How can freelancers develop a robust content strategy for their clients?

You need to identify goals and the target audience. 

A good early step is to audit the existing content (if there is any). Look for current gaps, as well as what is working well. 

Do some competitor research. 

Know the tone and voice that needs to be used. If there isn't one already, create a brand voice and style guide. Consistency is very important. 

Create a content calendar - my favorite part! I love batch-creating content, as well. Plan content around key dates, 

Know all the steps of the content strategy - research, content creation, content calendar, optimize for SEO, post/schedule, analyze metrics and data, tweak and adjust as needed. 

For best results, PERSONALIZE! 

Developing a robust content strategy for clients as a freelancer requires a systematic approach that aligns with the client’s goals, audience needs, and brand identity. Here’s a step-by-step guide:

 

1. Understand the Client’s Objectives

 

• Identify Business Goals: Determine what the client wants to achieve (e.g., brand awareness, lead generation, customer retention).

• Define KPIs: Establish measurable outcomes, such as website traffic, social media engagement, or sales conversions.

 

2. Research the Target Audience

 

• Create Buyer Personas: Develop detailed profiles of the client’s ideal customers, including demographics, preferences, and pain points.

• Analyze Behavior: Understand where the audience consumes content (social media, blogs, email) and the type of content they engage with (videos, infographics, articles).

 

3. Audit Existing Content

 

• Evaluate Performance: Analyze the client’s current content for effectiveness using metrics like views, shares, and conversions.

• Identify Gaps: Look for missing topics, outdated materials, or underperforming formats that need improvement.

 

4. Define the Brand Voice and Messaging

 

• Establish Tone and Style: Ensure the content aligns with the client’s brand personality (e.g., formal, conversational, witty).

• Craft Key Messages: Highlight core ideas or values that the content should consistently communicate.

 

5. Choose Content Types and Channels

 

• Select Formats: Decide on content types based on goals and audience preferences (e.g., blogs for SEO, videos for engagement, infographics for education).

• Identify Platforms: Focus on the channels where the client’s audience is most active, such as LinkedIn for B2B or Instagram for visual content.

 

6. Create a Content Calendar

 

• Plan Topics: Develop a list of content ideas tied to themes, seasons, or campaigns.

• Schedule Posts: Use tools like Trello, Notion, or Google Sheets to organize a timeline for content production and publishing.

• Account for Frequency: Balance consistency with quality to avoid overwhelming the audience or the client’s resources.

 

7. Optimize for SEO and Performance

 

• Keyword Research: Use tools like Google Keyword Planner, SEMrush, or Ahrefs to find relevant search terms.

• SEO Best Practices: Optimize headlines, meta descriptions, and images while ensuring the content provides genuine value.

• Performance Metrics: Set up tracking systems (e.g., Google Analytics, social media insights) to monitor content effectiveness.

 

8. Incorporate Visuals and Interactive Elements

 

• Engage Visually: Use eye-catching images, videos, or custom graphics to make content more appealing.

• Encourage Interaction: Include polls, quizzes, or comment prompts to increase audience engagement.

 

9. Collaborate and Iterate

 

• Communicate with Clients: Regularly review the strategy with the client, incorporating their feedback and insights.

• Analyze and Adapt: Continuously assess performance metrics and refine the strategy based on what works.

 

10. Showcase Results

 

• Create Reports: Use visuals like charts or infographics to highlight performance metrics and ROI for the client.

• Share Insights: Provide actionable recommendations for future content improvements.

 

By following these steps, freelancers can create a comprehensive, data-driven content strategy that meets the client’s objectives while engaging their target audience effectively.

Planning. Planning and more Planning. 

Create a Content Calendar (aka Your New Content GPS)

Think of your content calendar as the GPS for your content journey. It’s here to guide you through the maze of topics, formats, dates, and channels, keeping you from wandering off into the “last-minute content scramble” zone. You’ll know exactly when to post, where to post, and—dare we say—what to post about National Coffee Day (because your audience deserves the java jokes).

Balance your calendar with a mix of evergreen content—the “solid rockstars” that stay relevant all year—and timely, buzz-worthy pieces tied to current events or trends. It’s like having a wardrobe that covers both timeless basics and trendy statements, so your content is always dressed to impress. Follow your calendar, and you’ll stay on track, making your audience think you’ve got this content thing down to a science (or at least like you haven’t thrown it together at the last minute!).

This is how I approach it:

Start with the client’s goals: First, I get clear on what the client wants to achieve—whether it’s building brand awareness, generating leads, or fostering a community. Every piece of content needs to tie back to these goals.

Understand the audience: I take time to research who the audience is, what interests them, and where they spend their time online. Tools like Google Trends and social media insights help me tap into what truly resonates with them.

Review what’s already out there: I go through the client’s existing content to see what’s working, what’s falling flat, and where the gaps are. It gives me a solid starting point to build on.

Create a content plan that flows: I map out a content calendar with key themes, topics, and timelines, mixing different types of content—blogs, videos, and social posts. Variety keeps things interesting and engaging for the audience.

Optimize and distribute smartly: I make sure the content is SEO-friendly, with the right keywords, and think through how it will be shared—whether organically or with paid boosts. A great strategy makes use of multiple channels to get the message out.

Measure, learn, and adjust: I track how the content is performing and tweak the strategy based on what’s working. Flexibility is key—being able to pivot when needed ensures the strategy stays effective.

The goal is to keep things simple but strategic, balancing creativity with what the data shows. A content strategy should always feel unique to the client’s brand and audience, and above all, it needs to deliver real results.

Hope this helps!

Every effective content strategy is an intersection of two main things:

 

1) your target market’s pains and interests, and

2) your business goals.

 

All the variations and combinations of the two lists give you different outputs in terms of content ideas.

 

The possible content planning scenarios are truly endless - you can have informative content, converting content, lead magnets, content that educates your market and generates demand, reputation management content, product-led content explaining the features of your products and services, and much, much more.

 

With that said, you need to

 

a) clearly define your target market and audience,

b) define your content production goals, and

c) list the main features and benefits of your products and services.

 

Start mixing and mapping these together and you will get a pool of potentially very effective content topics. Prioritize topics that make the most sense business-wise.

 

To take it one step further, run keyword research from the ground up. Harvest keyword suggestions using third-party tools, inspect your Analytics and Search Console data, find the keywords that send the most traffic to your competition, inspect Google trends, and so on.

 

Make your topics searchable. That is, enrich them with keywords and tailor them to the specific ways your target market uses search engines to solve their needs.

 

Usually, this is a lot of work, and it has to be done well because it lays the foundation for all your future content production efforts.

 

You can’t afford to cut corners with planning, because content is costly, and you might as well focus only on things with the highest chance of working.

 

We at WebCopyLand specialize in content planning and strategy research, and we've helped grow hundreds of websites. Message me & get a free call to see if we are a good fit to work together!

First you need to establish what the client's goals are, because the answer to this question depends on a few different factors.

If the client wants to expand their reach via SEO, for example, the content strategy is pretty well defined: Create silos of articles with interlinked subjects, and a few meta-articles that pull them all together as a single topic. The length of these articles depends entirely on the target audience and the industry, so do your research. Incorporate at least three appropriate external links and three associated internal links per article.

If the client doesn't care about SEO, they might want to entertain their captive audience. In which case it's far more important to understand the audience's experience level and expectations than it is to care about what Google thinks. For captive audience content, you want to narrow in on subject matter and words that resonate with them. A forum for newbie game developers is a world away from a newsletter for elite hackers. Understand the common terms they use and the subject matter they're interested in, which will in turn determine if the next step is on the tutorial side (explainers, simple definitions, etc.), the news side (community events, major developments, etc.), or strictly the entertainment side.

In short, content stretgy has to be tailored to the results that the client wants and the medium they're using. So don't be afraid to ask for more information and use a detailed requirements process before starting.