148 CONTENT STRATEGY AT WORK thorough content audit for them with a detailed site map, and they absolutely loved it. It gave them so much information that wasn't sitting on the surface, so they felt very confident to move ahead with hiring me," she concluded. In Chapter 3, we discussed the differences between quantitative and qualitative content audits; here, Ahava is describing a quantitative audit. It works as a stand-alone piece to open the door to dig deeper into the content--and the client organization itself. I often approach this type of work by conducting a quantitative audit with the understanding that after I know more about the client and their goals, we'll document those goals in a message architecture. That, in turn, becomes the yardstick against which we can conduct a qualitative content audit. Ahava works as an independent consultant, not in the context of a multifaceted team or agency, so you can see how this approach works for the lone wolf consultant as well. If that's you, you know what it's like to wear the many hats of specialist, salesperson, project manager, and bookkeeper; creative approaches to streamline the sales process never hurt, right? CONDUCT A HIGH-LEVEL AUDIT TO INFORM SCOPE WITH GREATER REALITY Another use for a content audit is to help your own scoping process. We previously discussed the quick-and-dirty approach of conducting a more minimal audit to save budget and allow for investment in other areas. This is a similar practice. Regardless of its size or depth, you'll never conduct a content audit for its own sake; rather, your content strategist will do it to learn more about what they're confronting, determine the quality of current content, or help the information architecture understand the breadth of content types. In the pre-sales process, a content strategist can conduct a more superficial or incomplete content audit and extrapolate. You'll gain several pieces of information from this process: n n The "some information is better than no information" approach is something you should apply before committing to any big job, like helping a friend move or volunteering to clean out the fridge. It might just take longer and require more bleach than you think. n n A better sense of how long it will take to conduct a full content audit An accurate assessment of the number of pages, screens, or modules in the prospective project High-level understanding of the range of content types A first blush grasp of the quality and redundancy of existing content None of this is precise, complete, or final, and it would be arrogant and presumptuous to think it is--but it is useful scouting. And even some