Cruce Saunders: Content as a Valuable Enterprise Asset – Episode 193

Content Strategy Insights

Cruce Saunders Content is a precious business asset and should be treated as such in enterprise accounting records. Cruce Saunders has been making the case for content as a financial asset for many years, arguing that much of it should be accounted for like the durable machinery that powers a factory, not like an ephemeral one-time business expense. He still sees a lot of work ahead, but Cruce is more hopeful lately that coordinated efforts by content leaders can get content out of the expense category and into an asset category on the corporate balance sheet. We talked about: his work at [A], a consultancy that focuses on intelligent content supply chains for large enterprises the accounting principles that show why content should be viewed as an asset on a balance sheet, not an expense on a profit and loss statement the kinds of content that should be treated as enterprise assets: documentation, support content, durable marketing content, and other types of content that deliver value over the long term how to calculate the value of content assets and to track their performance how the absence of financial-industry standards make it difficult to capitalize some content assets the first step in showing the value of content: building an ROI framework the unique value of content models in transforming content from an expense item to a valuable asset the benefits of the service-oriented architectures that well-modeled content permits the need for content-industry leaders to come together around the goal of ensconcing content as an enterprise asset Cruce's bio Cruce Saunders is the Founder and principal at [A], simplea.com. [A] serves organizations utilizing headless, composable content and generative AI to craft next generation content supply chains and publishing architecture. Clients include complex enterprise publishers as well as growing mid-market companies. As a thought leader, Cruce hosts the Towards a Smarter World podcast and The Invisible World of Content YouTube series. He has been a keynote speaker around the world at conferences and an invited speaker at enterprises in the US, Europe, and Asia. Topics regularly discussed in these series and talks include AI, content intelligence, content operations, content engineering, personalization, governance, content structural and semantic standards, and enterprise transformation. Cruce also founded a product team that builds tools to support the content data modeling needs. This group has built the Schematica suite of tools for content interoperability, including CoreModels, RealContent, and ContentFlow. Connect with Cruce online LinkedIn [A] simplea.com Towards a Smarter World podcast The Invisible World of Content YouTube series Schematica Video Here’s the video version of our conversation: https://youtu.be/X2vUHxqpNXY Podcast intro transcript This is the Content Strategy Insights podcast, episode number 193. Anyone who works with content understands its value. But getting business executives and financial standards bodies to treat content like the valuable asset that it is has been a challenge. Cruce Saunders has advanced the idea of content as a precious business asset for years. There's still lots to do, but he's hopeful now that coordinated efforts by content leaders might get content out of the expense category and onto the corporate balance sheet, where it belongs. Interview transcript Larry: Hi everyone. Welcome to episode number 193 of the Content Strategy Insights podcast. I am really delighted today to welcome to the show Cruce Saunders. Cruce is the principal and founder at [A], which you can find at simplea.com. He also does this brilliant website (actually a podcast; I misspoke) called Towards a Smarter World. So welcome Cruce. Tell the folks a little bit more about what you're up to these days. Cruce: Hey, Larry, it's great to be here. And it's amazing,