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Creating a content strategy

Last updated on June 29, 2026

A content strategy guides what you create and who manages it. It reduces the risk of duplicate or outdated content being misrepresented by search engines or AI tools.

If you have existing content but do not have a strategy, it’s time to create one.

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When to create a content strategy

A content strategy should be created before you start writing and continue throughout the content’s life cycle. The strategy is the vision for how and why the content will be created and managed. It helps teams coordinate content and reduce duplication. Your vision may change throughout the project, and that’s okay, a content strategy should be able to adapt to the project’s needs.

Not every project will need the same level of depth. Scale your strategy to the size and risk of the content.

Developing a strategy for existing content

Many pages have content that was created without a formal strategy. In these cases, create one to review what exists. Use it to find gaps or duplication and decide what to update, improve or remove. Look beyond your own branch’s pages to check if related content exists. Consider working with other branches or ministries to reduce duplication.

Follow the standards

All online content created for the B.C. government is required to meet our Web Content Standards. 

Use the appropriate tone and be consistent across related pages or services.

Understand the current website

What content already exists, and do you need something new? To understand if there is a need:

  • Do an inventory and audit of existing content. Go beyond what your team manages, other teams may have similar or related content
  • Review site analytics
  • Review any research that has already been done
  • Find out what the business and project goals are

Do design research

Design research (also known as user research) is a vital and ongoing process. It helps you understand the people using the content and why, when and how they use it. By identifying gaps between what people need and what you offer, you can design more useful content. Think about who the content is for, and what they need to do or know, then:

Define success measurements

For content to be successful, it needs to have a purpose. Define what that means to your team and then develop goals to measure it. This allows you to track when content needs to be created, updated, moved or removed. 

Purpose and priorities

Whether you're drafting content or working with existing pages, you need to consider:

Usability and clarity

Once the content has a clear purpose, make sure it's easy to use. Consider:

Service completion

If it's a service, are people able to complete it easily or do they give up and call or go into an office? Connect with the teams that manage calls or in-person aspects of the content. They may have good insight to share. Consider: 

Measurement and testing

Content work is never done, after you publish: 

Find the right place for content

Once you understand your audience and purpose, you can decide where the content belongs. Information architecture (IA) focuses on how we organize, structure and label web content. Thoughtfully considering where content lives in the IA helps people understand where they are and how to find what they need. If people can’t find what they need, it doesn’t matter how good the actual content is.

An information architecture can shape:

  • How content is structured and organized
  • How much content you need
  • Which topics are out of scope
  • How you can work with existing content

When deciding where it should go think about: 

  • The purpose of the content
  • What this content will do
  • What it won’t do
  • What you can link to instead of rewriting

Draft and edit the content

Assign accountability

Determine the content governance and life cycle before you hit publish. This means planning who, how often and how you manage what you publish. This helps reduce clutter on the website by removing duplicate, unneeded and out-of-date content. Out-of-date content can pose legal or reputational risk. Out-of-date or conflicting content can be surfaced as current by search engines or AI tools, increasing the impact of even small errors. It's important to continually manage content so people can trust that they're finding accurate information. This is particularly important for content related to health, safety, eligibility and enforcement.

This in turn helps people find what they need faster.

Remember to:

  • Assign a person to maintain the content once it is published
  • Have a backup in case that person is unavailable
  • Know who the subject matter experts are and keep them involved
  • Consider who else may be interested in the content. Is there another team or ministry you should work with?
  • Know who has approval to make changes
  • Decide how often to review published content and assigned roles
  • Establish timelines based on your success measurements

Publish

Once you've created content that meets our Web Content Standards and planned who will maintain this content, you’re ready to hit publish.

Hitting publish doesn't mean you're done. Content should always be considered ongoing work. You need to:

  • Monitor how the content performs once it's live
  • Use analytics and feedback to make improvements
  • Be prepared to adjust content, IA or format based on how people use it in real life