How A Non-Advertising Content material Strategy Produced Award-Successful Outcomes | Frost Tech

Matt Hartley is just not a salesman.

And but, it is a finalist for the 2022 B2C Content material Marketer of the Yr.

Though apparently incongruous, it isn’t. Not all firms method content material (or advertising and marketing) with the identical organizational construction.

Matt leads editorial technique for TD Financial institution Group as a senior supervisor within the company and public affairs division. Underneath his management, TD Tales took house high honors for Greatest Monetary Companies Content material Advertising Program and earned runner-up mentions for Greatest Monetary Companies Content material Advertising Launch and Publishing on the 2022 Content material Advertising Awards. .

These outcomes show that division, title, and reporting construction do not matter if the content material works.

“We inform tales aligned with the communication aims (of the corporate). We’re not essentially seeking to promote one thing. It is about model constructing, thought management, monetary training,” explains Matt.

Here is how a non-marketer finalist for Content material Marketer of the Yr created an award-winning program.

If #Content works, details like reporting structure, title, and department don’t matter, says @AnnGynn via @CMIContent. click to tweet

Inauguration of the newsroom

In 2018, Matt joined TD as a Content material Strategist. He was employed partly due to his expertise writing reviews and creating new content material merchandise. Matt had labored as a expertise reporter for The Globe and Mail and the Nationwide Publish. He additionally created the Monetary Publish Tech Desk, a house for Canadian and worldwide expertise information, and was the founding editor of the Publish’s arcade online game information website.

TD’s management had acknowledged the altering media panorama. They noticed fewer alternatives gained within the media and turned to Matt to assist scale a TD-owned channel referred to as TD Newsroom.

Whereas TD Newsroom aligned with exterior communication objectives, it ended up with an inner viewers: lower than 10% of holiday makers got here to the positioning from outdoors the financial institution.

Flipping the content material program

TD Newsroom’s significance grew when the pandemic hit in 2020, making some conventional types of buyer contact unimaginable. Not simply one other software within the communication toolbox, TD Newsroom has turn into important.

“Creating our personal content material and with the ability to distribute it turned vitally essential to us,” says Matt.

The TD Newsroom group centered on creating branded service journalism (content material meant to assist prospects) and site visitors to the positioning elevated considerably. Subjects like banking you are able to do on-line, budgeting for COVID-affected earnings and planning an emergency fund took heart stage.

That was the start of the evolution of TD Newsroom.

“We had been rethinking how we created content material and the place the shopper was on their journey,” says Matt. The group additionally doubled down on data-driven content material and honed its content material technique.

In 2021 TD Tales debuted. “It places the shopper on the heart of the story. He tells tales that resonate with purchasers and colleagues,” says Matt.

The location’s motto – “Enriching lives one story at a time” – displays this mission.

TD Tales organizes content material round 5 pillars (as proven within the website navigation on the screenshot above):

• Your cash presents monetary suggestions and recommendation.
• Innovation highlights new applied sciences to create extra personalised banking experiences.
• Group options tales about TD’s involvement within the communities the place it operates and the place its staff stay.
• Colleagues tells the tales of the workers.
• views presents the thought management of financial institution executives.

TD Stories puts the customer at the center of the story, says @thehartleyTO of @TDnews_Canada, via @CMIContent. click to tweet

making every thing rely

“We’re a small however highly effective group in company affairs. It is a flat group: everybody brings concepts to the desk. It would not actually work if it wasn’t as cohesive as it’s,” says Matt.

The digital content material group additionally works a bit like an company. On company issues, they work with relationship managers for classes reminiscent of private banking, insurance coverage, US banking, and many others., in addition to product, partnership, and philanthropic managers.

“We work with them to create the tales. We are able to introduce them, ask an issue professional to assist us inform a narrative, and many others.,” explains Matt. “We couldn’t exist in a vacuum.”

He oversees a digital content material group that features a data-driven technique perform that has been instrumental within the evolution of TD Tales. That further focus has helped the group of their content material improvement.

For instance, the financial institution’s editorial calendar revolves round repeating deadlines and patterns. Deadlines for retirement plan contributions and earnings tax returns happen throughout the identical interval every year. And each spring, extra folks begin on the lookout for properties.

With TD’s digital content material group increasing the content material measurement technique, Matt and the group are capable of analyze how nicely these yearly items of content material are doing. They’ll additionally higher perceive what individuals are on the lookout for, to allow them to refine and enhance the subsequent iterations of content material.

“We are able to take these moments and make these moments contemporary,” Matt explains. “We are able to be sure that the shopper will get one of the best and most correct info doable.”

The metrics replicate the group’s dedication to excellence. In 2021, site visitors to TD Tales grew greater than 125% yr over yr. Nearly all site visitors (98%) comes from exterior sources, together with 25% from natural Google searches.

Figuring out the actual aim

“On the finish of the day, the content material is just not the top aim. The aim is to assist educate the shopper and assist them really feel extra financially knowledgeable and safe. Whenever you maintain that in thoughts, the precise construction of a narrative or every sentence is a way to an finish,” says Matt.

Educating the customer is the goal: story and sentence structure are the means to that end, says @thehartleyTO of @TDnews_Canada via @CMIContent. click to tweet

That is a part of the key science of name journalism. As Matt explains: “Take enterprise aims and mix them with tales that prospects discover participating and helpful.”

And that is an award-winning system, no matter division title, title, or organizational construction.

Cowl picture by Joseph Kalinowski/Content material Advertising Institute