Content calibration is a great way to boost efficiency, productivity, and morale for your agency, outsourced workers and the client.
What is Content Calibration?
Calibration is the act of standardizing something or checking that your measurement device is working as it should. Calibrating content involves testing instructions, style guides, and brand documents to ensure they support writing and editing teams in creating what you really want.
For agencies, a content calibration phase can mean working with outsourced content providers over the course of a week or two – or a handful of content pieces – to troubleshoot details and provide feedback so future content is exactly what’s needed. Agencies can also go through calibration with their own clients, taking multiple rounds of small content orders and getting in-depth feedback to ensure client instructions are clear and that everyone involved knows what the client wants and how to produce it.
Using Calibration Phases to Create Happy Clients
Adding calibration phases to your content creation services is one of the easiest ways to boost revenue and retain more clients. Content calibration lets you:
- Test whether your understanding of client needs is accurate
- Help the client decide what they want earlier in the process, as some clients aren’t sure or think they know but change their minds as content starts coming in
- Ensure instructions and other project documentation is clear and that nothing is left out or confusing
- Feel out writing and editing teams, so you know whether changes must be made to meet future obligations to the client
Without a content calibration phase, agencies can deliver dozens – or even hundreds – of content pieces that don’t meet the client’s needs. That typically leads to expensive rework, a foundation of distrust or complete loss of the client – and the revenue. Starting with a calibration phase creates transparency and communicates to the client that you:
- Care deeply about the client’s business
- Want to provide the best possible product, customized to his or her needs
- Will do what it takes to get the job done, but plan to work in a smart, effective and professional manner
Content Calibration Helps Everyone Involved
Calibration phases aren’t just great for clients and your bottom line. They also help boost performance and morale for your content creation teams. Whether you work with in-house or crowdsourced writers and editors, they’ll appreciate an organized approach to the project.
Content calibration lets you use a small team to ferret out client needs and potential issues before placing work with larger teams if you need to scale. It’s much easier to communicate changes to a small, expert team, and calibration lets you avoid frustrating larger teams with instructions that evolve constantly or requests that may be confusing or vague. When you do launch a full-scale version of your content creation project, writers and editors more more likely to join in, knowing you’ve laid the ground work to make their job easy.
At Crowd Content, we always recommend multiple calibration phases to our Premium and Enterprise clients. For more information on how we can help you scale content creation with smart, professional teams, contact us today.
