Producing online content for serviced office centers has three major benefits:
- When you regularly generate posts, you provide added value to your members’ experience with your organization.
- Your content serves as a marketing and advertising tool especially when shared by your members and network.
- You build your search engine optimization so that you can be more easily found online.
The major roadblock to creating a blog and posting on social media for most of the serviced office centers that I have worked with is that there is no one on staff with the time or writing skill to take on the responsibility. This roadblock is easily overcome by outsourcing content creation to a freelancer or agency that is dedicated to that function. Here, I’ll share some information on the different types of content companies to work with, features to look for, and warning signs to avoid.
Content Outsourcing Companies for Serviced Office Centers
There are two major categories of content production service providers: agencies and freelancers.
Agencies are businesses that generally employ several types of content creators: writers, graphic designers, videographers, and photographers. Agencies might also employ experts in marketing, advertising, and search engine optimization. If the agency is a larger one, you might be assigned an account manager who directs the creative and marketing team that works with your brand directly to fill your content needs. While smaller agencies might give you direct access to the person/people actually producing the content.
When you work with freelancers, you’re always working directly with the person who does the work. The advantage of working with an agency is that you benefit from the collective knowledge and experience from the entire staff assigned to your account. Agencies also have editors that review and proof your content before it’s pushed out for your audience to see. Because freelancers are in business for themselves and by themselves usually, it’s unlikely that they will be able to offer the editorial advantage. That means you may have to spend some time reviewing their content before it’s posted. And while a freelance writers tend to have an understanding of SEO as it pertains to content, they might be at a slight disadvantage when it comes to coding posts for searchability.
Must-Have Features
Whether you go with a freelancer or an agency, there are a few key features that your content creation server should offer.
- You want to make sure that they have experience writing for commercial real estate, entrepreneurship, and business owner audiences. They need to be able to offer insightful and well-researched pieces that appeal to your serviced office centers’ current and potential members and referral partners.
- The company you use should offer some type of analytics or reporting option to prove that the content they produce is driving traffic to your website and boosting your search engine optimization. Without this, you can’t fully see if the value they bring is worth the expense.
- Before you begin working with the content creation service, you should get a formal agreement in place. Agencies are likely to have packaged services and set terms and conditions. However, freelancers may be more flexible in their agreements. In both cases, ensure that the service they’re going to provide and the fees they’re going to charge are in writing.
Warning Signs to Avoid
There are some major red flags you’ll want to steer clear of when choosing your outsource service provider for online content creation. The first warning sign is a company that cannot provide you with a reference from a customer. This indicates the company or freelancer hasn’t had enough positive experience with customers to give a reference either due to time in business or dissatisfactory service. Either way, your serviced office center deserves a seasoned content creator that does quality work, and you can’t be sure that a company can provide that without hearing it from a satisfied customer. Don’t rely on the company’s own website testimonials alone. Another warning sign that applies to freelancers mainly is lack of business structure. Many freelancers work their businesses part-time, so they may have other obligations that can push your content to low priority. Ensure that if you use a freelance provider, they take their business seriously, have a formal agreement in place, and adhere to a standard for turnaround time and production deadlines.
Final Thoughts
Outsourcing your content creation for your social media and blog can be a huge time-saver for serviced office centers. Workspace Strategies is a leader in content creation for the workspace services industry. We provide all the flexibility and attentiveness of a freelance writer with the experience and team of resources of an agency. Workspace Strategies has spent countless hours of research to set up our team of writers. After finding our team, we have invested even more time educating them on the nuances of our industry. We have streamlined the process of delivering our clients’ message through their blogs, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and various other social media outlets. Content creation with Workspace Strategies is an effective marketing tool. Whether you want to establish a content creating partnership long-term or to have a one-time press release written, please contact us to set a time to talk.
