Building a great content design team to meet user needs

Problem

‍Keyboard magazine, the leading publication and website about musicians and music production, was losing market share as users began to get more of their information from manufacturer’s more sophisticated websites.

Solution‍

Find out what users wanted, and what they were not getting from our content. Then redesign, revitalize, and rebuild our content to match our users’ needs.

Role‍

As Editor in Chief, I directed user research, content design, and expanding our content design team, collaborating cross-functionally across ad sales, marketing, production, and C-level management teams.

Key activities

• Conducted user research (focus groups of users and non-users, interviews with stakeholders and users, user surveys, analytics)
• Analyzed data and identified user needs
• Created user personas based on research

• Recruited, hired, and trained 10 new content designers — and involved them in the design process

Instructional Design Lens

Growing the team from a handful of writers to a ten-person content design group was itself an instructional design challenge — not just hiring, but building the onboarding and skill-building path that got new hires producing at a professional level fast enough to hit a hard redesign deadline.

• Designed onboarding around the personas and research findings the team had just generated, so new hires learned the "why" behind the redesign before being asked to execute it.
• Used the content guide, developed in parallel, as a living training resource for the team rather than a static reference — the same document taught new writers the voice and served as the standard they were measured against.
• Ran brainstorming and design iteration as a shared practice, not a top-down handoff, so newer team members built judgment through participation rather than instruction alone.

• Developed a content guide
• Facilitated brainstorming and design iterations with the content team
• Launched the redesigned print and digital content

Results

• Increased advertising revenue and market share
• Grew readership
• Created a cohesive, talented, and effective content design team
• Improved user experience with content that met their needs
• Met all deadlines and financial goals

Key takeaways

• User-centered design approach was crucial to success
• Building a strong content design team was essential
• Involving the content design team in the design and iteration process led to better outcomes
• The redesign achieved the goals of realigning with user needs and regaining market share