Does the Creative Process For Content Marketing Exist?

As a marketing specialist, I manage a lot of projects. I ensure that all team members are on the same page, that tone and style in the marketing content stays consistent and that deadlines are met.

One of the projects I manage is heavily reliant on the creation of two videos. Both videos were on track to their designated deadlines—until the unthinkable happened.

The Video Team requested to scrap all their work on one of the videos and start over—from scratch.

Naturally, my answer was no. The quality of the current video matched our project objectives and goals. We have a deadline to meet. Getting stakeholder approval and creating the video by that set-in-stone date was next to impossible.

Of course I lost. The stakeholders decided that this new video direction was all part of the creative process. If the video wasn’t allowing us to meet this deadline, then so be it.

So, I shrugged and moved along with the rest of my day.

But it hit me the next morning. Why is the creative process limited to video creation? What about the creative process for content marketing?

There’s a creative process to marketing through words. As content marketers, we brainstorm ideas, scribble down rough phrases, shuffle sentences about the page, tweak words again and again until the tone and style and facts and rhythm are just right.

The content marketer’s creative process is uniting the strengths of both left brain and right brain. Left brain strategy and reason must balance right brain creativity and innovation when crafting marketing content.

In other words, content marketing is an art. Words must paint a picture inside a reader’s mind, print out beautifully across the screen and roll rhythmically off the reader’s tongue. Words are visual, auditory, tangible.

Served with a twist of persuasion.

But we have deadlines. Tweets and blog posts and press releases can’t be rescheduled because we want to switch the direction of the piece. We can’t blame the creative process for missing the train on a time-sensitive opportunity.

We can’t beg for more time. We can’t stop the clock because we have writer’s block. We can’t press snooze unless we want to lose the marketing race.

I’m very competitive—so crossing that finish line first is the option I choose.

Content marketers tie in the pressure of the deadline into the creative process. Not only do we have to write persuasively with hard facts and soft beauty—or, at least, a memorable catchphrase—we have so many days, or even hours, to make it happen.

For doesn’t the creative process thrive within limits? Successful companies are praised not only for their catchy jingles and poignant ad campaigns, but also for their timely execution.

Content marketers must decide: Does your creative process embrace the time crunch so that you deliver content marketing that resonates?

My answer: Challenge accepted.

Do you think there’s a creative process to content marketing? Share your opinions below.