How to build a scalable workflow for B2B

It’s well known that content production takes time.

Michelangelo had his eye on the Sistine Chapel ceiling for four years. Leonardo da Vinci spent 16 years touching up the Mona Lisa. Barcelona’s Sagrada Familia took Gaudi the last 43 years of his life, and it’s still not finished. 

What’s less well-known is that most of this time wasn’t spent with a paintbrush or trowel. Michelangelo’s “workflow” mostly involved designing scaffolds.

Leo’s “content marketing” was about developing new techniques, not pretty paintings. And Gaudi’s “content at scale” was more about fundraising than building. 

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In other words, the content marketing process can be a far bigger job than content creation.

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This matters because it’s the process – the content marketing workflow – that gets the product “out there” and produces results for your business.

The Louvre wouldn’t have its most famous exhibit if Leo had just doodled randomly on his kitchen walls. (Although to be fair, he was a bit of a procrastinator.)

Bad process means wasted resources, missed deadlines, and subpar quality … and it crushes team morale faster than a falling marble statue.

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Looking for tips on content strategy instead?

Read Crafting a Perfect Content Strategy

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That’s why we’re big on process at Contentoo.

As companies scale up, their B2B content workflows need to scale too – and ideally at a faster rate, so returns from your content strategy can grow even as teams get larger and approval processes more complex.

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How can you make sure your workflows match your ambitions? There’s a proven method.

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It involves looking critically at your current process, clear communication as to what-success-looks-like, and automating what’s automatable while keeping the conversation productive among your humans with a collaborative methodology.

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And - of course - the part that delivers continuous improvement: wash, rinse, repeat. It’s what we do – and it has six distinct parts. Let’s share them.
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Section 1: Assess your current workflow

Many workflows grow the same way most companies do – messy, complicated, reacting to circumstances rather than forward planned.

This means bottlenecks and inefficiencies get “baked in”, with people doing things the way they’ve always done without even realising where the timewasters are.

So – however hard it feels – start with a comprehensive audit of your current workflow.

For best results, go back to basics.

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Literally, roam around your team and ask what actually happens when someone says, “We need a piece of content”. Note down how it’s briefed, who’s involved, the sequence of approvals and the metrics applied.

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(No metrics, you say? You’d be surprised how often that’s the case.) It can be fun – and revealing.

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You’ll see all sorts of time sinks and misallocated resources. Mismatched skills lead to unqualified people with Edit permissions. Cumbersome sign offs from unrelated roles. Outdated software, or no software at all. Long production cycles. Gaps where quality falls short.

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Here’s a tip: For each interaction on the journey, ask if this action adds value. If not – cut, cut, and cut again.

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Want to choose the right platform for your B2B content workflows? Here’s what to consider.

A lot of Contentoo clients find outsourcing content to external professionals is a great way to free up time in their own schedules – why not think about where your content production flow could do the same?

And by the way: “We need a piece of content” above isn’t a business goal. For that part, read on.
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Section 2: Define clear processes and goals

Planning a faster, smoother, easier process – creating something completely fresh on a blank canvas – can be wonderfully refreshing. (As Michelangelo would agree.)

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From that initial idea or content, map out every step it needs to go through to become a high-performing chunk of content marketing in your chosen channels … including all the people (job titles are best), resources, and time each step takes.

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Keep in what adds to the quality, discard what doesn’t.

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Of course, to define that journey, you need both a starting point and an endpoint. So, the next critical part of your content marketing workflow is to decide on an end goal. What, really, do you want this piece of content to achieve? Readership? Leadership? Turn-the-ship-aroundship?

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Think whether you want to influence opinions, awareness, actions … or anything else.

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Set yourself some worthwhile metrics to shoot for – perhaps how you can double the viewership of your content without adding more headcount.

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Marketing automators StoryChief have some tips we enjoyed reading.

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And that leads us to the next level of content marketing processes – scale. A hero thinkpiece deserves wider distribution than your blog: careful adaptation can make it sing across trade websites, social media, and even visual channels like Instagram and YouTube, increasing reach and frequency without needing a new creative concept or text. 

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That’s another Contentoo plus point, btw. One large client scales its output across markets, audiences, and languages by using our platform to engage the right freelance talent at the right time – from copywriters to translators to localisation experts.

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(And no, localisation isn’t the same as translation – see the difference here.)

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Finally, don’t forget to plan for time.

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Content calendars can keep your workflows honest with specific dates and deadlines for each activity; use them. And if those timelines look tight – let’s talk next about automation.
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Section 3: Leverage automation

Even in the age of AI, people and machines have different talents.

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Humans are great at creative “thinking” tasks like ideation, concept development, and innovative solutions. Software is great at well-defined, repetitive tasks like content scheduling, SEO audits, data-gathering and performance measurement. So why not swing in apps where it makes sense?

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Tools like Asana, Zapier, and Trello can help teams manage tasks without piling on administrative burdens, saving time and money for a huge list of repeated tasks in the B2B content workflow. (We bet they’d have helped Antoni Gaudi with his 100th finance raise.)

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If you’re looking to scale up content volumes with automation, take a look at Actionable Tips on Content Scaling.

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You may use other tools already. Make sure each is well suited to its role … software needs performance management as much as people. Make time for an annual audit of the tools you’re using and whether they remain your best choices as the market evolves. 

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One Contentoo freelancer did a project on this and discovered that using our platform for his client base led to an average of 60% lower administrative overhead, meaning he delivered each project in half the time.

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And that’s a single freelancer! Imagine those advantages rolled out across a 60-person team. And to make that team work … let’s talk collaboration next.
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Section 4: Foster collaboration and communication

Maybe great art comes from a tortured individual, but great content marketing needs a little more manpower.

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Who in your process needs to talk to each other, and at what points in the workflow? Rather than corral people into strict times and dates for interaction, it’s better to adopt a platform everyone can collaborate on in the depth they need.

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Slack and Notion are popular for this reason, combining the permanence of email with the context of social media. When adopted enterprise-wide, they build a culture of communication that can include reminders, summaries, and nudges to action … making sure everyone stays on the same page with shared understanding. Slack’s classic article on communicative collaboration has plenty of insights.

The great thing about this is that it’s not limited to your internal people.
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With a widely-known collaboration platform, you can bring external experts – freelance copywriters, editors, translators, project managers – into your internal workflow, each expert doing the jobs you don’t want to handle in-house.
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Incidentally, Contentoo itself is a collaboration platform of sorts. Each project has its own discussion space and simple workflow for exchanging documents, feedback, and approvals – and even for some large-scale projects clients are finding it’s all they need.

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One B2B big name scaled its output tenfold by bringing multilingual experts from across the world together in one place for localisation projects. So, if you’re looking to make external resources part of your content marketing workflow, talk to us first. Next up: how to stay agile, with Agile.
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Section 5: Prioritise agile content strategies

On the same theme of “enable, don’t control” comes a philosophy for keeping your workflow, well, flowing: stay flexible with Agile.
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Agile is a methodology with roots in software development. But it works brilliantly for a long list of business tasks – including content production and distribution at scale. It starts with the concept that it’s impossible to know everything in advance, so plans should be able to adapt and evolve.
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Accordingly, Agile makes you iterative – always moving forward, not always getting the expected result, but always learning and correcting mistakes.
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It’s especially useful for evergreen content that stays in the market for years: what if a new channel or website gained traction and you suddenly realise it belongs on your distribution plan?
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For some hints on getting your stuff out there, see Content Distribution Strategy: The Ultimate Guide
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Flexibility and iteration trump brittle one-size-fits-all strategies every time. That’s why we enjoy Agile strategies here at Contentoo. Because the market is constantly moving, and so should you.

Let’s move on now to measurement and optimisation.
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Section 6: Measure and optimise continuously

Whether you call ‘em CSFs, KPIs, or just plain counting clicks, management means measurement. All the more, if you’re developing a new workflow and need to know if it’s functioning at the max. 
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We can’t tell you which metrics will work for you – every business is different. But in general, those that show how you’re performing at scale will be best. For example, is your audience growing linearly or exponentially with headcount? (If it’s linear, you’re not leveraging scale advantages yet.)

Are your output volumes rising faster than resource costs? Are your engagement indicators (views, clickthroughs, dwell time, comment density) getting better as your audience enlarges? 
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This is how you manage your content marketing at scale. And best of all, with the right workflows, activities, people, and platforms in place, you’ve got the connected infrastructure that can give you this information!
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But a cautionary note: while the numbers matter, don’t forget the human stuff. Always include a few “qualitative” metrics with the quants, like people’s satisfaction or sense of pride.

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Remember, ultimately, people read content because they like it – and “likeable” content, with humanity and warmth, comes from the efforts of engaged and happy people. 
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Culture design consultancy GapingVoid has these thoughts on high purpose culture.
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We like to think we run a happy ship at Contentoo, with unusually strong teamwork and motivation scores – and it wasn’t an accident. We built our culture by paying close attention to workflows and processes and optimising them for greater productivity and satisfaction from both our people and our clients. Which is what makes Contentoo more than a workflow app – it’s a true content marketing workflow platform.
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And these six ideas can make your content workflows the same – at scale. Let’s wrap up this mini-guide.

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Conclusion

Think of it as a mantra: assess workflows, define goals, automate repetitive tasks, connect and collaborate, adopt flexible methodology, and optimise continuously.
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It works even if your content calendar is a single blog a month. But it really shines when you scale up because it makes your workflows perform disproportionately better the bigger your volume gets.
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And that’s what we do at Contentoo: work with you to build content marketing workflows that deliver at scale. Our platform helps your team produce and refine content with some of the world’s top freelance talent … in a way that works for the enterprise.
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We may not be Michelangelo or Leonardo – but we do work with hundreds of top global talents (and we’ve got better workflow management for the win). Ready to talk to us? We’re right here.

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