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Like it or not, you see content just about every waking second of your life. Whether you're scrolling through Instagram, browsing the web or passing by a billboard in an Uber to the airport, you can't escape it.

When you see a brand's content, there's more where it came from. Most companies use between 3-10 marketing channels, and they're running multiple campaigns at once.

Across the omnichannel, it has to make sense. And it has to be easy for the marketing team to plan, coordinate and deploy. That's where content modeling comes in.

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What is content modeling?

Content modeling is a critical practice in content management and web development that involves defining the structure and organization of content within a system. It's about creating a blueprint for organizing, interlinking and displaying content on websites and other digital platforms.

The two foundational aspects of content modeling are content types and attributes:

• Content types are the different types of content that will be included in the system. Examples include articles, blog posts, product listings, landing pages and photo galleries.
• Content attributes are the specific characteristics or information that will be associated with each content type. This could include fields like title, author, date published, body text, images, FAQ blocks, contact forms and categories.

The primary goal of content modeling is to define these types and attributes. You want to break these assets down into their smallest, most meaningful elements and establish relationships between them.

This is the root of all your content management and operations. It's how you ensure consistency and create systems to expand your content strategy in a cohesive way.

How does content modeling work?

Although it might seem complicated on the surface, content modeling follows a simple structural approach.

The content model within your content management system (CMS) specifies the associated fields, field types and rules defining how content is structured and organized for each type of content. It will also specify which fields are required, and callbacks to external systems or APIs for data retrieval.

Let's say you have an e-commerce site. "Product Page" would be one of your main content types. For this type, you may establish specific attributes — product name, description, price, images, sizes available and customer reviews. You could also have a "Blog Post" content type with different attributes like title, author, published date, body text and categories.

Why bother with content modeling in the first place?

Several reasons. For one, the practice helps you better understand and define your content assets. By breaking them down into smaller, manageable pieces, you can see where there may be duplication or inconsistencies. This leads to improved content governance and a more streamlined process for managing and updating content.

Let's take a look at some of the other benefits of content modeling:

It helps you reuse and repurpose your content

Models are designed to make the content reusable across different parts of a website or even across different platforms. You can maintain streamlined content types while allowing customization through content attributes. This involves creating modular content that can be mixed, matched and reused without duplication.

You can standardize content across different platforms and channels

Content models facilitate the integration of content with other systems like CRM and ERP systems, social media and ecommerce platforms, enabling a seamless flow of information across channels. When your content model is well-defined, your team can easily translate it into different formats for use on various channels. This ensures consistency in messaging and branding across all of your marketing efforts.

Plus, a well-defined content model helps in managing the content lifecycle, from creation and maintenance to archiving. It provides a framework for content governance, ensuring that content remains consistent, relevant and up-to-date.

Content models improve UX

By structuring content effectively, models help in crafting better user experiences. Models ensure the content is accessible, logically organized and easy to navigate, enhancing the overall effectiveness of digital content.

Modeling facilitates collaboration

At a glance, you can use your content model to understand any asset on your website. It's a digital blueprint for understanding the structure of your site and how it all fits together. Since it's an accessible resource anyone can reference, communication with team members is a lot faster and more seamless (especially for remote and hybrid teams).

Setting up a content model in your CMS

Creating a content model within your CMS requires a structured approach to defining your content types, attributes and relationships.

Here’s a step-by-step guide on getting content modeling right:

1. Define your content types

Start by identifying the different types of content you need/use most — blog posts, landing pages, product listings and others. Map out how these different types fit together.

If you're running a text-based site, your most used content types will probably be blogs. Visually oriented sites might have more photo galleries and landing pages. Ecommerce sites would also have more product pages. Here, take inventory of the different sections of your site and how they’re organized.

• Is each section its own content type?
• How do these types relate to one another?

Brightspot provides a flexible system that allows you to define these types with specific fields and attributes. Not every pre-built type will fit your needs, which is why you can also make your own with our editorial content types functionality.

2. Create fields and attributes for each content type

For each content type, specify the fields that are needed, like title, body, images, etc. Brightspot allows you to set field types, validation rules and default values.

As an example, the article content type fields might include:

• Headline
• Subheadline
• Slug
• Author(s)
• Lead (gallery/image/video after the article's headline)
• Body text
• Section (visible to site users)
• Secondary section (not visible to site users)
• Publish date/time
• Sponsor
• Tags (topics, locations, etc.)

When creating your attributes, make sure they're easy to reuse. For instance, if you have multiple product pages, the attributes for "product name," "price," and "FAQ" should have a consistent appearance across each one.

For pre-built content types (like articles), you can auto-generate tags from the article's headline and body text.

3. Set up relationships between content types in your content model

Determine how different content types relate to each other. For example, an article might be related to an author or a blog post might link to a category. Setting up relationships will also help determine the structure of your site and how content is organized.

Brightspot supports one-to-one, one-to-many and many-to-many relationships.

4. Use modules and plugins

A CMS or digital experience platform (DXP) with composable architecture allows you to enhance your content types with pre-built modules and plugins, adding functionalities like SEO, social media integration or custom forms.

Doing this, you can easily manage content across the omnichannel without relying on custom development or tons of third-party tools.

5. Configure views to reflect your content model

Decide how the content will be displayed. You can customize views with templates and style configurations, allowing you to tailor how content appears on different platforms or devices.

For instance, an article might have a different layout on desktop vs. mobile.

Brightspot's view system supports headless and traditional implementations. Each supports the Model-View-ViewModel (MVVM) pattern, meaning that you can reuse models and views for both.

6. Test, iterate and refine

Once your content model is set up, test it to make sure it’s doing what you intended and that all the fields and attributes are working correctly. Preview the site in your CMS before publishing and make any necessary adjustments.

7. Deploy your content

Once your content model is finalized, use it to create and publish your content on your website. With a well-defined content model in place, you can easily manage and update your content with consistency and efficiency.

Content modeling is just one part of organizing your site

Investing in a composable platform enables you to easily define and manage your content model, fit it into your broader marketing stack and launch a best-in-class omnichannel experience.

By starting with this foundational step, you ensure that your content model aligns with both organizational goals and user needs.

Request a demo to see how Brightspot's approach to content modeling and how you can create and manage robust digital experiences with CMS at the core.

Inside Brightspot

Brightspot 2024 User Conference: Content is everywhere

By Alistair Wearmouth
May 15, 2024

Brightspot's 2024 User Conference brought together an audience of Brightspot CMS users, practitioners and partners for two days of conversation, learning and networking in Reston, Virginia. Here are some key takeaways and insights from the event.

Request a demo to see how Brightspot's approach to content modeling and how you can create and manage robust digital experiences with CMS at the core.