Building systems to create remarkable content at scale — part 2

The brief-outline-draft process

Lily Ugbaja

Oct 23, 2025

Hola, oh hi 👋🏾

Glad you’re still here. 😁

When I wrote Volume 1 of this newsletter almost three years ago, I ended it with:

“Coming Next: Building systems to create remarkable content at scale.”

I had no idea it would take this long to send the next issue.

I like to tell myself that I kept putting it off because I had too much on my plate. And I did, to be honest. Between 5 kids (one, the first deaf person I ever met), a few businesses, and, until recently, a full-time job/consultancy as well, I was running on fumes.

But there was also pressure. Pressure to top part 1, and dang, did the response to that first one already blow my mind! Pressure to always write LEMAfied content, haha. Pressure to test more, share results.

And that right there is why it took so long.

So what changed? Why are you writing this now?

In those three years, I’ve experienced burnout multiple times, taken year-long breaks, and basically felt suffocated by what used to be a dream.

Through all that, I learned two things:

Control is an illusion.
There are no absolutes.

And if absolutes don’t exist and you can’t really control everything, then maybe “perfect” doesn’t exist either.

…that there’s no single right way to build, parent, create, or even be. There’s just the next faithful step, the best you can give with what you have that day.

And when you really let that sink in, something shifts. You stop chasing the version of yourself who has it all figured out and start honoring the one who keeps showing up — tired, hopeful, messy, learning, average. Because average, done consistently, beats perfect, done occasionally.

And now, I just don’t care what people think that much anymore, haha. Yes, I’m still holding myself to ridiculous standards (I don’t think that’s ever going away). But, I’m optimizing my 50%, my average, instead of my 100% (talk about this in another episode).

Enough of the emo drizzle, let’s talk systems and scale

I think the good part of waiting three years is that this system has now been battle-tested at scale: across freelance writers of varying skill levels, agencies juggling ten clients from different industries, SaaS companies, e.t.c. And through creative highs, and total burnout, clients and I have seen remarkably consistent quality of work.

What I learned? There are three checkpoints where remarkable content is either made or lost:

Brief stage (to guide the article to business goals)
Outline stage (to guide the piece to reader goals)
Draft stage (to plug gaps in logic)

Here’s what each looks like:

1. Brief - Guide the article toward business goals

People say to write like a journalist, and for the longest time, I stood firmly against that recommendation. Gripping as the writing may be, journalists inform; they’re ethically bound to stay neutral. Marketers, on the other hand, we get paid to persuade (even when our product isn’t better than the competition 😁😁).

But… what if writers could think like strategists, and then write like journalists?

Yes? Yes?? Done right, the brief takes care of that “strategist” side!

The brief answers the question “Why does this piece of content need to exist on our blog?”

💡 The keyword in that question? …our blog.

The same topic — like “jobs for teachers in the summer” — can and should look wildly different depending on who’s publishing it and what they’re selling.

Let’s see.

🎯 Example 1: A SaaS Platform for Freelance Marketplaces

Business: EduGigs — a platform that connects teachers to freelance curriculum development gigs.
What they sell: SaaS access to a job-matching marketplace.
Business goal: Attract qualified leads (teachers looking to earn over the summer) and convert them into free trial users.
Primary CTA: “Sign up to find flexible curriculum jobs this summer.”
Secondary CTA: “Download our guide to pricing your first freelance gig.”

Their content strategy angle: Build trust and show value. Include teacher testimonials and highlight ease of use.

🎯 Example 2: A Career Coaching Service for Burned-Out Teachers

Business: PivotED — a career coaching brand that helps teachers transition out of traditional roles.
What they sell: Paid coaching packages + courses.
Business goal: Build awareness and warm up leads who feel stuck but aren’t yet ready to leave the profession completely.
Primary CTA: “Take our free quiz: What’s your ideal summer career path?”
Secondary CTA: “Join our email list for job alerts and transition tips.”

Their content strategy angle: Be empathetic, inspiring, and quietly persuasive. The goal is long-term nurture and trust.

🎯 Example 3: A Blog Monetized by Display Ads

Business: A lifestyle blog for moms (display ad revenue via Mediavine)

What they sell: Nothing. Traffic = money.

Business goal: Get as many pageviews as possible.

Primary CTA: Keep readers clicking (“Read next: Side Hustles for Teachers”)

Secondary CTA: Maybe offer a printable (“Download the free checklist”) to build an email list for future traffic pushes.

Their content strategy angle: Go broad, hit SEO, write a lot of related posts, and internally link like a boss.

We figure this out so we can naturally align the content we create with the end goal of serving the business. And we do this before we write a single line of text, not after we’ve written the entire article.

We’ve got a whole process for this internally, and it starts with the reader themself:

(snapshot of brief research process from our internal doc)

But here’s what to keep in mind as you navigate this stage:

The goal is to connect three things: The business goal, the reader’s goal, and the natural bridge your product or offering provides between them.

Start with the reader’s goal and knowledge level: What they know/want/need. This helps you ground your content in empathy before strategy, and empathy is what makes people listen.
Figure out the most high-impact-yet-relevant-to-that-specific-reader business goal. Ask: Who is the business, what do they sell, what do they need this content to drive?
Build the bridge: What product feature to what pain point? What customer transformation to what resistance?

Plug all that into a living template containing:

Business goal
Audience insights
Transformation promise
Product features to highlight
CTAs

This is your first checkpoint.

2. Outline stage - Guide the piece to reader goals

The outline is where you stop thinking like a marketer (for a minute) and start thinking like a reader who’s juggling six tabs, three deadlines, and a toddler on their lap (Ask me how I know. 😅)

Here’s why you should care:

Readers don’t read in order, they scan for relevance.
Your job is to make that scan effortless. So, a great outline makes the piece feel like it’s anticipating the reader’s thoughts as they scroll.
It builds trust before they even know they’re trusting you.
When your content follows their natural logic — their mental breadcrumb trail — they relax. They stop bracing for fluff and start believing you can help.
It’s your best quality-control tool.
A strong outline exposes weak logic before you’ve written 2,000 words you’ll just delete later. Map the blueprint before you build the house!

Start with the thesis:

The thesis statement is a single sentence (usually in the intro) that clearly expresses your article’s main argument — your “Here’s my take, and here’s why I’m right.”

A strong thesis:

Draws a line in the sand. It gives your reader something to agree or disagree with.
Infuses the piece with direction and energy — you suddenly know what matters, and what doesn’t.
Turns generic advice into perspective. You stop teaching what everyone already knows, and start arguing for what you’ve learned to be true.

My former editor at Animalz, Nathan Wahl, he taught me a simple hack for developing your thesis statement.

Topic - What’s the subject?
Stance - What do you believe about it that others might not?
Why - Why do you believe that? What have you seen or learned that proves it true?

For example:

Topic: Content briefs
Stance: Most content briefs fail because they focus on instructions, not insight.
Why: Because writers don’t need more instructions; they need context that helps them think like the reader.

Now put that all together, and you have your thesis statement.

“Most content briefs fail because they focus on instructions, not insight — writers don’t need more instructions; they need context that helps them think like the reader.”

From there, everything else (hook, headers, they all exist to anchor, explain, or defend the thesis).

(snapshot from internal checklist)

But don’t neglect structure

Think: What. Why. How.

Of course, this changes depending on your audience, topic, and format.

A listicle structures around items or points.
A how-to follows steps.
An opinion piece builds from tension to resolution.

So, we created structure guides for each article type — complete with examples and a checklist — to help writers organize ideas around how the reader naturally discovers, doubts, and decides.

This is your second checkpoint.

3. Draft stage - Plug gaps in logic

This is where you pressure-test your arguments and make sure the piece can survive real readers.

“Does this still hold up when someone else reads it cold?”

The writer-review: tightening your own logic

Once the draft is done, the writer runs the LEMA Filter before submission.
Each element gets a few focused checks:

Logic: Flow & structure

Do sections answer the reader’s “what / why / how” in the right order?
Does every claim have proof (data, logic, or example)?
Cut or merge any point that repeats.

Explicitness: Clarity & precision

Replace “good results” with what kind of results.
Name examples and tools directly, don’t dance around them.

Memorability: Voice & conviction

Where’s the belief?
Where’s the aha moment, analogy, or story that sticks?
Every core idea should carry your brand’s fingerprints: phrasing, examples, or lived experience. If a paragraph could appear word-for-word on a competitor’s site, make it your own.

Actionability: Usefulness & next steps

Does the reader leave knowing exactly what to do next?
Are there visuals, examples, or short how-tos to make that next step effortless?
Is the CTA natural, not forced?

When this pass is complete, the piece should read like a clean, defensible argument.

The systemized review: scaling logic across a team

When you’re editing multiple writers, your job isn’t just to “fix things.”
It’s to standardize good thinking.

Here’s how to do that:

Distribute a “Writer’s LEMA Sheet.”
- Every writer runs their own LEMA pass before submission.
- This minimizes rewrites and teaches editorial judgment.
Build an “Example Bank.”
- For each LEMA pillar, collect before-and-after examples from your real articles.
- Over time, this becomes your in-house writing bible.
Label feedback with LEMA shorthand.
- Instead of “unclear,” comment “E — missing explicitness.”
- Instead of “too generic,” comment “M — lacks memorability.”
- This creates shared language and makes reviews faster and fairer.
Systematize it in your tools.
- Add a mini-LEMA checklist at the top of every Notion or Docs brief.
- Use templates that force clarity — with checkboxes for each element.