Fractional content strategy

As the old saying goes: content is king. You need to keep a steady pipeline of new content so you can grab attention and draw new clients. But what if your organization doesn’t have the “people bandwidth” to maintain a stream of new content? That’s where fractional content strategy comes in.

We spoke with a content strategist about what fractional content strategy looks like, and how hiring an outsider can benefit an organization.

Let’s start with an introduction. Who are you and what do you do?

I’m Katie Sanders, and I run Katielees LLC, a fractional content strategy and editorial leadership practice. In the simplest way possible: I step in as the senior content person a team needs but doesn’t have bandwidth to hire full-time.

Occasionally that’s running the whole editorial operation, sometimes it’s fixing a strategy that’s not landing, other times it’s building AI workflows that won’t disrupt the brand voice.

I work with lots of technical teams, remote, on a fractional or project basis, but I’m looking to expand outside of B2B and SaaS for a new challenge!

What’s your background?

I have 16 years in B2B tech content, and I’ve worn a lot of hats. Some of my long-running gigs have been: Community and Content Manager at Red Hat winning over 10 million in attributed pipeline, Executive Editor at Black & White Zebra building The CTO Club from launch to 1.9 million unique visitors and over $40,000 in weekly revenue in year one, and Executive Director of Content at a B2B adtech PR agency managing a dozen client accounts through major exits.

Currently, I’m freelancing as a senior technical writer with an AI manufacturing software company and supporting Wellth on a fractional basis.

I took all the lessons from these places and combined them into a killer package for any company that needs help with their content strategy.

Who are typical clients that work with you for fractional content?

Usually it’s a company that doesn’t realize the breadth and depth of what “content” entails: how many angles you have to consider (SEO/GEO/AEO, social, newsletter, etc.) and how many people are needed to cover all the bases. Or their content needs have outgrown whoever’s currently doing it: A marketing lead who’s also trying to be the editor-in-chief, or a founder who knows they need senior judgment but isn’t ready for a full-time content director.

The needs vary; some require an experienced hand running the editorial calendar, others need help to fix a strategy that isn’t converting, and some need help building AI-assisted (human-in-the-loop) workflows without losing quality control.

I offer six core things: fractional content and editorial leadership, AI content systems and workflows, content strategy and audits, newsletter creation and scaling, copyediting and editorial QA, and community building. Most engagements end up mixing two or three of these.

What do people usually miss about creating their own content strategy?

The biggest miss: Teams skip straight to “we need more content” without answering who it’s for and why it matters to the business. You end up with a lot of output and no strategy underneath it.

The second miss is treating content like a project instead of a system—publishing in bursts around launches, then going quiet, instead of building something that runs continuously.

And the third: not having anyone senior enough to say no. Everyone can write content. Not everyone can tell you which content is actually worth writing.

Is content strategy a contained thing or an ongoing thing?

Both, and that’s what’s tricky. There’s the campaign layer: “we’re launching a product, we need a push.” Then there’s the always-on layer: ”we need people to know we exist and trust us before they ever need us.”

A mistake I see is when people treat the campaign layer as the entire strategy. The ongoing engine is what makes the campaign bursts land, because you’ve already got an audience paying attention.

Has SEO changed with AI? Where’s the balance between writing for AI, humans, and SEO in 2026?

It’s changed a lot, but the core hasn’t: write something genuinely useful and clearly structured, and both humans and AI models tend to reward it.

The shift is that “ranking” is no longer simply about a blue link. Now, you’ve got to consider whether an AI answer engine trusts your content enough to cite it. So the balance isn’t really AI vs. human versus SEO—it’s clarity and credibility for humans, which happens to be exactly what AEO and GEO reward too. The teams still stuck writing purely for keyword density might be falling behind.

What do you use for collaborative writing?

I’m sticking with Google Docs for now since it’s fairly universal and easy to use. I always start there even if I end up somewhere else. Unless a client has a specific place they want me to write, I’m going to Google Drive.

How do you use AI in your work?

I build structured, human-in-the-loop AI workflows, meaning AI helps with research, drafting, and repurposing, but nothing goes live without a full editing pass. I’ve been using Claude Cowork a lot these days as ChatGPT seems to have gone to search.

AI can accelerate the mechanical bit: first drafts, research pulls, and reformatting for different channels, but judgment, voice, and the final polish are completed by a human. That’s the whole point of “human-in-the-loop.” AI doesn’t get to make the call on what’s good, we leave that to flawed humans.

Thanks to Katie for her insights in content strategy. If you need a fractional content leader, you can reach Katie at Katielees LLC or via LinkedIn.