Modular Content Components: How Do They Work? Why Use Them?

Let's start by imagining the “bad” scenario! The one where you don't implement modular content components in the creation/editing process on your website! It will only lead to a poor editorial experience, where editors/content authors:

 

1. depend on your technical team for every little tweak that they need to apply to content on your Drupal site; which will obviously slow down the processes of updating content and sending it to your various distribution partners    
    
2. are forced to learn HTML and thus to focus less on creating and polishing content and rather on acquiring some sort of technical “expertise”
    

Granting your editorial team (even more) flexibility will benefit:

 

1. you, as an organization, since they'll be empowered to run all the necessary updates, in due time, with great ease
    
2. your site builders and Drupal developers who will then win more time to focus on their own tasks (no one wants to get interrupted from his/her work each time there's content to be added or to be edited on the website).
    

So, it's a sort of win-win-win type of situation ( where you, as an organization, your content authors, and your team of developers gets to win)! 

And now let's detail the concept of “flexible modular content components”, and point out why they shape the future of content creation:

 

1. How Should The Content Creation Process “of The Future” Be Like?

First of all, it should definitely go beyond:

 

1. the "box body" concept
    
2. the content management framework that your Drupal development team can program to do anything by using just the proper custom site-building techniques
    

The future of content creation lies in a redefinition of content in CMS and in putting the spotlight on the creation experience itself! It's that improved creation experience that will easily lead to a unique, easy to personalize user experience.

And there's more:

 

• content of the future should be a “cluster” of modular content components of rich media
   
• creating and editing content should be a simple, few-steps process with no technical “burden” involved
   
• content of the future should be exchangeable across platforms and to support multiple forms of media
   
• content of the future should easily adjust to the requirements of a multi-channel publishing context
   

Needless to add that a weakened creation experience, where the content writer/editor/publisher is fully dependent on the technical team, will only lead to slow site updates. And you definitely don't want to fall behind with your updates!

 

2. The Content Creation Process of the Present 

Now, before we highlight for you the benefits that you can reap from adopting a structured modular content on your Drupal site, let's take a look at the “current” issues that modular content components come to solve:

 

• the “one and only WYSIWYG” standard
   
• content writers aren't granted as much “independence” as they should in order to create/edit content without any technical support from the development team
   
• leaving content creators no option but to put together layouts within the WYSIWYG editor and to learn HTML
   

3. But What Is Modular Content After All?

Making your content modular means switching from the practice where you edit a page, on your site, as a whole, to that where it gets automatically generated from other content items. For instance, an example of “content item” could be the “recipes” one on a farmers market website.

The key benefit of adopting modular content is that you're granted consistency across the content on your site and that the entire editing process gets automated.

For instance, once a piece of vendor information gets changed, all the pieces of content on your website that display that particular information gets instantly updated.

Step into the future of automated content updating and leave behind the irksome manual updating process!

Moreover, you get to leverage the power of modular content for putting together page sections and composite web pages, too!

 

4. What About Modular Content Components? What Are They?

You could see them as “tools” empowering your content creation and editing team to:

 

1. easily add new sections without the help of the technical department in your organization
    
2. send their pieces of content to several distribution channels (sending them, each, specifically those content formats that meet their requirements).
    

And all this in just one single step!

 

5. “Should I Be Integrating Modular Content Components in My Content Creation Process, too?”

It depends!

It depends on whether it's crucial for the whole workflow within your team that your content editors should be able to update content on the fly and to send it to your network of distribution partners “in the blink of an eye”.

If it's the case, then you should definitely leverage the modular content components' functionality on your Drupal site, too!

This way, you'll be empowering your editorial team with a simple, yet highly effective drag-and-top tool that they can use for adding new content components quick and easy. 

The next step is to send it to your content distribution partners, whether it's Facebook, AOL, or Apple News, or none of these three.

 

6. Key Modular Content Functionalities Worth Your Attention

5.1. Consistency Across Your Website 

And you can't underestimate the advantage of keeping a consistent branding throughout your Drupal site!

This is precisely what you can achieve using modular content components:

 

• you'll eliminate those situations where your team uses inconsistent layouts when publishing content, taken from legacy website designs
   
• re-branding your website will turn into a streamlined process with a solid and scalable architecture as its foundation; it will be a lot easier to “implement” the new look and feel across your website and to achieve a consistent branding
   
• the current situations where content authors just drop “slices” of HTML into the WYSIWYG editor will become “history” on your new future platform, a highly maintainable and nicely structured one; a modular content components-powered one!
   

5.2. Easily Adjustable Content According to Your Distribution Partners' Restrictions

It will be far easier for your content editing team to tailor it to their specific restrictions! Since with modular content components they get to edit and update content with such ease! 

Whether it's:

 

• links that they need to remove in order to comply with your distribution channels' requirements
   
• certain formats that they should stick to
   
• any other special requests that they need to meet while creating or editing their articles
   

… with Modular Content components integrated into their article creation process, it all gets much more streamlined!

 

5.3. Marketing Power 

And you surely can't afford to underestimate digital marketing-oriented tools that help you build targeted and ideally creative advertising campaigns:

 

• you have the Double Click for Publishers module
   
• you have flexible ad tags that you get to use for implementing your campaigns
   
• you have built-in identifiers helping you achieve your “smart targeting” goals through your campaigns
   

Need we add any more reasons that modular content components make the future of content creation? Are you ready to embrace the future?