The Content Strategy Rap
Ah, sweet inspiration...
One of the best parts of attending Confab last week in Minneapolis was having the opportunity to meet, in person, all the fabulously talented content strategists I’ve been connecting with on Twitter and through various content groups. To my delight, they are as smart in person as they are online — and a funny, talented, irreverent bunch to boot.
One evening saw us downing cocktails (including the brilliantly named Lorem Sipsum) and admitting a secret, shared affinity for Vanilla Ice…whereupon we started ad-libbing content-themed lyrics to the seminal hip-hop masterpiece “Ice Ice Baby.”
Buzzing on caffeine and enabled by a four-hour flight delay, I made use of my trip home to write a complete version. With apologies to Mr. Ice, and a thank-you to Margot Bloomstein, Erin Kissane, and Leen Jones for the alcohol-fueled inspiration, I present to you a content strategist’s rap:
NICE NICE BABY
(sung to the tune of “Ice Ice Baby,” by Vanilla Ice)
All right, stop! Collaborate and listen
We are here on a content mission
Content grabs a hold of us tightly
Analyzed and revised, daily and nightly
Will it ever stop? Yo, we don’t know
You think it’s good — but it blows
To the extreme, we gotta edit and handle
All your attempts to write are a scandal
Damn! All those conference rooms
Are killing my brain like a poisonous mushroom
Deadly, when I got no taxonomy
No workflow and the client’s all over me
Love it, can’t leave it, with content I’ll stay
I’m a content strategist and I don’t play
If there is a problem yo I’ll solve it
Check out my site plan as I evolve it
CHORUS
Nice nice baby…my content’s nice nice baby (repeat 2x)
Now that everyone’s jumping
Through stakeholder hoops, we gotta do something
Quick to the point, to the point no faking
Usable content is better than bacon
Bad formats hurt my head, like a cymbal
I go crazy when content’s not nimble
Or semantic, with no RDF, yo
Is that good? Nah, I have to say no
Rollin’, on Web 2.0
The tags aren’t right, we need SEO.
The boss is on standby, gotta make one more try
Did it work? Yeah, it was real fly
Kept on pursuing to the next goal
Social media is how we’re gonna roll
Facebook and Twitter, yo, let’s continue to
APIs — apps on every phone!
Content’s hot and we are the genies
Turning Hyundais into Lamborghinis
Jealous ‘cause our content is fine
We are a 10 and at best you’re a 9
Look at all those chumps on the walls
Wanna-be strategists who have no *alls
Web stats are ringing our bells
Traffic’s up, and we can tell
That users are finding stuff real fast
Our new IA is kicking some ass
Over and over, the sales funnel’s packed
Tons of conversions that we can track
Consumers on the scene, you know what I mean
What we’re doing is a strategist’s dream
If there is a problem, yo we’ll solve it
Check out our site plan as we evolve it
REPEAT CHORUS
Take heed, ‘cause I’m a strategy poet
I’m always on the scene just in case you didn’t know it
My plans, so clever, smart and sound
So strong they kick holes in the ground
We clean up your chemical spills
Caused by all of your content ills
Conducting an audit
That’s a hell of a concept
We do it well, so you wanna stick with this
We come to your aid, slice your content up with a razor blade
So fast, everybody says damn
With so much data we should charge by the gram
Keep our composure when it’s time to produce
All our findings, reports, and the data we used
If there is a problem yo we’ll solve it
Check out our site plan while we evolve it
Nice, nice, baby…our content’s nice nice baby (repeat to fade)
C.C. Holland 
as a hip hop fan, that makes me sad.
but as a content strategist, it makes me amazed and happy that there were enough of you in one place to do this!
perhaps you could do a folk song next time though?
Gretchen, absolutely! Just suggest a favorite tune (ideally, one that resonates in the zeitgeist) and I’ll see what I can come up with. Hmm, this could become a thing…
Legendary! I love it.
Secretly happy, this post didn’t delve into content strategists’ affinity to star in musicals.
🙂
Matt
Don’t count your chickens, Gene Kelly…I might be saving that for another post.