Best practices for transforming your global content management

A strong content strategy is critical to attract and communicate with customers, partners, investors and other stakeholders—and it’s especially important in highly-regulated industries like pharmaceuticals, where creating compelling content while meeting strict regulatory requirements is a constant challenge. The problem becomes even more complex as pharma companies work to implement an omnichannel approach to communications with their customers.

CSL Behring, a global biotherapeutics company, wanted to centralize its content management worldwide. It deployed the Veeva Vault Content Management System to store, manage, and distribute medical content used by field agents and creators. Unfortunately, employees weren’t able to use the system efficiently, nor did it have governance oversight or universal processes. Compounding the already challenging inefficiencies was the growing risk of unapproved or expired content going live, or staying live after its expiration.

We worked with stakeholders to transform the infrastructure to fit Veeva’s platform, simplifying internal processes and boosting usage. We evolved content creation mechanisms and reviewed inefficiencies, while meeting local compliance. A total of 33 content types were cut to five with taxonomies reduced from 12 categories to six. These changes improved how CSL Behring creates, manages, and distributes content to hundreds of field agents and creators across the globe.

So, if you’re facing a quick and efficient digital product launch, and want to ensure your content strategy will support it—while staying compliant—we have some recommendations. They’re based not only on our experience working with CSL, but also on our collective experience getting customer-centered products built successfully and on time.

Considerations for optimizing a global content management strategy

These 7 considerations will help your organization improve its content management and strategy, from process to development. Let’s dive in.

1. Get leadership and other stakeholders involved and invested

It’s important to identify top considerations when it comes to optimizing global content management strategy. Foremost, CSL Behring felt leadership needed to drive change internally and get all stakeholders involved. It was essential everyone understood and was on board with its goals and objectives. Not only did this help avoid potential roadblocks along the way, but it helped highlight the importance of the work and ensured it was prioritized. 

2.  Discover what content you already have and how you can use it

Next, for CSL Behring to effectively optimize, we needed to know exactly what they had. So, Think Company conducted a complete inventory of their content, identifying what assets could be used and where knowledge gaps had to be addressed. Understanding CSL Behring’s audience was critical, too. To reach prospects and customers, their entire team had to know how, and where, its information was being consumed. 

3. Identify bottlenecks in the review process

Even one line of content has a rigorous review process in a regulated industry like pharma; from internal stakeholder and subject matter expert reviews to legal and compliance, these processes can slow down the time to market.

We assessed and analyzed CSL Behring’s content repository, determining what worked best and where the review/approval process was failing or getting bogged down. This involved in-depth interviews with content creators, field reps, and the sales team to determine what content in the repository they felt should be kept and what could be tossed. These interviews also allowed us to understand what processes within the review timeline might need to be evolved—queue next consideration. 

4. Simplify and automate systems used to create, publish, and promote content

Making content as easy to create and leverage as possible was vital. After speaking with CSL Behring’s internal teams, we helped determine which systems were too complex and needed to be simplified. We also identified manual processes that were ripe for automation and steps to be taken to eliminate tasks via technology.

5. Empower each team to localize content for their audiences and regulatory requirements

While CSL Behring wanted to build globally, it had to customize locally. They were tackling a worldwide rollout, but needed to adhere to local compliance and regulatory requirements. It was imperative to educate users on how they could customize content for distinct audiences without going rogue and passing along incorrect or unauthorized information. This meant documentation of the content creation process and local compliance guidelines were key.

6. Create a content governance model and document everything 

You never know when you’ll need to look back in order to move forward. With this in mind, we always make sure to document everything, and for CSL Behring, we provided governance models and precise workflows to follow in order to meet industry compliance demands. 

We defined content taxonomy and naming conventions, while formalizing processes in easy to digest and understandable ways. A key best practice for getting and keeping people on the right track is spelling out exactly what is entailed and enforcing it.

7. Frequently test and revise content to increase effectiveness 

You can’t have a “set it and forget it” attitude. We helped CSL Behring set up a cadence for reviews. They are now prepared to test, validate, and revise content often. This included identifying the team involved and making sure they understand the tasks at hand. 

The process to determine what is and isn’t relevant and where content that’s falling short can be updated and recycled. Conduct validation sessions with stakeholders, guided by in-depth interviews that will pinpoint areas for improvement and ensure your content management runs smoothly. 

Strong content management pays big dividends

 A global content management is a living process that requires constant monitoring and an ability to quickly adapt to change. When well executed, you’ll attract and engage target audiences—gather, cultivate, and qualify leads—all while being able to troubleshoot issues before they evolve into major problems.

Content management plays a strategic role in achieving success. Learn more about the CSL Behring project here. If you’re looking to transform your content management, get in touch!