Content strategy is a plan for creating and publishing useful, usable content on your legal website. In order to fully realize that goal, you must not only define—at least in your own mind—which content will be published, but you must be able to articulate why each piece will be published at all. If you don’t have a good understanding of your expectations from each published article, then there can be little reason to publish.

Content strategy should define your firm’s primary theme and intended message, cover the various topics you feel most important to your firm, explain how your articles will make the leap from what your business requires to what your potential clients need and finally will analyze any potential gaps in your content. Of course all content strategy plans should include a comprehensive discussion of SEO, taking into consideration the latest, most up-to-date search engine requirements including Google’s algorithms.

What Should I Be Looking For When Mapping Out Content Strategy?

Your first concern falls under the wide umbrella of editorial needs. These are the guidelines under which all content is governed, so to speak. They are the values, the voice, the tone and the legal concerns as well as the calendar which dictates the cycles you will publish under. Next is the web writing itself, which must be both high quality and imminently usable not to mention specifically intended for online publication. As most web writers know, there is an entirely different writing technique used for online publications as compared to print.

Online articles are shorter, more concise, and depend heavily on attention-grabbing headlines. Online articles generally hit the reader with a fast burst of information in the hopes of holding their attention to the end of the article. If you haven’t hooked your web reader within five seconds or less, research shows you have likely lost them for good. A great web writer will understand the user experience design, will be able to write effective metadata as well as manage an ever-changing content landscape.

Search engine optimization is a large part of content strategy as it seeks to increase the potential relevance of articles to specific search engine keywords. There will be a process of editing and organizing all content on each page as well as across the firm’s website. As technology constantly shifts and changes, content management strategy will attempt to capture, store, deliver and preserve the organizations content.

Content—Complicated and Messy

After the initial wave of writing content for a legal website, the time constraints usually set in, and the enthusiasm tends to wane. It’s at this point that website owners want to bury their head in the sand and pray that the content part of their website becomes someone else’s problem. It begins to feel complicated and messy and becomes the incredibly junky closet you throw everything into and try to avoid looking at.

At this point it’s time to engage in honest content dialogue with all those involved in the content of the firm’s website. Content dialogue must first expand the audience, attempting to engage a broader audience of consumers, and will also realize that everyone involved has a stake in the future of web content. Content and the practice of content strategy absolutely deserve our time and attention yet until we begin to treat it as the critical asset it is, worthy of planning and meaningful investment, it is likely we will keep turning out the same old stuff. It’s really not someone else’s problem. Learn about content strategy, practice it and promote it—your website will thank you for it.

Any time you display information on a webpage, the actual content and presentation are tied together; the information is tied to the visual design and the reader must be able to access the information then interpret it. The ultimate goal of the web is to make the content accessible to every user. Web content is neither tied to a specific operating system, software or even a computer—web content can be accessed on a wide variety of devices even some kitchen appliances can read web documents. The content can be displayed in a dizzying array of sizes, colors and fonts, limited only by the reader’s imagination. The goal of achieving device independence as well as access for all therefore must lie in the separation of presentation and content.

For those who are unclear about what exactly constitutes content and presentation, content refers to the information in your web pages as well as how that information is structured. Structure may appear to be somewhere floating between content and presentation however presentation would be meaningless without structure therefore the structural elements belong more clearly to the content side. Presentation encompasses all the ways the content—and the structure of the content—is presented. Anything which controls how the content appears rather than what it actually says is presentation.  The separation of content and presentation may seem like a foreign concept since most of us are accustomed to making the visual choices related to content such as headings, paragraphs, lists, etc.

The Benefits of Separation

By separating the content from the presentation on your website you will ensure your web pages are more widely accessible to your potential clients. In practical terms, however, it can be extremely difficult to maintain the distinction between presentation and content since often we are unable to see the difference between what is being communicated and how it is being communicated. When you realize that even the most poorly formatted document nonetheless has a presentation in the form of layout, fonts, etc., you understand the difficulty in the clear separation.

How to Achieve Separation

The first step in the overall idea of separation is to build structure into web documents through the use of HTML which encodes headings, paragraphs and lists. The document which results from this step is richer in meaning and can be accessed by any web-enabled device in the necessary format. Think of your overall intentions when attempting to separate content from presentation—what is your content goal for your web users, and what do you think potential clients intend to do with that content? Do you think it is what they are searching for, what they need to answer their most pressing questions and problems?

To begin separation, start with plain text—that is, text which is placed in a notepad on Windows. Then use HTML tags which clearly mesh with the meaning of the content. Remember, HTML tags should describe the text placed inside rather than be placed simply to achieve a desired “look.” Double-check to ensure you are not accidentally placing presentation markup when new content is created and learn all the styles available to you. Take a look at your finished product—it should be simple, crisp and clear and you should know exactly what each HTML tag is being used for.

In the end, the separation of presentation and content can stop a simple design tweak from becoming a full-fledged re-design. Isolating content ensures adding and updating will be as simple as possible while design consistency is maintained throughout your sight. While the separation of content and presentation can make you want to throw up your hands in despair—don’t. There is plenty of high-quality help available to make the process as simple as possible.

Headlines have always been an important component in writing—particularly journalistic writing—but with the rise of social media they are probably even more important than ever before. When content is shared through Facebook or re-tweeted on Twitter, the headline will either grab the reader’s attention or it will not. Our increasingly busy lives dictate that we no longer read when perusing a web page, rather we skim quickly, jumping here and there until a word or a phrase stops us and makes us take notice.

Scanning is the norm in web reading, with readers spending less than five seconds on a headline to determine whether they will continue to read. If you’ve offered a confusing or lackluster headline, you have just ensured your article will not be read therefore your headline is possibly the very most important part of your article.  So, your headlines must grab the reader’s attention, snapping them out of their digital media daze. Next, it should spark their interest by relating to a particular problem or issue they are having in their life. A great headline should not, however, attempt to tell the whole story rather should intrigue the reader while staying snappy and to the point.

Sparking Your Reader’s Curiosity

If your headline fails to engage your reader’s curiosity, then it is unlikely they will continue to read. To stimulate curiosity, writers must use word such as “revealed,” or “at last,” to generate interest. Your ultimate goal in your headline is to speak directly to the emotions or needs of the individual reader, making them feel as though you are speaking directly to them. Keep in mind the five basic human needs or motivators when writing your headline.

Of course first there are the physiological needs such as hunger, shelter and clothing, and the safety needs including the physical, emotional and financial. Next comes social needs which include the need for acceptance, companionship and love. Self-esteem needs include the need for attention, respect and recognition, and finally comes the self-actualization needs which speak to a person’s need to reach their potential in life. These motivators should be incorporated into your web content headlines whenever possible.

Other Ways to Write Killer Headlines

You can use the “call out” method when writing your headline which specifically calls out to your target audience. If you write a one-word headline which simply says “Migraines?” you have effectively hooked every reader who has ever suffered from migraine headaches with one little word. Another method involves simply stating the benefit right up front in your article’s headline. Say you are writing an article about how to make vanilla extract at home.

You could simply title your article “Making Vanilla at Home,” or you could grab your reader with this headline: “Saving $$$ by Making Vanilla Extract at Home.” The second headline has told your reader right up front that they can save considerable amounts of money by making their own vanilla extract, while the first, while it gets the point across, is somewhat lackluster. Writing a “how-to” headline is also an attention-getter—after all, how many women will bypass an article that states “How to Lose 15 Pounds by Summer.”

Dealing With Conflicting Advice

New writers particularly can be confused by conflicting advice from professionals. Some state that information must always be front-loaded into the headline with a goal of conveying as much useful information about the content of the article as possible. Unfortunately, headlines of this type can often end up so dull they are regularly bypassed. Other seasoned web writers advise using the headline simply to lure your visitor in, ignoring whether there is any front-loaded information involved. What you should remember is that your headline will quite often be read out of context, meaning it could come up as an Internet search result, a newsletter subject line in an email, or re-tweeted on Twitter. This means that your headline must have significance outside the context of a website. In the end, it is definitely worthwhile for any writer of web content to focus considerable time and attention on their headlines.