GCI’s continuous improvement journey with Sitecore Content Hub

In their Symposium 2024 presentation, Heather Nicholls, Senior Digital Product Manager at GCI, and Jennifer Johnson, Associate Director, Strategy & AI, at Horizontal Digital, shared GCI’s journey from digital asset management (DAM) to a full content marketing platform (CMP) and beyond.

GCI, Alaska's largest telecommunications provider, serves a unique and diverse audience spread across vast and remote communities. With offerings ranging from 5G mobile and high-speed internet to streaming TV and enterprise telecommunications, their content needs are as varied as their customer base. The challenge? Managing this complexity efficiently while maintaining a unified and scalable content strategy.

Creating a single source of truth

GCI’s journey began with a simple yet powerful goal–creating a single source of truth for all their content. By consolidating assets into Content Hub, they eliminated silos and inefficiencies, enabling seamless content reuse across digital platforms, traditional media, and even out-of-home placements.

For instance, a single support article can be adapted for multiple audiences, an internal knowledge base for support teams, and an external website for customers, with both versions pulling from the same source. Similarly, images uploaded as source files can be cropped and resized automatically for use across channels such as email, web, and social media.

This level of integration simplifies workflows and reduces errors, allowing GCI to automate tasks like content approvals and expirations. Content Hub has proven to be a powerful tool, that has streamlined processes and made their content ecosystem more manageable.

One of GCI’s most significant challenges revolved around metadata, a critical component of Content Hub. Robust metadata improves discoverability and enables advanced functionalities such as personalized experiences and automated content recommendations. But too much metadata can overwhelm content authors, leading to skipped steps and incomplete tagging—a problem they refer to as ‘the metadata paradox.’

Making content discoverable

Initially, GCI’s enthusiasm for metadata led them to request nearly 20 categories of metadata per asset, with most fields dumped into a confusing “tags” category containing 120 options. The result? Authors avoided metadata altogether, leaving assets poorly labeled and difficult to find. Nicholls described the outcome as “a metadata-less monstrosity,” with images named generically and no way to locate them later.

To resolve this, GCI reduced the number of metadata fields to 12 categories tailored to critical use cases. Authors now provide just enough information to make content discoverable without overwhelming themselves, striking the delicate balance necessary for success.

Reflecting on their journey, Nicholls emphasized the importance of preparation. GCI learned the hard way that simplicity is achieved only through thoughtful planning and execution. By rushing into implementation without fully understanding the downstream impacts, GCI had to spend time reconfiguring and retagging assets to align with their needs.

Key project takeaways

• Spend time on use case definitions to guide implementation decisions.
• Strategically develop metadata to ensure it supports discoverability without overburdening authors.
• Train content approvers on why adherence to metadata and naming guidelines is crucial.
• Take full advantage of Sitecore resources like administrator training and online forums.

As emphasized by Nicholls and Johnson, GCI’s journey with Sitecore Content Hub is ongoing. While they have already achieved significant improvements in efficiency and content management, they continue to refine their processes and explore new possibilities within the platform. By fostering collaboration across teams, embracing lessons from past challenges, and leveraging the full potential of Content Hub’s capabilities, GCI is setting the stage for even greater digital innovation.

Their advice to others embarking on a similar journey? Take the time to plan, prioritize simplicity, and involve stakeholders early and often. By combining technical expertise, strategic foresight, and a commitment to enhancing user experiences, you can bridge the gap between complexity and simplicity—delivering a seamless, impactful digital presence that meets the needs of your diverse audience.

Discover more about improving workflows and brand consistency and why a content hub is a must for marketing teams.