My name is Corey Vilhauer.
I am director of strategy at Blend Interactive. I write here. I also write at Eating Elephant about content strategy. I am co-author of a book about the web process, The Web Project Guide, and co-host of a podcast by the same name. I used to occasionally write about records at Kallax 365. The W stands for Wayne.
Latest Posts
April 27, 2022
The Followers We Made Along The Way
A look at Twitter’s influence on my life, my friendships, and a very specific few hours in which I was stranded without cash at Cape Town International Airport.
March 29, 2022
Nostalgia (Remake)
I’ve been playing Final Fantasy VII Remake, and it’s got me overthinking the two spectrums of nostalgia — general and specific, and restorative and reflective.
February 28, 2022
Remaking Our Songs and Ourselves
Artists are always revisiting the songs they’ve recorded in the past — to give it a new spin, or to fix past mistakes. We do that too — and in doing so, we both accept and move on from whatever we once were.
January 31, 2022
On The Whiteness of Country Music
In which I write about being at the Grand Ole Opry (it was amazing), learning from our history, and my struggle to come to terms with how country music continues to embrace its whiteness.
December 29, 2021
The Gatekeeping We Do to Ourselves
Whether it’s convincing ourselves that we don’t belong in a scene, or convincing ourselves that we can’t stop drinking, our own gatekeeping shields us from accepting who we actually are.
Selected Works
August 5, 2015The Pastry Box Project
While No Guitar Gently Weeps
The world continues to move even as you wander around, looking for inspiration, and the risk is always there: what happens when everyone passes you by, and what happens when you realize you never really cared in the first place?
February 28, 2012A List Apart
Audiences, Outcomes, and Determining User Needs
Every website needs an audience. And every audience needs a goal. How do we get to really know our audience and find out what these mystery users really want from our sites and applications?
May 2013Offscreen Magazine
Life In Folders
Commissioned thoughts on organizing photos, organizing files and folders, and organizing life.
January 14, 2014Black Marks on Wood Pulp
The Ocean
Thoughts on large bodies of water, the dream and desire to see the world, and the utter exhaustion of travelling for work when all you want to do is hang out at home and be a dad.
December 7, 2011Contents Magazine
A Content Methodology Primer
Content wants to be messy. It wants to roll around in the mud. It wants to be gross. Our job is to pull it together—to take the guesswork out of creating and curating it—and to treat content work as something closer to a science.
July 19, 2011Eating Elephant
Domain Knowledge: What You Need - Or Don't Need - To Know
As content strategists, we are expected to help our clients communicate the concepts, benefits and advantages of their company or industry. But we are not who our clients are. We do not possess the same amount of knowledge about their business. How do we bridge this gap?