DIIS & contentgroup

Australian Government Department of Industry, Innovation and Science & contentgroup

Content Framework: A Better Way to Communicate

While it's never been easier to create and distribute content, communication professionals will agree it's never been harder to get people's attention. For government departments, this becomes an even tougher challenge. To help address this challenge and enable the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science (DIIS) to better engage citizens, it engaged communication agency contentgroup to develop a content communications framework to create consistent, easy to understand and streamlined communication strategies.

Through developing and implementing an efficient and effective content framework, DIIS aims to be a leader in the way it communicates both internally and externally.

The draft content framework, informed by existing user insights and best-practice models, was developed to improve the way DIIS communicates with its staff, stakeholders and the public. This framework includes templates and guides that aim to maximise the reach and impact of the department's stories, successes and insights. The framework will assist in better repurposing and better targeted towards a range of different audiences. 

The content framework draws upon existing resources (such as the department’s growing bank of case studies) and complements other internal reform projects.

The content framework enables DIIS staff to:

Deliver persuasive stories and facts to citizens and stakeholders through a deliberate, evidence-based and user-focussed approach.
Ensure a consistent narrative and voice across divisions.
Enhance communication capability amongst staff.
Benchmark and measure benefits delivered.
Improve the shelf-life and impact of high-profile content.

DIIS will operationalise the framework in four stages, firstly educating the content creators within the department and then introducing the framework across the entire department to all employees. The four stages are:

Online content including websites and social media 
Case studies
Newsletters
Stakeholder messaging

While the evaluation process cannot be fully completed until after the project has been fully implemented, DIIS has identified that the best way to measure effectiveness is through the reduction of duplicated or unreviewed content on their website and growing their social media base.

DIIS also hopes for regular interviews and people surveys to measure the project’s success. The surveys and interviews will be conducted to both internal staff, as well as external stakeholders.

More so, they will monitor page interactions, website feedback and improvements in both staff and customer satisfaction. Reduction in customer calls will also be a measure with the hope that more concise information will result in better communication and interaction with customers.

DIIS will make note of all this through statistics in order to get a clear picture of how well the project has worked.