The Content Advantage (Clout 2.0): The Science of Succeeding at Digital Business through Effective Content

by Colleen Jones

In The Content Advantage (Clout 2.0): The Science of Succeeding at Digital Business Through Effective Content, expert Colleen Jones argues that in the age of digital disruption, your company faces an important choice. The choice is not whether to do content. Every business function–from marketing to sales and from support to recruiting–demands content. The choice is whether to make your approach to content strategic and, consequently, an advantage.



This book, which is the second edition of the pioneering content book Clout, offers a modernized and comprehensive approach for planning, creating, delivering, and optimizing content that will make your business thrive. Executives and practitioners alike will find value in this book as they face increasing pressure to deliver the right content to the right customers at the right time.

 

Drawing on her in-the-trenches experience with organizations ranging from the Fortune 50 to small and medium businesses to government and

nonprofits, Jones





Guidance on creating a content vision A primer on conducting content analysis Techniques for developing a competitive content strategy Elements and principles of effective, influential content A blueprint for developing content intelligence A maturity model for content operations Examples from diverse companies and contexts

232 pages, Kindle Edition

Published July 11, 2018

About the author

A content expert and Star Wars fan, Colleen Jones is the founder of Content Science, a content strategy and intelligence firm where she advised or trained hundreds of the world's leading organizations to become Jedi Masters of digital content, including 6 of the Fortune 50, 5 of the largest U.S. web properties, 3 of the largest nonprofits, and 3 of the most trusted U.S. government agencies. She also is the former head of content at MailChimp, the marketing platform recognized by Inc. as 2017 Company of the Year.

A passionate entrepreneur, Colleen led Content Science to develop the innovative content intelligence software ContentWRX, publish the online magazine Content Science Review, and offer online certifications through Content Science Academy. These products are still empowering brands from American Cancer Society to AT&T to make content an influential force in accomplishing their goals.

Colleen has earned recognition as one of the Top 50 Most Influential Women in Content Marketing by a TopRank study, a Content Change Agent by Society of Technical Communication's Intercom Magazine, and one of the Top 50 Most Influential Content Strategists by multiple organizations. Colleen is a member of Mensa and an active supporter of women in technology. Colleen speaks at conferences and corporate events around the world, from San Francisco to Sydney.

Reviews

[Tessa Floreano · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just finished reading THE CONTENT ADVANTAGE, 3rd Edition, by Colleen Jones from Content Science. To all my colleagues—content strategists, content designers, content architects, UX writers, and UX designers—I highly recommend adding this latest edition to your library of professional books.

Easy to read, yet packed with practical strategies to win in the digital content space. As a 10+ year content strategy veteran, I so appreciated this updated 3rd edition because it included more illustrations, finally defined content strategy and content analysis in a robust way, and gave us a deep dive into how AI plays into our work these days. I also liked that the book advocates for a content operations team. I have worked in places that could have prioritized that team, and Ms. Jones makes a strong case for it that I can present to future employers.

I was also pleased to see the book address recommendations for smaller and mid-sized businesses that don't have the budget of larger corporations to implement some of these system and process changes. Those businesses can feel confident exploring the tweaks and alternatives mentioned throughout.

The actionable advice, accessible language, and structured approach helped me better understand the book's complex concepts and examples. I will refer to this book for years to come for definitions, real-world examples, illustrations, case studies, and practical tips. The Content Advantage really drives home the point about continuously measuring and improving content performance.

When I searched for a particular concept (ex. ROI), I couldn't immediately find information written about it, so I would have liked to have had an index to see where it was included quickly. That would have saved me time.

Overall, the book is a must-read and should be a permanent desk reference for any content strategist, whether solo practitioners or team members. Kudos to Colleen Jones! Her expertise is evident from beginning to end in this well-thought-out and informative book, making it a valuable resource for achieving content excellence.

[Alyssa · Rating 5 out of 5]

As companies go through digital transformation, they are starting to focus on customer experience more than ever before. Delivering content to prospects and customers at the right time in their journeys is a massively underrated differentiator for businesses today. The Content Advantage does an excellent job of emphasizing the importance of bridging the silos of the functions that create content - marketing, sales, engineering, and support - to build a stronger and more consistent customer experience.

This book guides you through effectively planning, creating, delivering, and measuring that content in a strategic way to give your organization a competitive advantage. It's stuffed with the principles of strong content strategy, suggestions for tactical implementation, and vivid examples. Highly recommended for execs and content practitioners who want to transform their content efforts.

[Cynthia Gelper · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are many books explaining content strategy and its role in user experience. But this is the first book I’ve read that explains the big picture: what content actually is, how can you use it to advance your business goals (and why you can’t afford not to), and then zooms out to show you the wide-angle picture of what happens next. All served up in an entertaining, understandable format free of industry-heavy jargon, with a generous helping of Star Wars examples and quotes. The inimitable Colleen Jones takes you on a journey, whether you’re running a small business or working your way up in an epic enterprise, on how to get started and ground your content in a vision, but doesn’t neglect nuts and bolts like who does what, what tools and methodologies to use, how to measure if it’s working, and how to scale, a/k/a grow your content operations and automate. If, like me, you find yourself at times exhausted by the pace of technology and the relentless onslaught of content everywhere in our world at all times, this book can help you make sense of it and use it to your advantage (hence the title). Content Advantage will be an indispensable guide for anyone who wants to understand both the big picture of systems and operations as well as the micro-picture of how to audit and assess a page or screen of content. She even offers some predictions for content in the future and my money's on her to be right.

[Jacy Garraway · Rating 5 out of 5]

Being smart about your content is a necessity for businesses today and hard to get right. In this book Colleen Jones maps how your team/company can approach your content in a holistic, strategic, and smart way. It looks at both high level concepts and actionable, tactical examples, and educates on how to develop a content strategy, content vision and content analysis, as well as how to make a business case for your content and get stakeholders on board. I’ve referenced this book several times at work since I’ve purchased it (specifically on how to prep your content for the future, map content to business objectives, and assess its effectiveness) and couldn’t recommend more for anyone in this field.

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fantastic book about content strategy. I’ve read several content books over the last decade and this is the only one that breaks content strategy into simple concepts and Star Wars puns. 5/5 would recommend.