The Nexus Content Review Process
Before publishing new onsite content or submitting offsite content for publication, many Nexus clients prefer to provide a quick review. Your copywriter will then incorporate your edits, follow up on any questions as needed, and move the content forward to start generating SEO power for your website.
What does the content review process look like? What kinds of edits are the most helpful for our team to refine our understanding of your company’s voice? We’ve rounded up everything you need to know about content review:
What to Expect From Us
We primarily use Google Docs to create and share new content rather than Microsoft Word. Since Docs are saved in the cloud, they’re much easier for us to share and update. They also allow us to clearly see the edit history of a document.
If Google Docs are new for your team, please don’t hesitate to ask your account manager or copywriter any questions — we’ll be happy to help!
When new content is ready for your review, your Nexus copywriter will provide you with a link to a Google Doc that contains the content. If we’re sharing a draft of an onsite article or activity, we will also share a link to a preview of an unpublished draft on your website in most cases.
- When reviewing offsite content, you’ll only need to read the Google Doc and provide any edits or comments directly on the document.
- When reviewing onsite content, you can review the unpublished blog preview to see how the finished piece will appear once it’s live on your website, but the Google Doc version of the article will be the easiest place to leave specific line edits.
We’ll also provide you with a timeframe or “Review By” date for each new piece of content that requires your review. This helps ensure that we can keep a steady pace of content production and meet any deadlines set by our external publishing partners.
Extremely delayed content review can ultimately harm the productivity and ROI of your Nexus engagement. In some cases of extreme delays, we may give you the heads-up that we’ll move forward with the content in question by a specific date.
That said, we also understand that you’re busy with a variety of responsibilities. If you ever expect that you’ll be unable to review content by the requested date or have any questions, just let us know — we can make adjustments as necessary.
The Content Review Hub
For most engagements, we’ll share content for your review in your “Content Review Hub,” which is housed in your engagement’s “Master Account Spreadsheet.” We recommend creating a bookmark for this spreadsheet, but please reach out to your account manager or copywriter if you’re ever unable to find it.
The Content Review Hub looks like this:
How the Content Review Hub Works
- Your copywriter will add new content to the review hub once it’s ready for your review by updating the date fields, activity type, title, link(s), and optional notes/context. We’ll set the status to “Ready for Review.”
- You can then check the Review Hub at any time to see new content.
- Your copywriter will also send a weekly email to update you on changes made to the hub in the past week. If there are no new pieces ready for your review, we’ll let you know what to expect from us next and when.
- Once you’ve reviewed a piece of content, you’ll update the status column to either “Reviewed and Approved” or “Reviewed – Discuss Further” (if you want to discuss the content or would like to see a second draft).
- You’ll then reply to your copywriter’s weekly update email to let them know that you’ve finished reviewing one or multiple pieces of content.
How “Review By” Timeframes Work
We’ll ask that new content added to your Review Hub be reviewed by the Friday of the following week. For instance, if a new offsite post is ready for review on a Wednesday, we’ll ask that you finish reviewing it by Friday of the following week.
This timeframe ensures that you’ll always have a feasible turnaround period to review content both before and after receiving our weekly update/reminder email. This will also give you the flexibility to better incorporate content review into your normal schedule, and it ensures that we’re not sharing content in a difficult-to-manage manner.
We encourage you to visit the Review Hub at any point during the week when you’re able to set aside time for reviewing content (not just after receiving our weekly reminder email).
Please let us know if you ever expect that you’ll be unable to meet a deadline so that we can make adjustments.
Alternative Review Processes
In some cases, we’ll opt to use a content review process different from the one outlined above:
- External project management platforms
- If your business uses a platform like Trello or Asana to manage marketing tasks, we can use it, too. No need to reinvent the wheel if your team already has a process that works! We’ll just need login credentials and appropriate permissions to post and update tasks.
- Email-based review of individual articles
- For non-standard Nexus engagements, it may make sense to manage the content review process solely via email. In this case, your copywriter will email you with new pieces for review along with a “review by” date and any notes. Questions and follow-up will occur on that thread as needed.
Your Nexus account manager will work with you during the onboarding process to determine the content review process that will work best for your engagement. For existing Nexus clients, we can also make adjustments over time if you strongly prefer one process over another — just let us know so that your account manager can discuss it with you soon.
What’s Most Helpful for Us
Feedback on content is most helpful for Nexus copywriters when it’s specific, actionable, and gives us a clearer idea of your preferences that we can carry forward into new content. For instance, rather than highlighting a sentence and asking that it be rewritten, leave a brief comment explaining why it’s not hitting the mark or effectively representing your voice.
For more straightforward diction or stylistic changes, direct line edits in the Google Doc will be most helpful.
We also ask that clients avoid heavily reworking links in content, especially in offsite articles (since the primary goal of these activities is to build authority to specific pages on your website using particular types of anchor text). In onsite content, we have greater flexibility with linking. However, if you strongly prefer that something about a link be changed, please let us know so that we can adjust our strategy as needed.
In onsite content, we use heading tags, image alt text, links, and keyword mentions to signal its relevance to Google. In general, please avoid heavily reworking these technical elements and mentions of relevant keywords. This will ensure the content can perform according to the keyword optimization strategy developed by your copywriter for that article.
If you have bigger-picture feedback on a piece of content or have trouble describing your desired changes, please let us know so that we can discuss and offer potential solutions.
What’s Most Helpful for You?
Our goal is for the content review process to be a collaborative one that helps us effectively capture your brand voice while delivering SEO results. Please don’t hesitate to get in touch with your account manager and/or copywriter if you:
- Have questions about the content review process or would like to request a process adjustment
- Have big-picture feedback to discuss that will help your copywriter better represent your brand
- Want to share new business priorities, preferences, or resources so that they can be incorporated into your content
- Have any questions about your overall SEO strategy, our content creation process, or anything else
We’ll be happy to answer your questions and chat about your strategy — just let us know!
