the associated costs

Unless you know the price associated with each step, you’ll be broke before you know it.

To avoid rolling your stuff back in the middle of nowhere because you don’t see the destination yet and you’re running out of supplies, TAKE COSTS VERY SERIOUSLY.

Wrap up

The content marketing team is not an ordinary one.

It is the team that offers the potential to bring you qualified leads and has the potential to multiply your take-home income. 

But there’s a catch!

Get the wrong team on board, and you have wasted all your efforts.

So, you must prepare yourself for hiring well ahead of time. Know your goals and expectations of the team. Know the roles you’d want to hire as per your business needs and budget. Understand if your business requires an in-house team or an agency or freelancers. Communicate your expectations with the team very clearly, right at the beginning, for he who doesn’t communicate gets his fingers burnt.

What Content Marketing Roles do Experts Hold on their Teams?

You’re up next

Bottom line, keep the essential considerations in mind for making a decision about your Content Marketing team and earn your fair share of rewards.

But before that, share with us other essential considerations you focus on for developing your Content Marketing team.

May you gather the most powerful Content Marketing team ever 🙂

Powerful Content Production Strategy influencers follow [Content Sprout Method]