As a relatively new Hippo, I’ve been getting to meet a lot of the content team and I’ve enjoyed hearing about everyone’s journey into the profession. I’ve always felt that while there are lots of principles of content design you can learn, the experiences you bring from other roles are equally as vital. Especially as content design is still a new profession, so we need to adapt existing skills. 

So, I thought I’d reflect on my journey into content design and how these roles have shaped my work.

Thank you for the music

I knew I wanted to work in music from a very young age. When speaking to my careers advisor at school, I told him by the time I was 30 that I would be working with Oasis, Pulp and Boyzone. After listening, he begrudgingly tried to convince me that being a nurse would be a better career choice, so he “helped me” select the nursing subjects and then waved me out of his office, thinking job well done.

Fast forward a few years and I’d failed Higher Biology, not once. But twice. 

The nursing career I never wanted was in tatters. Going back to my original plan, I went on to study Commercial Music at university. Whilst there, on the back of a Dreamweaver website design module, I realised if I wanted to work in the music industry, digital was the way forward. 

It was the dawn of social media. Everyone was HTML coding their MySpace page background and deliberating over what song to have on their profile. I saw a gap and began cold emailing record labels and management companies offering to update MySpace profiles and websites as well as manage their fan forums. From there, my own freelance business began as I started working at Deltasonic Records, home of The Coral and The Zutons. 

Now having actual clients, I continued reaching out to record labels and to my surprise, got a response from Ignition Management. This reply would land me what was potentially my favourite job and first on teenage me’s bucket list. I was employed to manage Oasis’ social media, having the all-important task of rotating their top 8 friends on MySpace weekly!

I then entered the world of record labels, initially with Decca and then with Island Records. I worked with a wide variety of releases, from Pavarotti and Lil Wayne to McFly and Florence and the Machine before moving into artist management with Ben Howard and Sam Fender. 

I continued freelancing and consulting on campaigns, sending emails along the way, which led to working with Ronan Keating in 2007. Then Boyzone got back together again. One more check on the list!

I returned to music full-time last year managing digital marketing for Oasis and Noel Gallagher, where I was involved in implementing the fan engagement platform they used for the tour announcement and presales! 

Looking back on my work in music, I didn’t appreciate how much I took from those roles into what I do now. 

  • Like in music, being a content designer means being skilled at your craft but also ready to take on other things. A bit of research here, some UX design there, maybe even some coding. We’re not just jacks of all trades; we’re masters of our own too.
  • Stakeholder management is a big part of the job. You come across a huge range of people, and the number of connections you make is vast. Often, people aren’t sure what we actually do, so being able to explain it clearly and help them understand is essential.
  • It’s about understanding your audience and giving them the right content. Music was where I first learned this, figuring out what works on each platform and tailoring what you create to meet that need.

Unwritten

Whilst I was working freelance in music, I started a job working on a newspaper website, moderating the user-generated content function which had recently launched. The day before I started, I realised the role was with the Daily Mail. 

Now, bear with me on this one! It was a job of two halves. I was employed to read the vast number of comments on the news articles and decide if they sat within the guidelines for the website. Both a hugely terrifying and funny insight into the mind of the British public.

The 2nd part of the job involved taking user comments and editing them into a daily letters page in the now-defunct London Lite newspaper. Which was no mean feat, considering some of the content in the comments!

  • This was the first introduction to style guides, tone of voice and guidelines around what kind of content was acceptable for the service. Creating and editing to standards was completely new to me then.
  • Compliance. Everything had the potential to become a legal problem. Learning about the importance of processes and being involved in developing them to ensure that all content was compliant but in a way that worked for the content team too.
  • A key takeaway was that we might not always feel aligned with the content we create, but being able to view it objectively and set emotions aside is essential.

Money, money, money

Wanting to gain experience in a different sector, I started contracting with various banks, including Barclays, Tesco Bank, and Sainsbury’s Bank, under a range of job titles:

  • Web publisher
  • Content manager
  • Website editor
  • Content editor
  • Web manager

Despite the different titles, the roles were largely the same: taking complex content and processes, presenting them in the best way for the user and the platform, managing legal and policy approvals, and uploading content to websites.

This was my first real introduction to User-centred Design (UCD). I was often the only person in the team doing this kind of work, but it was here that I realised these various roles I’d been filling were part of something much bigger.

It was also my first experience with agile ways of working. While content wasn’t always part of the boards or processes, being exposed to this way of working and gradually becoming more involved helped me understand the broader teams behind projects and how UCD can fit into that in the most effective way.

Bring it on home to me

All these roles combined led to my first Content Designer role at Social Security Scotland. I was the 2nd content designer in the team and during my time there the team grew to 60+, each designer coming from a very varied and different work background which I think was a key attribute for the team. The shared learnings are invaluable, especially for people who are new to the profession.

Without a doubt, all the experience and learnings I’ve gained in roles that might seem quite far away from content design, have all played a big part in how I work as a content designer today.

Also, if you’ve made it this far then you’ll want to know that I consulted on a Pulp reissue shortly before I turned 30. Meaning, I could tick the final band off my list!