Content Development

Let’s Declare War on Collateral!

by
Content Development

Thanks to LinkedIn’s improved functionality, I recently have received multiple endorsements from former and current coworkers for my expertise in marketing communications. Every time I get one, I have to confess, I cringe a little.

It’s not that I don’t appreciate the votes of confidence. (I do. Really. Thank you.) And I’ve spent a lot of time over the years concepting, writing, editing, producing, and otherwise creating and project-managing all kinds of communication vehicles for marketing. White papers, webinars, datasheets, sales presentations, press releases, FAQs, web content, articles, brochures, blogs, newsletters, posters, mailers, table tents, sales tools – the list goes on. Some of it’s been good, too.

But let’s face it. Marketing communications is so yesterday. Content marketing is today. And the two are not synonymous.

Continue reading →

CONFAB 2012 Cliff’s Notes: Visual Thinking, Content Down to a Science, and My Summer Reading List

by
Content Development, Content Strategy, Marketing Musings

I spent three enlightening days at CONFAB: The Content Strategy Conference 2012 in Minneapolis last week. The sun was shining and folks involved with content and strategy worldwide came to share, learn, and mingle. I met some great people, learned a lot, and was immersed in the world of content strategy.

With references to Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones, and Sherlock, I felt at home–literally. Like watching cable with friends and discussing favorite shows during commercial breaks, there was a sense of camaraderie. Kristina Halvorson, CEO and Founder of Brain Traffic, said in her welcome that CONFAB is a rare opportunity when all those involved with content strategy get to be with their people. Indeed. I felt I was with a kindred bunch of folks who are all keen on the future of content in the digital space and read uncommon yet fascinatingly applicable books.

Over three days, I went to many sessions and took enough notes to fill several scrolling pages. Each was thought provoking and a few really stuck with me. Below are a few of my notes from two of those sessions:

Be Vivid: How to Make Content Work — Even When Words Don’t Work – Dan Roam
Roam discussed how it is important to really think about the content we create so that it doesn’t become “a wall of noise.” He stresses that we need to have enough purpose behind our content so that folks are willing to take the time to read it. The content needs to be “vivid.” It needs to be “absolutely clear because it is expressed with both words and pictures.” Using the metaphor of a sooty lump of coal turned sparkling diamond, Roam described what the pneumonic, “vivid,” means in a world where we don’t rely so heavily on words.

Vivid Thinking
Vi = visual
V = verbal
Id – interdependent

Continue reading →

Writing Case Studies: The Hard Part

by
Content Development, Customer Evidence, Marketing Musings

Writing a case study is kind of like being Santiago, the aging fisherman in Ernest Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea. It takes days to catch an 18-foot marlin, and then once you manage it, the sharks eat it. (That is, your case study goes through a rigorous editing and review process). But you get some sleep and live to write another case study.

Continue reading →

Six Tips for Working with Content Development Stakeholders

by
Content Development, Content Strategy, Marketing Musings

In the content strategy world, experts talk about the tasks involved in creating, delivering, and governing content. What’s rarely discussed is that content experts are usually hired to develop content for one or more stakeholders who work outside of the world of editorial. Those stakeholders—otherwise known as clients—are counting on you to provide the skills and knowledge to deliver useful, usable content. Every client is different, and of course the basic rules of business etiquette apply to all your interactions with stakeholders. Beyond that, here are six tips for providing value to your clients during a content development engagement.

Understand your stakeholders’ situation. You may be working with stakeholders in different disciplines that are siloed within their organization. For example, on a single project, you may work with marketers, product managers, and developers. Each stakeholder may have different motivations and each may be envisioning different outcomes. It can be hard to know who is reviewing a deliverable. (I knew of a project for an enterprise organization where 70 stakeholders had been assigned to review a document!) As a draft moves through the company hierarchy, expect feedback to differ considerably from what you got in earlier review stages. Even small copy changes can result in considerable debate among stakeholders.

Inspire confidence. You’re the content expert. When you meet with stakeholders, you may find they have varying visions for the project. They may have limited insight into the amount of work and time required to deliver on ambitious plans. They may be unsure of what they need. Take it all in stride. Content development tasks aren’t easy; in fact, it’s a sophisticated endeavor that requires working hard and taking risks. You can do it. It’s your job. (It’s a bonus if you can make them laugh with some dry, writerly humor.)

Get answers to fundamental questions. Content strategy expert Nicole Jones wrote this story about developing content for Fortune 500 companies. She includes the following excellent list of basic questions that you need answers to before diving into a new project:

  • Does the project make sense?
  • Why is it important?
  • Who is the audience, what do they need, and what action should they take?
  • Is there any data to support the project?
  • Does the content apply to other countries or languages?
  • Who owns the content and who will update it?

Educate the stakeholders. We’re all in this together. I learn every day from the stakeholders I work with, and I return the favor by educating people about editorial standards. For example, some stakeholders may provide you with overwritten or jargon-filled content. As content producers, it’s our job to create content that delivers the message plainly in the language of the audience. (It’s that simple, really.) It’s okay to explain that common insider terminology (that is, most acronyms and jargon) is hard for most audiences to understand. It’s also helpful to define editorial concepts. I recently educated a client on a presentation project about how using parallel construction (in bulleted lists, for example) makes content easier for readers to digest. He got it right away and soon after sent me some raw content that featured parallel construction. I praised him enthusiastically, and we had a nice moment.

Realize your client’s vision. Your working drafts are the fundamental way you realize the vision for the project. This is especially true when your reviewers push back. Reviewers push back because once they read the message in plain English, they often see an opportunity to change positioning. I use this dynamic strategically and tactically. The written word—especially when it’s been produced—is powerful. People can have conversations with their colleagues and intentions in their heads, but once they see their ideas delivered on paper (so to speak), it’s concrete. Clients can’t reject a message, change a message, or refine a message until you make it clear where the message stands today. Content development stakeholders are going to want changes—significant changes—and often they’ll be able to figure out the changes they want only after they’ve reviewed your draft. It’s not personal. It’s just part of our job.

Defend excellence. On one presentation I developed, the stakeholders added two slides at the last minute. They didn’t want the content on those slides to be scrubbed editorially because they were running up against the end of their budget. As the content shepherd, I wanted the entire presentation to meet standards of excellence. During the final review meeting, I asked for a few minutes to look at those slides. Then I read aloud one (unscrubbed) sentence from a slide and asked the reviewers in the room what it meant. Everyone laughed because no one knew. As content developers, we’re on the side of the stakeholders. Assume the role of an advocate for the highest quality and most effective content possible.

The Writer’s Dilemma: Pursuing Mastery in the Age of Social Media

by
Content Development, Marketing Musings, Social Media

I started my writing career before the Internet became widely available. It was only during my final year as an undergraduate that the University of Oregon School of Journalism started requiring students to learn to operate computers. My first computer was a Mac 512K, which was more or less a glorified typewriter. I conducted primary research by phone or in person and did secondary research at the public library. There was no dial-up Internet in those days, and the hardcover thesaurus my grandmother gave me as a graduation gift was almost always open on my desk. To wit, as a young magazine journalist, I delivered stories to my editors on 3.5-inch floppy disks, which I carried to the office by bicycle like a courier.

Recently, one of Projectline’s leaders asked blog contributors if we had any response to this story by Alissa Walker, a Los Angeles-based writer who points to the predominance on the web of bulleted “listicles”—a common editorial device used to draw in readers. If you haven’t heard of the listicle before, now you’ll see it everywhere. Your favorite regional lifestyle magazine will feature the following cover story: “Top 10 Fall Getaways in the Pacific Northwest.” This approach sells magazines at the grocery store checkout line. As Ms. Walker notes, “It had been proven somewhere (where?) that people love lists.” Blame David Letterman if you must. But don’t blame the Internet, because I’m here to tell you that I delivered listicles on those 3.5-inch floppy disks.

Ms. Walker, who is a fine writer, takes issue with the influence of usability and traffic data on prose writing for the web. (She does acknowledge, however, that when she writes on topics relative to web trends, it seems to increase her page views, which she likes.) She also criticizes the Huffington Post for purposefully misspelling “Superbowl” in a headline in an effort to optimize its place in search results. I agree with Ms. Walker on this: Disregarding editorial standards in the name of SEO is going too far, especially for a respectable publication. I’m grateful to any publishing entity that manages to churn out copy without hurting my eyes.

Regardless of the medium, and whether you call yourself a writer or a “content creator,” the goal is the same: clear, concise copy that has a compelling message or story. As Marshall McLuhan famously wrote, “The medium is the message.” That is, any medium affects society not only via the content delivered through the medium, but also through the characteristics of the medium. This doesn’t scare me at all. Good writers will always be able to use their skills—including improvisation—to take advantage of whatever medium they use. The English language is precise and versatile. All writing should lend itself to the mandate of editorial integrity. Indeed, whatever the medium, there are no real excuses for a writer; there is only the pursuit of mastery.

For Projectline blogs, I choose topics that are relevant to the company’s business practices and grounded in my experience. Being quite new to both Twitter and blog writing, I’m fascinated by the idea of skimming trending topics and writing a related piece. Like Ms. Walker, I enjoy seeing mention of my work in the ongoing conversation that is social media. For example, I just now went to my Twitter account @mollydeewrites. and noticed that Casey Hibbard, who wrote the book on customer evidence, tweeted a mention of my story on writing case studies. I’m thrilled!

Maybe someday I’ll write an Internet classic that’s referenced for years to come. In the meantime, I’m going to participate in the modern publishing paradigm—while doing my best every day to honor the old-school lineage of distinguished print journalists who taught me my craft.

I’d love to know—What helps you pursue writing mastery while writing for the web?

Writing Case Studies, Part 2: Ten Tips for Interviewing Customers

by
Content Development, Customer Evidence, Marketing Musings

This is the second installment of a two-part series on customer case studies. The first post looked at the importance of using detail to tell a compelling and credible customer story. In this second post, Molly Dee Anderson, one of the talented staff writers at Projectline, offers 10 practical and insightful tips for conducting customer interviews.

“Interviewing is both art and science. The art comes in how you interact with customers, put them at ease, and encourage them to provide information. The science comes in what you ask and how you ask it.” – Casey Hibbard, Stories That Sell

If you are well-prepared for a case study interview, you can effectively gather the customer’s narrative arc-the challenge, the implementation of a product or service, and the positive results-in an hour’s time. You will also gain some choice quotes. Try these ten tips for conducting customer interviews with both art and science.

1. Review the customer’s website thoroughly. You may find relevant information in unusual places. Press releases often provide a concise description of the organization as well as insight into the strategic direction the company is pursuing. Use what you learn to engage with the customer, even if the dialog is not specifically pertinent to the case study. Interviewees will often appreciate that you’ve done your homework and will be more likely to give you the details you need.

2. Get a good working knowledge of the featured product or service. Customers sometimes assume that you are an established expert in the case study’s featured subject. Chances are you’re a writer with a generalist background, so you’ll need to do some research. Aside from getting detailed information from the product or service team, consider reading product reviews, watching videos, and walking through demos.

3. Build a detailed and focused questionnaire. Use complete sentences. Include questions even if you already have a sense of what the answers will be. Be prepared to prompt the customer with a possible answer in case they draw a blank. Once prompted, the customer will likely provide additional details. It’s also a good exercise to create a comprehensive questionnaire and then cut it substantially, based on the specific customer scenario. You probably won’t have time to ask all the questions anyway.

4. Remove distractions. When doing an interview, you’re on stage. You can’t afford to be distracted by anything. Avoid conducting an interview on an empty stomach. Turn off call-waiting, silence your cell phone, shut doors and windows, mute your computer, and set your instant messaging status to “Busy.” Also, sit up straight: It’s showtime.

5. Communicate the agenda to the interviewees. Prepare a script to introduce yourself to the interviewees. Explain how you plan to conduct the interview and what information you’re seeking. Let them know that you’re recording the interview and that you’ll be asking for details so you can get the most compelling story possible.

6. Adopt a persona. Try on an interviewing style. For example, you could assume the interviewing style of Larry King or Oprah. I’m a fan of Charlie Rose because his style is plainspoken, grounded, and engaged. And he’s good at asking for clarifying details about an interviewee’s statement: “But what do you mean when you say that?” Rose asks.

7. Take notes. You’re recording the interview, but audio devices sometimes fail. Plus, written notes help you ask more relevant follow-up questions. Cover your bases by getting down as much as you can with your pen and keyboard and then hope you never have to refer to those notes.

8. Don’t be afraid to ask a few “stupid” questions. It’s not possible to be an expert in everything. It’s better to ask an interviewee to explain something you don’t understand than pretend that it makes perfect sense and then later not know what to write. If you’re reporting about technology, for example, you can ask your interviewees to describe an implementation for you as if they were speaking to a general rather than a technical audience.

9. Be persistent about metrics. Your interviewees will not always be prepared to state numbers such as return on investment, revenue increases, or cost savings. You can nudge them with a leading question such as: “Would it be fair to say that your employees are saving 20 minutes a day by using the new productivity tools?” If you encounter reticence, then offer to follow up about metrics by sending email or by putting queries in the review draft.

10. Be humble. The art of interviewing is primarily the art of listening and putting the interviewees at ease. When they have explained a complex concept, tell them what you heard them say-in your own words. That way they’ll know you’re listening. Gently direct the conversation, but make sure the interviewees get most of the airtime. You may be the host, but they are the stars of the show.

Writing Case Studies: The Narrative Arc

by
Content Development, Customer Evidence, Marketing Musings

Case studies are true stories, and true stories communicate credibility. They help readers understand how a product or service works in a real setting. Case studies validate solutions by going into specifics and providing details about a customer’s experience. When you write a case study, you tell a story that helps people imagine scenarios-and they are moved to act as a result.

We humans love to hear about other people, and we often look to others to help us decide what to do. Narratives are most powerful when we read about people like us. Stories can build trust, increase sales, and shorten the sales cycle.

Take the example of a company in Singapore that develops business software for managing human resources, customer relationships, and accounting. Its customers frequently asked for customizations, so it decided to build an application with ready-made modules that could be customized by anyone. It hosted the application in the cloud in a way that was reliable, highly available, and scaled on demand. Other software vendors in the same market space will want to know how the Singaporean company solved its challenge. A case study can provide the answers.

In another cloud success story, an online ticketing company needed to ramp up its technology to be able to sell 150,000 tickets in a few hours in order to handle traffic for a large music festival for a marquee customer. Before, its best record was selling 2,000 tickets in two hours, so it had a long way to go. It implemented a cloud solution that used sharding technology to distribute the ticketing data across multiple database servers-and sold 150,000 tickets in 10 seconds. The CTO described the technology as a “windfall” for the company. That’s a pretty compelling result and an example of how a product or service can completely alter a business model. Readers will want to know the details of the story.

The structure of a case study gives you an excellent framework for capturing the elements of a customer’s story. The three main sections are designed to contain the classic narrative arc and tell the age-old story of the hero: People meet with challenges to overcome, find solutions, and ultimately triumph.

  • Challenge. Describe the customer’s circumstances. Every customer has challenges to address, or it wouldn’t be shopping around for solutions. For example, a customer might be looking to lower costs, bolster data security, or expand revenue opportunities. It’s especially important to start the narrative in this section. This is where you draw the reader into the story. Use details and revealing quotes. Keep in mind that although people work in a variety of organizations, they are ultimately seeking the same kinds of things-like innovation, profit, competitive differentiation, and success.

  • Implementation. Provide information on how the customer met its challenges by using a product or service. This section is the heart of the case study, and can be the most exacting to write. Every customer uses a product or service in a different way and it’s your job to record the specifics of the solution, including any custom deployment details or workarounds. Keep in mind that the customer—and not the solution—is the hero of the story. Avoid constructions such as, “The product made it possible for Company A to sell 150,000 tickets in 10 seconds.” Instead, write, “Company A used the product’s sharding capabilities to scale beyond what a single database could provide.”

  • Results. Summarize the advantages that the customer gained by using the product or service. Start with a summary of all results and provide a compelling general quote that speaks to the solution’s overall value. Then give each individual benefit a heading and describe the proof points for each result. This is where you can use metrics related to results, such as productivity improvements, cost savings, improved profits, or increased revenue opportunities.

When writing a case study, keep in mind that your job is to make abstract concepts—such as how a product or service works—concrete and comprehensible. To build credibility, rely on a high level of detail, which helps make prose more convincing. To get readers engaged in an emotional way, provide specifics. Think of case study writing as one step away from journalism. You are the storyteller with a human interest piece to write, and that story is true. It’s honest labor, and it’s fun.