Content marketing should be an organization-wide initiative. Think about it. Not all of the thought leaders in your organization sit in marketing. Think about what type of expertise can be contributed from your product teams, executive teams, sales, and customer service teams.

Content marketers are responsible for building relationships, conveying the story of the business, and engaging customers in a unique and humanistic way. But it is tough to tell the story of the entire business in a vacuum. You must create a culture for content contribution to be successful.

But how can you harness this expertise and thought leadership in order to create highly valuable content that will not only resonate with your target audience, but will also help you convert buyers? As any content marketer knows, this is easier said than done.

Luckily, with a good strategy in place and some internal evangelism, you can start building a content culture inside your organization.

Step 1: Create Program Guidelines

The first step is to create formalized program guidelines around content creation and contribution. Determine exactly how you want your various teams to contribute. Do you want employees to blog? Create ebooks? Be active on social media? All of the above? If so, outline exactly what you are looking for and come up with guidelines and formalized steps around submissions and approvals. You also probably have brand and voice guidelines you want to jot down and make available. You want people to contribute, but it must be on-brand and consistent with the rest of your content creation.

Make sure these guidelines are made available for employees. Create a mini-ebook or a microsite that details everything they need to know in order to contribute effectively.

Step 2: Get Executive Buy-in

In order to create a content-centric culture, it needs to start from the top down. You need to get your executives on board to create content and evangelize the benefits of creating content to all company employees. once you have your program outlined and documented, set up meetings with the powers-that-be on an individual level and walk them through all of your plans. Get them on board! A great way to begin your program is to get an executive to send out the first introductory email.

You also want to make sure your executives themselves are contributing to content creation. If they don't have time to blog themselves set up 30-45 minute brain dump sessions with them so they can dictate their ideas to you. Then you can formulate a blog for them. If your employees see that your executives are contributing content, they will follow suit.

Step 3: Consider Incentives

Incentives are always a great way to peak the attention of your thought leaders. Give them an immediate WIIFM. The toughest part of your challenge will be to initially get the ball rolling and enticing incentives are a quick and easy way to gain some momentum. Obviously incentives depend on your budget. If you are lucky and have a large budget consider some high ticket items like ipads, cameras, airline tickets and so on for a certain number of blogs or other content contributions. if you have a smaller budget what about a day off? A team pizza party? Company swag? Or some equity grants if you have those available. I have even seen many companies start tying bonuses directly to content contribution.

And from my experience, even though these incentives get people excited to make their first contribution it is usually the long-term value of being content contributors that keep employees coming back for more content!

Step 4: Provide Training and 1:1 Consultations

Don’t assume that everyone knows how to write. There will be people in your organization that have great ideas but who aren’t comfortable putting them down on paper. There will be people who would love to write but have never actually put a pen to paper to create a compelling blog. You will certainly notice varying levels of interest amongst your employees. Make sure you are catering to everyone’s writing and interest level.

Provide interested contributors training on how to blog or create long-form content. This can be done through in-person slide decks, on-demand training, and even 1:1 consultations. When you first begin a program like this 1:1 training will be particularly important. Some people don’t want to put themselves out there in front of a group. Offer 1:1 time with you so you can go through submitted content together--or just bounce ideas off of one another.

Step 5: Launch Your Program with a Bang

When you launch your content contribution program, launch it with a bang. Make an impact that your company will remember! Consider theming your program and creating fun posters to evangelize it throughout your organization. Choose a launch date and have an executive send out the launch email. Also consider getting some swag made that promotes your program. Stickers, waterbottles, t-shirts, anything to draw attention to content creation and your program. If you launch everything on the same day and roll it out, your program will have an impact that your teams will remember.

Ultimately, getting your organization to be regular content contributors is a sea change, but with some focus, dedication, and incentives, you can surely change the organizational culture towards content.