4 months earlier than its January 2022 debut, GO! Journal was solely an concept.
The content material staff at Pega thought {a magazine} may work effectively as a pure extension of the model’s profitable Way forward for Work content material marketing campaign.
Nobody on the staff knew journal publishing, however that didn’t cease them.
Two weeks after they pitched the thought, GO! Journal moved ahead. Impressively, the staff stayed on schedule and printed the digital and print variations of the now award-winning journal as deliberate.
“In hindsight, it was ridiculous and loopy, however superb that we managed to do it,” says Nick Lake, senior director of worldwide advertising at Pega.
That bold content material mission was one of many causes Nick was not too long ago named 2022 B2B Content material Marketer of the Yr.
GO! Journal is the publication the tech world didn’t comprehend it wanted, based on Pega’s Content material Advertising Awards submission. Subjects lined within the inaugural concern cowl themes essential to the model and its potential prospects: automation journeys, IT unicorns, citizen builders, methods to lead higher, inclusivity within the workforce, decoding the bias of AI, and Pfizer’s frictionless drug-development mission administration system.
GO! took prime honors for greatest new publication design and greatest general design. The mission additionally earned finalist honors for greatest new print publication, greatest general editorial, and greatest distribution of a know-how publication. The staff’s Tech Developments 2025 report earned a finalist nod for greatest use of unique analysis in content material advertising. Way forward for Work earned finalist mentions for greatest B2B branded content material marketing campaign and greatest built-in content material advertising program (print/digital).
However the GO! story started a number of years earlier than its quick-to-market debut.
Taking a model journalism launch from concept to printed in 4 months felt ridiculous, loopy, and superb, says @NickLake1 by way of @AnnGynn and @CMIContent. Click on To Tweet
To start with
When Nick joined Pega 4 years in the past, the corporate didn’t have a devoted content material advertising program. “We had a whole lot of content material, however we didn’t have any sort of construction or course of or governance round it,” he explains.
It fell to Nick to develop a program and deal with the problem downside. His first step? Conduct a content material audit. He discovered Pega wasn’t completely different from many corporations – a lot of the content material produced didn’t get used.
Underneath Nick’s management, that’s all modified. Content material doesn’t get created if it doesn’t serve a function. And that function should align with Pega’s technique and messaging.
“The standard of a corporation’s thought management content material is essentially the most seen illustration of the model. It’s what potential purchasers make choices based mostly on,” he says.
By organizing and constructing a strategic content material staff, Nick helped others within the firm acknowledge how crucial content material is to the enterprise. It acts because the gasoline to energy the model’s go-to-market packages.
And Nick’s position? “Typically, my job is to be a inventive particular person. And generally it’s to be a site visitors cop (to the remainder of the group),” he says.
A strategic content material staff is crucial to enterprise – it’s the gasoline that powers go-to-market efforts, says @NickLake1 by way of @AnnGynn and @CMIContent. Click on To Tweet
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Pega challenges the traditional
Powering the corporate’s advertising isn’t a easy feat. The model’s low-code, AI-powered decisioning and workflow automation platform competes for patrons in opposition to high-profile, big-name manufacturers with greater budgets. “As a challenger model, Pega must do issues otherwise and present up otherwise,” Nick explains.
On the identical time, the content material market is noisier than ever. “The pandemic was an enormous wake-up name. Organizations needed to speed up their transition to digital advertising,” Nick says. “The bar has gotten larger over the past couple of years.”
So Pega adopted a test-and-learn mentality to assist it zero in on content material that breaks by means of the noise. “We’ll strive issues. In the event that they don’t work, we’ll fail quick. But when they do work, we’re going to double down,” Nick says.
One of many staff’s first tries got here within the type of Pega’s Way forward for Work report, based mostly on the corporate’s unique analysis. When that labored effectively, Pega spun off gated stories targeted on area of interest audiences with the Way forward for IT, Way forward for Operations, and Way forward for Advertising. This fall, they’ll add the Way forward for Buyer Service to the content material ranks.
These aren’t your normal state-of-the-nation stories, which cowl what’s occurred or occurring right this moment. As an alternative, they illuminate what 3,000 senior managers and frontline IT employees say they anticipate will occur – and what to do about it.
The Way forward for Work content material marketing campaign works effectively, attracting the audiences Pega values and incomes nice engagement from these readers.
Go for GO!
The success of Way forward for Work gave the content material staff the credibility to strive GO! Journal, which is localized for six international areas.
Assembly the bold launch timeline took collaboration and creativity in downside fixing.
Nick employed a contract managing editor with journal expertise (and a community of world-renowned journalists on the prepared) to steer the content material. She rapidly put her connections to work on the journal’s characteristic tales.
These tales embody interviews with many Pega purchasers. “We wished to ensure that we had an important voice for purchasers by means of this journal,” Nick says.
However the staff knew that each one work tales and no enjoyable would make GO! a uninteresting learn. So the journal additionally consists of horoscopes and different gentle content material (like methods to make a stress ball).
An in-house inventive staff created the content material’s sturdy visible id. In addition they developed a thematic design system so every web page unfold may work by itself digitally and stream collectively for the print journal.
Inventive expertise alone gained’t get {a magazine} from concept to publication in 4 months. Nick credit Pega’s advertising mission supervisor (Kate Sutherby) for guaranteeing all of it got here collectively so rapidly. “We would have liked somebody with that actually strong set of mission administration expertise to assist us hit that deadline,” Nick explains.
Placing the content material to work
Transferring the needle on model consciousness and engagement by means of content material is just half the job. Nick acknowledged the necessity to allow salespeople with the content material, too.
GO! Journal’s data-driven views on what’s occurring and the place the market’s heading give the gross sales staff a approach to showcase the Pega distinction in shopper conferences.
“Hopefully, these purchasers or prospects are extra inclined to work with us as a result of they see we’ve acquired insights to carry to the desk – a extra consultative method,” Nick explains.
Pega opted to print 1,500 copies of the inaugural GO! Journal to be used in gross sales conferences. “It’s about getting the journal into the arms of salespeople and gross sales enablement kits … If you happen to’re bodily giving it to them, it’s a visual reminder of the model and the energy of the model,” he says.
It additionally distinguishes Pega’s content material from many opponents’ all-digital method.
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Powering forward
Constructing a strategic content material advertising program at Pega wasn’t an in a single day success. Nevertheless it’s been impressively fast. From the technique carried out just a few years in the past to the four-month GO! Journal launch, Pega is discovering its content material not solely is used but it surely’s a key differentiator in a crowded market. It additionally stands tall inside the group.
“What began as a staff to create content material and a construction round that content material is now a hub staff within the advertising group. We’re the engine home,” Nick says.
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Cowl picture by Joseph Kalinowski/Content material Advertising Institute
