When it is engineered to be in line with positioning and serve a media outlet’s different objectives, content can do much more than attract audiences and secure high ratings or circulation. It can become a powerful strategic tool, serving to bolster the media’s brand and performance. The strategic management of content can indeed play an important part in helping various media outlets accomplish concrete goals, ranging from achieving commercial and financial success to securing a sustainable competitive advantage.

Following a thorough analysis of their current content strategies, S2C recommends ways for media outlets to align their existing content with the positioning they are seeking to establish for themselves. It also recommends ways of entirely updating content, suggesting fresh, innovative ways of producing quality content that also helps to achieve the organization’s objectives. S2C also offers its clients full content support and development by working closely with qualified partners, staying on to oversee the implementation of its recommendations.

The historic events that have been reshaping the Middle East since the start of the ‘Arab Spring’ and the subsequent shattering of what had long been the status quo have required media outlets across the region to adapt to this newly formed reality. With freedom of expression on the rise and opinions multiplying by the day, media outlets now need to find their place amidst the surrounding upheaval and deliver content in line with their stated mission and vision. What’s more, this must be done while upholding their newly relevant role as the Fourth Estate tasked with elevating political maturity and promoting democratic practices such as accountability and transparency.

S2C offers media outlets a number of services to help them navigate these new waters. It provides editorial line development aimed at establishing and applying a clear editorial direction that allows the outlet to affirm its identity while effectively fulfilling its role as a responsible fourth estate. S2C also provides program concept development, as well as content support and development, helping outlets adapt to the changing political climate and address emerging issues including citizenship, voting and elections, reform implementation, and institution building.

Media outlets in the Arab world, far from being seen as powers of the Fourth Estate that hold political parties and officials accountable for their actions, are all too often perceived as existing to further the agendas of different political parties or currents by serving as their mouthpieces. This can change, however, if media outlets assert their independence and strive to create a self-regulated industry whose members uphold values and codes of ethical conduct they have endeavored to set for themselves.

Through its years of experience in the field, S2C can guide media outlets through the process of developing their very own ethical charts. Such charts must be the fruit of a reflective process that accounts for the specificities of every individual organization, assessing its needs, determining its shortcomings, and designing ways to align its own practices with those international benchmarks recognized for their credibility and commitment to ethical conduct. Based on all of the above, a customized chart can be developed and communicated to the entire organization, ensuring that its members understand the need for it and apply it in their day to day operations.