Discover the Power of a Managing Editor in Your Content Strategy

In the intricate world of content creation, the managing editor often plays an unseen yet indispensable role.

More than just a proofreader or a basic content organizer, the managing editor is the lifeblood of your content strategy, ensuring every piece of content aligns with your brand’s voice and mission.

Unfortunately, companies often focus on hiring content creators and lack a senior professional tasked with content oversight.

In fact, Contently’s State of Content Marketing 2023 report found that people resources were among the top content challenges, with 33 percent of respondents reporting not having enough people and 10 percent citing a gap in skills.

Businesses frequently encounter these challenges in generating consistent, high-quality content that resonates with their audiences. Cultivating a team of freelancers to adopt your brand’s unique style and voice is a lengthy and difficult process.

Even then, the resulting content may not meet your expectations. This is where a managing editor can add value to your content process and organization.

What Is a Managing Editor?

A managing editor juggles a multitude of duties and responsibilities. They dictate the content direction, liaise with writers and designers, uphold content schedules, and ensure all content adheres to your brand’s standards. They are an indispensable component of any content strategy, ensuring your content is consistent and on-brand so your message is always clear and cohesive.

At Contently, managing editors are freelancers within our talent network who partner with clients to execute content strategies. Some of their other responsibilities are to:

• Manage Contently contributor teams
• Solicit pitches from contributors
• Create and assign project briefs
• Edit content according to clients’ brand guidelines
• Provide strategic editorial insights to advance clients’ content goals

In other words, a managing editor becomes an extension of your team, fully versed in your goals and content strategy.

3 Strategic Advantages You Gain Working with Contently Editors

At the heart of Contently’s successful content strategy are the managing editors who play a pivotal role in bringing high-quality and engaging content to life. Their daily duties span from the creative side to customer relations, all while keeping the business goals of the client in mind.

1. Streamlined Editorial Process

A managing editor at Contently is the driving force behind the story-creation process. They are responsible for developing new stories, establishing and enforcing quality standards, and providing feedback to writers on their pitches.

They also play a critical role in shaping the editorial calendar to align with the customer’s content plan.

But their responsibility continues beyond creating a content strategy. They also update it as directed by the customer success team, ensuring the content continues to serve the strategic goals of the client.

Editing content for grammar, spelling, tone, and voice, plus verifying facts, dates, and statistics are part of their daily routine as well, establishing the highest quality for every piece of content the team produces.

2. Centralized Team Management

Managing editors are instrumental in orchestrating the work of freelance writers. They onboard writers, answer questions, clarify briefs, and approve drafts. They ensure that every piece of content aligns with the publication’s style, content strategy, editorial policy, and publishing requirements.

Managing editors also oversee the content workflow and enforce deadlines. They liaise with customers and the customer success team regarding any changes in agreed-upon delivery dates, ensuring a smooth and efficient process from ideation to publication.

3. Collaborative Customer Relationships

The high-touch relationship between Contently’s managing editors and clients goes beyond content creation. They provide editorial and talent updates during biweekly or monthly status calls with customers and customer success teams. They also maintain regular communication with customers via the platform and email as needed, ensuring a continuous flow of information and fostering strong, collaborative relationships.

Through these three key areas of responsibility, Contently’s managing editors serve as critical resources and partners for their customers, helping them craft compelling content that drives strategic business goals.

They bring together their impressive copy and narrative chops, management skills, and a deep understanding of client needs to create content that truly resonates with the target audience.

When Is Your Organization Ready for a Managing Editor?

Scaling up your content production often requires also scaling up your content team. But how do you know when is the right time and to what level your organization should scale?

First, you need to evaluate your organization’s content maturity level. This will help you understand if you’re within the Crawl, Walk, or Run stage and what steps to take to progress.

Then once you determine your stage, you can map your content methodology to align with that stage to get a sense of target content output and the optimal internal and external resources.

As this chart shows, even organizations in the Crawl stage may want to consider hiring a freelance editor.

Knowing where you are in the content maturity model is key to helping you chart a growth path for your content marketing efforts and provides a roadmap to follow as you progress. This phased approach is how Contently helps clients mature their content operations over time.

Behind Successful Content: Case Studies of Managing Editors at Work

To understand the tangible impact of Contently’s managing editors, let’s review some real-world examples.

CarMax, a leading used car retailer, joined forces with Contently and reaped significant benefits. Their collaboration with Contently enabled them to produce a high volume of content that they couldn’t have achieved alone.

Contently’s managing editor, who had automotive experience, started attending CarMax’s weekly standup, fostering incredible collaboration and a content production process that felt like an in-house operation.

Dell Perspectives, Dell’s thought leadership platform, also reaped the benefits of partnering with Contently. When Christina Westbrook stepped in as editor-in-chief, she collaborated with Contently to assemble a diverse team of global writers and editors.

“I appreciated the excellent editing and the thoughtful writer sourcing,” she said. “I don’t have to worry about whether the writers or the graphic designer are up to par. They’ll point out things that I don’t notice, and that’s where the partnership is really valuable.”

In both case studies, the advantages of collaborating with a managing editor are evident. Both CarMax and Dell Perspectives were able to produce more content, maintain a consistent brand voice, and effectively reach their target audience.

The managing editors from Contently played a pivotal role in these successes, offering their expertise and understanding of the brands to steer the content production process.

The Contently Edge: A Partnership Rooted in Expertise and Collaboration

The benefits of adding a managing editor to your content strategy are profound. They salvage valuable time, ensure your content is persistently on-brand, assist you in amplifying your content output, and effectively manage external teams of writers.

With a managing editor, your content production process becomes more efficient, your brand voice becomes more consistent, and your ability to reach your audience amplifies.

If you’re yearning to enhance your content strategy and output, consider employing a Contently managing editor. They’re more than just editors; they’re comprehensive team members ready to help you elevate your content. Don’t squander precious time training a team of freelancers to produce content in your style. Get superior copy from the onset by leveraging a managing editor that understands your business.

Reach out to Contently today and let our managing editors help you narrate your brand’s story.