Overview
Creating a global content presence for developers
I was a copywriter turned Editorial Manager / Content Manager for the GitHub Blog, Product Manager and Content Designer for GitHub Sponsors, and served on the Inclusion Advisory Council.
As a Content Manager, I managed the blog pipeline as content was drafted, edited, and published through GitHub or WordPress.
- Check out the GitHub blog archives from 2018 - 2019 (I’ve ghost-written or edited almost every post).
- I debuted as an author when I transitioned from Content Manager to Product Manager.
- I wrote content and supported launches through the Microsoft acquisition, GitHub India, Octoverses, GitHub Sponsors expansion to countries like Malta and Cyprus, and more.
- Through my time at GitHub, I've overhauled and created guidelines and templates for internal and external processes, audiences, and partners.
Goals
Create processes that scale and content that delights
📝
Help developers contribute content
It's great to have content options, but a backlog of content just means that by the time an editor gets to the material, it may already be stale. This frustrates the author and can result in project delays.
The content team needed a way to review drafts and share feedback timely, with a way to prioritize and schedule different requests.🌱
Make processes that scale
During my time at GitHub, we were acquired by Microsoft. Because of the acquisition, we increased in numbers and needed content processes that can adapt to a larger volume of requests and editors.💡
Educate and delight audiences
While we were growing after the Microsoft acquisition, we wanted content to still have the same approachable, educational, and supportive voice and tone our community knows and loves.
Challenges
Growing pains
When I joined, GitHub was already the well-known and beloved platform for developers of all sizes. After a few short months it, we grew exponentially and eventually completed our acquisition by Microsoft.
Not only did we have to consider the volume of supporting content for GitHub AND Microsoft, but we had to elevate our communications and processes to match the next stage of the company. What does this mean? Auditing processes for efficiency and resiliency when scaling, evolving communications and content plans to even more diverse audiences, and lowering the barrier to entry for collaboration between companies.
Process
Remembering our roots while we grow
Because of GitHub's beloved brand personality, I wanted to retain the familiar and fun tone but elevate it to complement Microsoft's style and content. This required auditing and reviewing everything from content contribution processes, to creating templates for briefs, analyzing data, creating transition plans, ghostwriting, and so much more.
Audit
Most of our audience could be filtered in these categories, allowing us to tailor specific campaigns to specific levels of GitHub experience.
Identify goals
Clarifying content via editing and ghostwriting to support developers, regardless of their level of development experience.
Research
It's important to do regular research about your audience to understand what they need from content and be proactive with communications. This was especially a priority because of the new client-base we'd inherit from the Microsoft acquisition.
Implementing process
Process should help creativity and collaboration, not hinder it! While not every piece of content can be templated, being able to provide standards for content when they're available was key to successful collaboration. Creating a blog post template helped anyone understand important details "at-a-glance" for easy context-shifting.
Getting feedback
Feedback is a gift. Providing clear guidelines and "lanes" for constructive feedback was essential to resolving a problem or issue. From the "kickoff" call to a retrospective, I welcomed feedback to elevate content at GitHub.
Collecting data
With Looker, Datadog, and more, we were able to make bets on the kinds of content our audience could benefit depending on what GitHub service they're working with. Data was at the heart of everything we did.
Expanding processes
As we scaled, our processes also needed to evolve. Collaborating with other teams to provide a process that makes sense for their resources and priorities was something I regularly supported.
Jekyll to WordPress
As we try experiments and gamble with public content, we also tried different tools internally to understand what makes sense for what's next. At one point we were using Jekyll with GitHub to publish blog posts, but I supported and completed the transition to WordPress. It was the right tool for the job!
Transitioning editorial calendars
When I started, we didn't have much of an editorial calendar that wasn't just a few tasks in a GitHub repository. I used Asana and then Airtable to create a "living" editorial calendar for everyone to understand our pipeline "at-a-glance."
Forgoing and re-adopting analytics
At the height of the newness of GDPR, we had to forgo analytics and go with our instincts and datapoints from other departments to make the right content choices. During this time it was important for us to connect and interact with our audience to really understand what their needs were without numbers to back it up.
Extending WordPress
After the WordPress migration, we were left with brand new CMS instance specifically for the GitHub blog. This was the time for us to incorporate more and evolve it to the beautiful, accessible, and content-focused blog you know and love today!
Transition plans
As I transitioned my role from Editorial Manager to Product Manager for GitHub Sponsors, I wanted to set up the next person for success in the role. There were so many moving pieces and not a lot of documentation where holistic information about "ALL THINGS CONTENT" was stored. I created a comprehensive guide for managing, supporting, and contributing to the GitHub blog.
Results
A more mature, process-enabled content model
What's left to say? Check out the GitHub Blog to see how far it's come.
Without my work and countless of others, it wouldn't be the publication it is today.
