Several informations are undisclosed to protect the client's privacy.
01/ Summary
Vietcetera, a media company based in Vietnam, made a decision in April 2019 to shift its focus towards the Vietnamese audience.
Their aim was to establish themselves as a trusted source of news analysis and opinion, catering specifically to the younger demographic of Gen Z and Millennials in Vietnam.
02/ Project goals
Paint a clear picture of Vietcetera’s audiences and how Vietcetera can use these insights to tailor their product and content to accommodate target audience's needs.
Who the target audiences are, their psychographics, and behaviors
What they might be doing, and when they interact with Vietcetera
When they might use the product, daily routines & rhythms of their behavior
How to understand the underlying emotional & rational drivers of behavior
03/ Problems
The brand and its approach to content is still new to Vietnamese audience.
As of the time we started this project, Vietcetera still mainly focused on the expat and international audiences. But their goal for the upcoming year was to shifting the focus to Vietnamese readers and find a way to produce more tailored content for this new target audience.
04/ Solution
In this project, our goal was to define Vietcetera's target audience and optimize the brand and content to cater to their needs. The content strategy was developed by following these steps:
User research
To understand the target audiences, their motivations, and goals, we conducted thorough user research. This involved identifying the target audience and gaining insights into their attitudes, goals, needs, and behaviors regarding content consumption.
Analysis and structure
By synthesizing the key findings from the user research, we identified patterns and gained an understanding of user expectations regarding content structure and organization. This helped us align the content strategy with the users' expectations, ensuring a seamless user experience.
Guides, templates, and workflows
We established guides, templates, and workflows to provide a clear framework for content creation and management. This involved deciding on the brand's voice, tone, and content direction, as well as creating efficient workflows to streamline the content creation process.
Creation and management
During this phase, we actively implemented the content strategy by making suggestions, creating engaging content, and continuously measuring and evaluating performance. This allowed us to refine the strategy and ensure its effectiveness in meeting the target audience's needs.
05/ User and internal research
Stakeholder interview
To understand the business from the internal point of view, we set up several talks to different business stakeholders to understand their business vision, their business goal, and expected outcome of the project.
Competitor audit
Alongside with stakeholders interview, we also conducted a competitor audit by looking at other key-players on the market to see how Vietcetera content measure against them, what works and what not.
Quantitative research
We distributed a survey to gather direct feedback from Vietcetera's readers. The data obtained enabled us to develop a comprehensive understanding of the target audience's demographics, interests, and the topics that concern them the most in terms of content consumption.
Qualitative interview
In addition to the quantitative data, we conducted 17 in-depth interviews with current readers from diverse backgrounds. The goal was to understand their content consumption habits, as well as their concerns regarding content consumption and Vietcetera's current content approach. We also inquired about the participants' perception of Vietcetera's brand.
Structure the data
With the help of our researcher, we were able to paint a clear picture of our target user, as well as create an experience map and user's persona.
User experience mapping
Target user's personas
06/ Content strategy process
Designing the content strategy
Based on insights gathered from the target audiences, including their behaviors, preferences, and other research findings, we developed a step-by-step content strategy. This strategy encompasses the team's unique selling points, opportunity areas, brand positioning, and content pillars. By leveraging these components, we aim to create a content strategy that resonates with the audience and drives content success.
Creating guides, templates, and workflows
There are three main challenges we aim to tackle.
Once we have established a baseline structure for the content, the next step involves considering the brand's tone and voice. Collaborating closely with writers and editors, we engage in brainstorming sessions to explore how our products can create an emotional connection with users. Our goal is to utilize content to establish a meaningful connection when users engage with our product.
Throughout the research phase, we consistently keep the target audiences in mind, placing them at the core of our content creation process. We also take a deep dive into the team's current workflow, aiming to identify and address areas where improvements can be made. From here, we craft suggestions to enhance the team's performance.
Outcome
07/ Writing workshop
To overcome the challenges related to the writers' skillset, we conducted a series of 7 writing workshops designed to assist in-house writers and editors in evaluating their performance and refining their skills to elevate the quality of their work.
These workshops covered a wide range of topics, providing training to enhance their abilities. We focused on helping them find captivating stories and develop engaging content angles for both articles and videos. Additionally, we provided guidance on improving interview skills when working with guests, discovering and strengthening their own unique writing voice, understanding formatting requirements for different channels, and mastering the art of writing for social media.
08/ Collaborating with Vietcetera team to find solutions
It’s crucial that the in-house team got to join hands to find the solutions for their pain points. To tackle the challenges on management process and Content Strategy, we hosted several brainstorming workshop with team members to understand more on different problems and concerns the team were currently facing. We used "How Might We" method to brainstorm ideas for their next course of action.
09/ Impact
The content strategy was approved with minimal changes by our client.
Vietcetera content team succesfully applied our content strategy to their planning and it helped them improve the quality as well as the variety of their content.
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Building a content strategy for Vietcetera
From researching, creating user's personas, to designing a content strategy, and conducting writing workshops.
