Lead With the Message, Not the Format

Format matters. As a record collector and content strategist, I say that with passion. But it's not the most important concern. Content creators of the universe, please heed this advice: Lead with the message, not the format.

Why you are creating content in that format?

You’ve probably heard the request: "We need to create (video / gifs / animations / infographics) because everyone else is doing it / leadership wants it / I read an article about it." Content is created. Then, the content disappoints. It doesn't have to be this way.

We have reasons for creating content. Some good, some bad. Some of these things are out of our control, no doubt. However, even the most vocal advocates of the format-of-the-day will see the light when we start to talk about costs, benefits, and realities of content creation. No one wants crappy content, after all.

"Don't value your content over the job you need your content to do," said John Lane, Vice President at Centerline Digital in his presentation, "Content Marketing Art of War." Don't fall in love with a format because of its format-ness. Or its current popularity, for that matter. Formats carry the weight of our message. But they do not determine the message.

Avoid the published-equals-success scenario.

We cannot communicate an idea without a format. The ideal situation is “we chose this format because it was best-suited to communicate our idea.” One serves the next. We are communicating ideas first.

Leading the content creation workflow with the format instead of the message is a flawed approach for most organizations. Success becomes "we completed and published" rather than "we conveyed the message and the user completed an action." It's a tactical rather than strategic act. Busywork, even.

Measures of wrongly-formatted content often devolve into page/video views or downloads, rather than the more valuable and considered metrics of conversion and task completion. Without knowing what you want the content to do, outside of existing, measurement turns into the binary situation of yes we have a video/no we do not.

And sometimes, the finished asset completely misses the mark. It kills the message. Videos end up rambling, and infographics bloat out of control. Organizations still publish it, even if they don’t like it, due to perceived sunk costs. THIS IS AN UNPLEASANT SITUATION.

Create with the message first, format second.

Content creation plans MUST include a discussion of format. It should come early in the conversation. But only after you know your message, that thing you hope to convey.

Each format choice has pros and cons, bonuses and baggage. Video assets are tough to get right. Editing octopus-like infographics quickly changes their overall message and composition. Governance becomes a greater issue. Our choice can influence how the audience receives each message.

Production values and capabilities vary from org to org. That's perfectly fine. My concern is less about the sheen of the finished product. I start a-fretting when form takes precedent over function. Basic messaging elements (i.e. focus, clarity, brevity) often suffer while superficial items such as logo treatments, music beds, and transitions see flawless execution.

Right, then. What to do? Create it as a video? An animation? A .gif? An infographic? Good old sentences? How does a content strategist approach content creation and formatting decisions?

• State the message you hope to convey, and what you wish folks to do next.
• Ask yourself, “Why are we doing this?” Write this down. Restate it. Say it out loud.
• Articulate HOW this serves business goals, even if only as an exercise. 
• Carefully detail the workflow to show how the content will take shape. All of it.
• Consider the capacity of your content creator(s). Do they have the skill set to tackle more sophisticated content? Or the time?

Know your audience: their habits, their abilities, their devices, their needs, their expectations, and their contexts. The counterpart of this is knowing yourself (or organization, actually): your production capabilities, your business goals, your larger content strategy. Each one of these has a bearing on which format you chose to deliver your message.

Publish (or choose not to) with confidence.

"Does the content you contribute shine through or does it distract through glitter?" asks content strategist and writer James C. Gunter in his article, "2014: The Year the Internet Finally Grows Up?" It's is a fine question to ask and ask again throughout the content creation workflow.

Finally, don't be afraid to kill the content before it kills your message. Each item you place online is an opportunity to set yourself apart from the competition. People (and more and more, search engines) are developing smarter content radars, and will go elsewhere when crappy content rears its ugly head. If the content isn't great, wipe the slate. (Sorry.)

Instead of looking at completed-but-unpublished content as a sunk cost, consider a halted content endeavor a non-public failure and learning experience. Failing is fine; acknowledging it is the key. Apply your lessons to the next effort. It'll thank you for it.
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Content Strategy Is All About CLARITY

Content strategists do many things, wear many hats. We may have different job titles, different duties each day. But really, what we do is simple. Content strategists provide clarity. It’s my chief deliverable, really. Not an audit. Not a set of content templates. Not even an editorial calendar entry. It's clarity.

Clarity for content creators

Content creators do their best work when they approach their work with clarity. When they have a clear picture of their audience, business goals, and the content's eventual home, good things happen.

Editorial calendars provide a clear plan for the coming weeks and months. Without them, content creators may scramble to find the right ideas. Channels start to languish. Stress builds, deadlines mount. The production cadence may soon assume haphazard status. NO ONE WANTS HAPHAZARD STATUS. Editorial calendars might take the form of a deliverable, but what they really deliver is clarity.

Content audits are the same. They provide insight (which is a form of clarity) into what needs work and what works well. Is the content accurate? Is it still on message? Is it complete and up to current standards? The audit will tell you. The audit is often a spreadsheet. It delivers details. It delivers CLARITY.

You’ll never guess what style guides can do. Provide clarity, you say? WELL DONE, FRIEND. Style guides help content creators articulate a brand’s personality or an organization’s value proposition in a consistent, easily-referenced fashion. Clarity.

Clarity for content managers

If your job involves the evaluation, maintenance, governance, or all-around wrangling of content at any place along the way, I'm willing to bet that you enjoy clarity, too. Each of these duties require guidelines and standards--the clearer, the better.

Publishing content online (on your site, a third-party partner's database, a social media platform, etc.) goes smoothly when content managers know the ins-and-outs of each channel. Some of them have quirks, unique needs. Different inputs, outputs, viewports, devices accessing. Make these requirements known and declare their importance. Provide this, and you've provided clarity.

Clarity for leadership

Do you know who else enjoys clarity? Leadership. Leadership of all sorts and strata. They’re often tasked with articulating the efforts of content strategists when the time comes to fund projects to improve a content experience. When they have a solid content strategy in their hands and on their screens, they’ll have clarity.

Those same folks in leadership positions need to understand the importance of content. They’re often ultimately responsible for the outcomes of content marketing- and content strategy-related efforts. They want to know returns on investment. Performance and efficiency. They must know how content helps their bottom line. Keen ears and minds await. The clarity of content strategy is on the scene, know what I mean?

Clarity for consumers

Call them users, visitors, consumers, or whatever. The people that come to your online presence. They do not want a muddled, difficult experience. They want simplicity, ease-of-use, and delightful experiences. THEY WANT CLARITY.

Can they accomplish what tasks they set out to accomplish? Can they find a product or service? Can they do it without wading through tons of fluffy marketing jive, or press releases, or mission statements, or outdated information? Yes? Then you’ve provided CLARITY.

Clarity for ALL

There you have it. *cue Oprah Winfrey free car meme* You get clarity, and you get clarity. EVERYONE GETS CLARITY. (Clarity, not bees. Sorry for any nightmares from the above gif.)

I’m Clinton Forry. I’m a content strategist. I PROVIDE CLARITY.
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I Wrote an Article for A List Apart, OMG

I recently had the distinct pleasure of writing an article for the esteemed A List Apart website: "'Like'-able Content: Spread Your Message with Third-Party Metadata."

The article is the result of a need for a definitive guide for the creation and implementation of third-party metadata. Now that Facebook and Twitter have their own proprietary metadata schemes, the time had come to look at how those schemes impact the creation and overall message of online content.

Frustration with scattered resources and a lack of editorial guidelines led me to believe that other folks might like to learn about this as well. (I'd been thinking about third-party metadata quite a bit, as a part of a work project.) MY PAIN = YOUR GAIN.

Have a look-see. Let me know what you think!

Five Ways to Save Your Video Content from Devouring Itself

Video content poses unique challenges to content marketers, content managers, and content strategists. Especially since it is often hosted on constantly evolving, proprietary platforms. The incorporation of outside links in YouTube videos is a fine, current example.

Search and content have a long, dysfunctional history. Search algorithms change to address unsavory content practices. New unsavory content practices pop up to exploit newfound vulnerabilities. This cycle continues, and will, for the foreseeable future.

These algorithm adjustments also apply to video content. I happened upon an article on ReelSEO, written by Chris Atkinson, detailing the introduction of including outside links on YouTube videos, and its potential search and content implications.

(These platform-specific announcements are especially important to we content folks, as they often have a direct impact on the whats and hows of our content delivery.)

Link to anything you fancy

Link placement within videos has been an option for years. Up to this point, YouTube has limited the nature of those links to other YouTube videos, YouTube channels, or fundraising appeals. Most recently, they added "merch" as an option for channel owners to link to YouTube-approved retail sites like iTunes, GooglePlay, etc.

Now, the floodgates are open. Links to any site are now allowed on any YouTube video. Gone are the days of only placing a link in the video description area. CUE THE PARTY HORNS. Sort of.

Some video content creators will abuse this. I guarantee it. Others will link to too many things in a video, causing confusion. We'll see videos so laden with links, calls-to-action, and more that your old GeoCities page will seem like a serene utopia in comparison. Link to the Facebook page! Visit this microsite! Fill out this email signup form! LINKS!11

Start by creating great video content

The best case scenario here sees content creators using the in-video link option to focus their channel-specific video messaging even further. We want to provide the best content experience possible, links clicked, Watch Time, and otherwise. How do we do that with video?

1. Create content that people want to watch. Think palatable, not gimmicky. Effective and straightforward trumps trying-to-be-funny or attempted-edgy on most occasions.

2. Make content clear and concise. Make your point in as few seconds as possible. Be direct helpful. PEOPLE LOVE THAT. A shorter video makes the link placement have less of an SEO impact. It's easier to watch a shorter video, from a life-expectancy point-of-view, too.

3. Focus on a single topic, concept, or task. The linear presentation of a video and its (new) links precludes an easy message hierarchy. Stick to a single message, and don't try to do to many things at once. Otherwise, you're likely lose your audience on all of the things in frustration and confusion. 

4. Give it context. Resist the urge to start off videos with a Ken Burns-style mini-documentary about the company. Instead, give them the background they need to make use of the rest of the video. If your messaging is consistent, this context should flow easily from one platform to the next.

5. Tell the story. Use a video's linear constraints as a force for good. Take advantage of it with an equally-linear storyline. Beginning, middle, end. Even if it is a :30 second piece. To quote Steve Martin's character Neil Paige from the holiday travel film, "Planes, Trains, and Automobiles": "When you are telling these little stories, here's a good idea: Have a point."

Place the link carefully

The ReelSEO article touched on another important part of this equation: inclusion of a "Watch Time" variable as a metric used in SEO. In other words, the longer a viewer watches your video, the better your stature in search results.

The Watch Time metric will be a considerable challenge for some. It's not exactly new; YouTube has been doing this since March 2012. This is fine for short videos with a quick and concise close.

However, longer videos were often published with the optimistic mindset of "viewers can watch a little, or they can watch all 18 or 32 minutes." The impact was the same. Now, the opposite is true. Watching a portion of a video to the end, once started, now has a potentially detrimental effect on the placement of the video within search results.

Atkinson notes that this presents a paradox of sorts. Ideal link placement within the video becomes a Schrödinger's content cat situation:

• Place the link at the beginning, where more people will see it? (Assuming more people will start your video than watch it to the end.) 
• At the end, to receive more SEO mojo? (At the risk of fewer people actually seeing and clicking on said link.)
• In the middle, to strike a perilous balance?

Link to appropriate web pages from your video (And vice veresa.) Strive for a seamless experience across platforms with branding, messaging, and tone & voice. Great content makes it all a more satisfying endeavor, all around.

More content tips from Neil Paige:

(Top image adapted from "Skip containing discarded VHS tapes" by Flickr user Rob Pearce.)

An Intoxicating Tale of Content Strategy

An effective content strategy bridges the critical gap between online and offline worlds, and the gaps between departments. When a content strategy is put in place, business goals will be met more easily, and people’s expectations with the brand will be fulfilled. I’ll drink to that.

A new product, a new opportunity

There it sat, on the shelf in the liquor store. An unfamiliar whisky housed in one of those fancy, boutique-style bottles. It wore an already-iconic label. I was intrigued.

This distilling company put some careful thought into this whisky. They even created some delightful point-of-purchase pricing signs echoing that label design. The text at the top of those tiny pricing signs reads “Just Released”–an announcement to the world, proud and urgent.

They want people to know about the whisky. They want people to buy it. But, as of this writing, THAT’S THE END OF IT.

The portable web changes everything

Like any other whisky nerd, I searched the web from my smartphone for any mentions or reviews of this whisky. To my surprise, there was only one relevant listing. And it wasn’t a helpful listing, either: an online retailer that offered only a price and size of the bottle.

The label on this bottle includes the company’s website. Unfortunately, it, too, was unhelpful. The whisky was not listed anywhere on the site. Searching for the whisky’s brand name on the company site brought up a page full of PHP errors. (That’s another matter altogether.)

Lots of whisky enthusiasts would have stopped right there. Despite the lack of information, I purchased a bottle.

(I shan’t mention the company name, lest this post become the only thing about this whisky on the all of the Internet.)

The gap between online and offline strategy appears

Time and money were spent on the product design and retail accoutrements, but the online presence? NOT A DROP. A chasm between the distillery’s new product strategy and the online strategy quickly became apparent.

This distillery has a product, a niche whisky. They want to sell it. Lucky for them, people want to buy distinctive whiskies. But they don’t buy them blindly. They want to know all kinds of things before making that purchase: age, blend, whose grandpa distilled it in the hills 100 years ago, etc.

If that information is not presented at the point of purchase or on the item itself, they’ll seek it out online. Possibly right there on the spot.

When companies present anything less than a complete and unified presence online and offline, people notice. Really, they do. Those people may shrug their shoulders and carry on with their tasks on your site (albeit with less satisfaction and ease.) Or, in the absence of any info online, they may give up and go to a competitor.

Each item and brand, especially in a retail environment, should have a corresponding presence online. That presence needs a solid strategy to inform its messaging, target audience, distribution, workflow, and maintenance.

Instill your projects with content strategy

I’ve heard online content strategy described, at its most basic, as the alignment of business goals and user expectations:

• Company provides a product or service
• People complete tasks related to that product or service (e.g. learning, purchasing)

The closer we align the meeting point(s) of those business goals and the user expectations, the better. Both sides need to be addressed. The one-way, broadcast model the distillery put in place, either actively or by omission, will no longer cut it. They missed the mark entirely in this case. No pun intended.

A toast to your future content projects

Part of the burden (or joy, I mean) of content strategists is keeping up with an organization’s new initiatives and changes to ongoing efforts. The launch of this whisky is a fine example.

To avoid a similar situation, get a seat at the table early in the process to engage with all staff involved on a project:

• Ask lots of questions
• Consider the implications of new company endeavors in the short and long term
• Filter each and every situation through your core online content strategy
• Be ready for changes that will inevitably come up along the way
• Make sure that new efforts are sustainable

Content strategists can have a great impact, but they are not a cure-all. Some projects may suffer from scalability issues, unwise decisions, or legacy organizational baggage.

What content strategists can do, however, is follow the standards for making great online experiences. They can ensure that the right audiences are addressed in the most effective way. And, they can guide the process with an overall strategic vision in place.

When your project is (hopefully) successful and all things are operating in sync, I have but one more bit of advice: pour yourself a glass of whisky.

This material first appeared on a post I contributed to the Follow the UX Leader blog. (Minus the Muddy Waters tune.)

You May Ask Yourself These Five Simple Content Strategy Questions

1. What am I trying to accomplish? Determine your core strategy, your unifying principles to follow. This is more critical than it might appear. Are you selling albums to adults? Soliciting donations for Dalmatians? With an honest evaluation of what you are trying to accomplish, only then should you begin down the path of content creation, delivery, and marketing.

2. What are my competitors doing? Or not doing? Put on your detective hat and figure out where you stand in the marketplace. Though you shouldn’t necessarily copy what they are doing (or not), observing your peers / competitors will give you a benchmark of current market and user expectations.

3. What do I already have? Complete an audit of your content. Audits uncover what you have, and what shape it is in. (Is it up-to-date? Accurate? Trivial?) Due to silo-filled work environments, many organizations are unaware of the value already in-house. The unrealized potential of ongoing initiatives may give you a head start on upcoming content marketing plans.

4. Do I have the capacity to create content sustainably? Honestly evaluate your organization’s human resource capacity and budget for content creation. Many plans look great on paper. At the start, enthusiasm is high. As campaigns and initiatives wear on, it becomes clear that they are unsustainable. Any content marketing plan should be based on an organization’s true ability to sustain it.

5. How will the content be cared for throughout its lifecycle? To remain effective, content needs to be maintained. Rather than implementing the “set it and forget it” mentality, content should enjoy regular, scheduled check-ups to ensure that it is still relevant, accurate, and supports the organization’s core strategy.

This material first appeared on a post I co-authored on the Coherent Social Media blog. (Minus the Talkiing Heads video.)

Online Content Readability Tests: Content Strategists Beware

Old-fashioned readability scores and indices don't account for some of the most critical elements of online content presentation. Avoid using them as the only measure of the true readability of online content. 

The story of a story

"Go Dogs. Go!" I love this book. Well, a version of this book. (The small one.)

Several popular children's books from publisher Random House are available in two physical formats: the standard hardcover book and the board book. Each format has its pros and cons.

• Hardcover book. More, thinner pages for more content. But, thinner pages tear easier.
• Board book. Fewer, thicker pages means less content. Super durable.

The more / less content situation wouldn't be an issue if you were writing a book from scratch.

Instead, publishers are most likely taking their more popular, large-format titles through an editing and re-versioning process. In the end, they can introduce a more durable version to another audience: page-chewing babies.

Getting to the point

This content editing process HAS to be complicated, from an editorial point-of-view. Imagine the task of conveying the familiar storyline in one-sixth the number of words.

In the case of "Go, Dog. Go!", the longer, hardcover version was trimmed from 528 words to only 70 words in the shorter, board book version. Each one of those 70 words matters, believe me. (I've read it hundreds of times.)

Sure, there are fewer words. But, fewer words doesn't always make a message or story clearer and easier to read.

Testing the readability of "Go, Dog. Go!"

Readability tests are equations using syllables, word counts, sentence counts, and familiar-word lists. Most often, they produce a number that corresponds with a grade level.

From a readability metric standpoint, you might think that such a dramatic reduction in content (the 528 versus 70 words) would make the story easier to digest. Based on five of the major readability tests, results were mixed.

Two tests showed improvements in readability in the shorter version, one saw no change, and two others came back with less favorable scores:

While the goal of the publisher, editor, and author is fitting the same, beloved storyline into fewer pages, another, more-interesting thing starts to happen: a brutal distillation. Only the essential remains.

The shorter version  of "Go, Dog. Go!" sheds some of the more superfluous elements of the story. Gone are the hat-disapproving dog, unrelated sub-plots, and unnecessary filler. What we are left with is pure magic. Seriously, you need to read this short version. I still love reading it.

Why we test content readability

Some of us might test content JUST FOR FUN. Others are tasked with the duty of measuring how consumable the content is by some score or index. The duty of measuring readabilty does not end there.  We want to:

• Determine if current content meets existing standards
• Establish a baseline readability score
• Set goals and standards for future content production
• Measure edited, re-vamped, and re-organized versions of the same content

How we've tested content readability in the past

The major readability tests were constructed in the 1940s to deal with printed texts. These equation-based systems improved the texts of the day: newspapers, books, etc. Familiar-word lists were refined, and other adjustments were made. Things were set for some time.

Research completed in the following decades took into account one of the foundational concepts for clear and concise online writing: structure. However, it proved impossible to fold structure-based variables into a traditional readability equation. Text needs are much more complex than could have ever been anticipated.

Today, a quick search online will produce several sites that offer options to measure content via cut-and-paste or by entering a page URL. Simple, quick, and easy. Right? NOT SO FAST.

This has an impact on online content

As we approach online content itself from a messaging and editorial standpoint, we encounter similar issues as seen in the children's book example. Adjusting text content can have a positive or negative impact, depending on the test. The worst-case scenario has people adjusting text to game the tests into delivering favorable scores.

No current readability test accounts for the hallmarks of easily-consumed online content:

• Concise sentences free of filler words 
• Bullets 
• Subheads 
• Emphasis (bold, H1, H2, etc.)
• Shorter, easily-read paragraphs

Add a few more variables into the equation by considering responsive design implications, device capabilities, and context, and soon the notion of an agreed-upon readability score is RIGHT OUT.

We are creating content destined for literally thousands of different environments. Even if we had a measure that took into account how that content was displayed now, it would by out of date in a week.

Don't measure readability only with a number

Content strategists are often asked how we might measure the effectiveness of our efforts. Sometimes we can point to cost savings, favorable return on key performance indicators, or other data-based measures.

Other times, our value is best presented in refinements to the overall user experience. Which can be tough to measure with a series of numbers.

It's hard to resist. You might be begging for an easy, scalable, plug-and-play solution for your online content readability measurement needs. Instead, you might wish to make a checklist of sorts, from a messaging point-of-view:

• Does this page/element stick to a single message overall?
• Does the content avoid jargon and language inappropriate to the audience ?
• Are the ideas presented in a clear, logical fashion from a user perspective?
• Does the page have a clear objective (and call-to-action, if appropriate)?
• Can users scan and quickly understand what they will get from the page?

Readability scores are not completely without merit. I still use them for passages and paragraphs, when appropriate. But they simply cannot be used for measuring an entire page's readability.

In the meantime, go find the board book version of "Go, Dog. Go!" at your library. (I didn't even let any story spoilers slip. The ending is AWESOME.)

Content Strategy and the Birth of the Cool (or Fabulous Business Blog)

Should you go forth and publish content before launch? Not to fill up the buckets on the site, but to determine the viability of newly-established editorial calendars and workflows? PERHAPS.

Birth of the Cool

Many of us have been lucky enough to witness the birth of something new. Like babies. Or cool. As in Miles Davis’ classic album “Birth of the Cool.” Or even, perhaps, a company blog.

Blogs, like babies and classic jazz albums, are each special in their own way. Unlike most babies or classic jazz albums, blogs ushered in a revolution in online publishing. Waves of that revolution are still having an impact in the business world as many are still launching their first forays into the blog world.

Usually, blogs have their chronological bits intact. Posts are dated, and listed in reverse publish order.  With those dates, you can tell how much time has passed between posts. That can be a good thing. Visitors will have an idea how often you are publishing new content.

Can we actually do this?

However, the blog format also puts forth the expectation that more content will be coming. That can be a daunting thing to a time- and resource-crunched team.

Fortunately, the launch of every company blog is accompanied by a robust and thorough content strategy. RIGHT? For now, let’s assume that it is. All of those classic, core, content strategy questions have been answered:

• Why are we doing this?
• Who are we speaking to?
• What are we going to say? And how?
• Who played alto sax on Birth of the Cool?

If things have gone well up to this point, these things will have been hammered out, too:

• Publish frequency
• Content ownership
• Content workflow from ideas to archive/sunset
• Editorial calendar for the blog that ties in with other company endeavors

Who is going to raise this thing?

The discussion that follows a decision to undertake blogging for a business brings up questions: who will write it, publish it, manage the calendar and comments, etc.

What is left is the world of planning, creating, and publishing the content. You know, ACTUALLY DOING THE THING.

Often, closer to launch, the discussion turns from horror (OMG, we don’t have any content) to that of shame (OMG, we need to compensate for a lack of content.)

Sowing the seeds of content

Many new blog owners seed their shiny new blogs with a few extra posts, a fine idea. Any artifice is quickly outweighed by the depth and context that a few extra posts bring to a blog. It might even change a one-time visit to a subscription (or other conversion).

Lucky for those managing a new blog, they are about to enjoy two opportunities. (I say that with a bit of sarcasm, because they are probably freaking out at the prospect of launching a completely empty blog.) Those opportunities?

1. Testing the viability of the editorial calendar
2. Testing the workflow under real conditions

These two things are ever so intertwined. An editorial calendar cannot be used without a workflow, and a content creation workflow needs the fodder of an editorial calendar.

Keep an eye on that (editorial) calendar

The success of an editorial calendar depends upon its honesty. Failed calendars are full of good intentions, but leave out important considerations like:

• Will our subject matter experts contribute?
• What if the contributions are of hopelessly bad quality?
• Can we sustain our proposed content production schedule?

Be as realistic as possible, and build in some extra time. If things are moving along ahead of schedule, note it, and keep going.

It’s gonna be work

The workflow test will very quickly surface any bottlenecks or pain points in the content planning and creation phases. Testing the workflow might seem awkward, but it will pay off quickly as the blog starts regular content production.

Keep things real at this stage. A certain amount of artifice will be apparent at this point, and that’s fine. You’ll want it to be the well-rehearsed fire drill that precedes the real burning building of content creation. Some tips:

• Carefully outline the steps in the workflow
• Communicate roles and expectations early on
• Track progress throughout testing
• Note any major issues along the way
• Adjust the workflows accordingly

Congratulations, it’s a blog

With these steps, you, too, can become the proud parents of a bouncing baby blog. A blog that is effective, meets business needs and user expectations, and is generally delightful.

Sure, there are lots of trying times ahead. But, by following the steps above, you’ll be able to avoid many of the headaches and late nights that other blog parents have endured.

Busy Content Strategist Is Busy

It's been a busy couple of months. To say the least. In the meantime:

The fantastic Kristina Mausser asked me to write a post for the Follow the UX Leader blog. I was honored. So, I wrote a post about content strategy and managed to make it partly about whiskey. Go figure. I titled it "An Intoxicating Tale of Content Strategy."

Contentmanagement.com republished my "7 Steps to Keep Your Content from Sending You to Prison" post on their blog. Again, I was honored.

The Minneapolis/Saint Paul Content Strategy Meetup group invited me to speak about curation and content strategy at their November gathering. I did. Honored.

The Non-Profit Spark podcast interviewed me about content and governance. As you might imagine, I was honored. (Plus, I got to use the ol' velvety baritone radio voice again.) Download it. Or dig it:

 

Finally, I accepted an offer for a Senior Content Strategist role at a major financial services company. I get to work on content things and stuff ALL DAY LONG. It's like some sort of weird content dream come true for this unabashed content strategy geek.

In summary, I am posting this to reassure you that I'm not being a total slacker. There are some interesting ideas under construction for 2012. To prove it, I hereby submit this old-school "under construction" animated .gif.

("busy schedule?" image from Flickr user flik (CC: BY))

Keywords, Work-arounds, And Souring The User Experience

Campaigns and other short-term online efforts can easily spoil online navigation and the user experience. Dismissing familiar cues to cut corners will leave people confused and ultimately unsatisfied. Consider campaigns early in the creation of a content strategy and you'll preserve the online user experience.

User experience and the supermarket

I fancy milk on my morning cereal. I don’t have a cow, so I go to the store to purchase it. I like it when that process is easy. It was, for the longest time.

Ever since I was a kid, I understood the mysterious code of the milk cap:

• Blue cap = 2%
• Yellow cap = 1%
• Pink cap = skim

However, at one particular food retailer that shall remain nameless, they use different colors.  

My entire life’s work of memorizing the fat content of cow’s milk at the market was destroyed on a recent shopping excursion. This store broke the unwritten code: don’t mess with another man's visual dairy purchasing cues.

I used to be able to go into the store and buy milk WITHOUT READING A SINGLE WORD OR NUMBER. Look for the proper cap color, then purchase. Now, I have to check and re-check. My milk-buying confidence has been shattered.

That simple color-coding turned out to be a greater navigational cue than I’d ever thought. It is simple, it saves time, and is near-universal. Or so I thought.

Online user experience and the keyword

I also fancy watching PBS on TV. Our local affiliate is running a promo for their photo contest called "Capture Minnesota." Their 30 second on-air promotional spot for the contest uses an old-timey artifact of a navigational element: THE KEYWORD.

They ask viewers to visit the station's website, and enter a keyword for more information.

This isn't a keyword in the Google sense. Think AOL keyword. Circa 1998.

While writing this post, I visited the website to see if I could find said photo contest. It was not in the navigation. Not in the rotating stories element. I did find a mention of it 1,850 pixels down on the homepage, effectively burying it. That's in sharp contrast to the amount of promotion the contest has enjoyed on-air.

The keyword is not an effective shortcut

For scientific purposes, I did click on the search box. It's actually labeled "keyword," rather than "search." After entering the terms "capture" and "picture," the search results were decidedly unhelpful. The third term, "photo," was the one they had slotted in their system to return a "recommended result." We have a winner! Kind of:

(The "recommended result" is confusing in its own right, as it looks different than other search results, and doesn't actually contain the term I used to search.)

The chief issue here is using the keyword as a shortcut or work-around rather than incorporating it into the current site. Better options for the photo contest?

• Introduce it into the navigation throughout their site
• Include it on the homepage rotating feature element
• Create banners to temporarily supplant current ad/promo inventory

Just help folks do what they want online (or offline)

Both the supermarket and the local PBS affiliate ended up souring my experiences. (Pun fully intended.)

The supermarket could have followed convention by using the standard milk cap colors, making the selection process as simple as possible. But they didn't, and it caused me to buy fattier milks in error.

The PBS affiliate could have used any number of other attention-grabbing standard promotional practices seen everyday online. Something milk-cap-color simple. But they didn't. They chose to rely on the keyword, and it will no doubt cost them traffic.

Make it part of your content strategy

I think the PBS affiliate wasn't able to fully incorporate the contest into their site as completely as they might have hoped. The contest's temporary, rather than permanent, existence likely contributed to this decision. In doing so, they soured the user experience. 


This illustrates the importance of including campaigns and other endeavors of limited duration online in your content strategy.

Campaigns need space on the site. (Think navigation elements and promotional real estate). They may require governance practices unique only to them. And their performance will likely be of great interest to those in your organization. Each of these campaign considerations should be woven into a content strategy in the context of other content and overall business goals.

Undoubtedly, campaigns will pop up when time is short. Plan for them even though they may not be on the horizon. In doing so, you'll help maintain a consistent user experience. As we know, that makes both milk buyers and site visitors happy.

"Milk Man Blues" by Merline Johnson a.k.a. Yas Yas Girl

7 Easy Steps To Keep Your Content From Sending You To Prison

Governance of online content is critical. If avoided, it will make your online presence less effective, at best. At worst, you could be facing a $2,000,000 lawsuit. These seven quick tips will help provide a better experience online. And they just might keep you out of the courtroom.

A rare story about online content and the law appeared in the news last week. Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum ran into a bit of trouble. Intellectual property trouble. Unlicensed third-party content trouble.

Presidential hopefuls need websites. They are usually better at presidential hopefull-ing than information architecture and content strategy. So, they hire firms to help them out. However, Santorum’s situation proved more harmful than helpful.

A Dutch font foundry claims the Santorum site is using an "unauthorized derivative version" of one of their products. The story from Thomson Reuters says:

“Typotheque VOF is seeking at least $2 million in damages from RaiseDigital LLC, a Virginia-based consulting company that develops new media strategies for political campaigns and politicians..”

They are seeking $2 million in damages. TWO MILLION DOLLARS.

One day, you pay someone to create an online identity, and the next day your name is attached to a $2,000,000 infringement suit. How does something like that happen?

Know your content rights

Good online content takes components from many different places, minds, and sources. In the end, the best content is greater than the sum of its parts.

Some basic categories, plus an example of each:

• Created in-house (user interface copy)
• Created by contractors (text from a freelance writer)
• Licensed from contractors (font from a type foundry, as in the news story)
• Licensed from content providers (news stories from Associated Press)
• Licensed user-generated content (image from a Flickr user)
• Public domain (primarily images no longer in copyright)

Each one of these components may have different legal guidelines, terms, and potential implications. It's a wonderful thing, really. These things ensure that content creators are properly attributed and/or compensated, in public or behind the scenes.

But, when one of these things is used without the proper permission, things get ugly. $2,000,000 ugly. How can a content team avoid that?

Avoid content lawsuits in 7 easy steps

1. Inform staff about the basics. Parts of copyright law are impossibly difficult and arbitrary. Other parts are quite clear cut. Make no assumptions on what your staff understands. A quick explanation of rights, licensing, and their potential impacts will put them in a strong position to produce content with confidence.

2. Provide clear guidelines for acceptable content. Style guides are a great place to detail an organization's legal and editorial copyright rules. These decisions can affect tone and voice, so consider them as carefully as you would the rest of the style guide.

3. Review current third-party terms of service. You know those monstrously large EULAs (end-user license agreements) that we sometimes accept without reading? That's where third-party providers dictate their terms. Look at them again to ensure that you are using them within the agreed-upon terms of service.

4. Remain cognizant of exclusivity clauses with other content providers. This separate yet still-complicated issue comes up on more complex projects. Some content providers require exclusivity. Sometimes that exclusivity is worth it. Other times, it's an impediment to achieving your business goals.

5. Enter into new content agreements carefully. Examine the track record of new providers and partners. Dig deep into their past projects and output. Read the fine print with an eye on concerns and issues from the past and present. And, eliminate any ambiguity before moving into that relationship.

6. Note where things are, and who is responsible for them. A content audit should indicate if that page contains content subject to rights issues and concerns. Advanced wireframes should also indicate if, when, and where third-party content will be used. Assign appropriate staff to manage each content provider relationship and address any concerns or issues that may arise.

7. Devise an exit strategy, NOW. Ongoing licensing agreements will change over time. Plan for those changes on all content that isn't owned outright. Operating with a replacement plan and process or an overall reorganization in mind will allow you to focus your efforts on "What next?" instead of "What if?".

[Image from Flickr user Mark Strozier (cc: by)]

Coke Fiends and Content Strategy

The Coca-Cola Company has unleashed a new type of soda fountain into the world. They've put some online marketing muscle to work to promote it. But is it enough?

My wife is an unapologetic Diet Coke enthusiast. When she breathlessly told me about a new sort of soda fountain at the local Dairy Queen, I was curious.

What could make a soda fountain new? Isn’t it just soda? Coke, Diet Coke, Sprite, and maybe lemonade and root beer?

I was in for a surprise, as this was no ordinary soda machine. This was a Coca Cola Freestyle machine.

The Coca Cola Freestyle soda fountain

Warren Buffett, Freestylin'

This thing is kind of a big deal. Most soda machines offer 8-10 choices. That is it. I’ve seen some convenience store fountains with more exotic options, like a shot of cherry flavor. Beyond that, the soda fountain world has been fairly static for decades.

This soda fountain changes all of that.

With a footprint smaller than a regular soda fountain, this one boasts not only a touchscreen, but a MIND-BLOWING array of options. Over 100, in fact.

Thirsty patrons touch the screen to choose a brand (Coke, Sprite, etc.) and then choose an optional flavor. Brilliant. Did I mention that there are over ONE HUNDRED OPTIONS?

How has the Coke Freestyle machine been marketed?

Well, there is a sign in the window at the DQ. And another at the cash register. But what is happening online?

They have a slim microsite set up, primarily to point people to these three things:

They've set up a Twitter account, @ccfreestyle:

• Listening for terms like "drink machine" "100+" etc. in addition to the brand names
• @ replying to mentions of those terms, asking "What did you like?"
• Getting little to no response (I've been there. It can be tough.)

They've also established a Facebook page.

• Running a "Fan of the Week" contest
• Offering lots of "What's your favorite?" questions
• Allowing users to post images in a largely unfettered fashion (not going to link to that one)

They have apps for Android and iOS.

• Primary function: a memory game mimicking the Freestyle's touchscreen
• Also includes a Freestyle machine locator map, via GPS
• Game-ified badge rewards for high scores and use of the Freestyle locator
• Apps can link to users' Twitter and Facebook account to share scores/badges

Looks nice. Game play? Check. Direct interaction? Check. But, I can't help but feel that they've stopped a bit short.

Coke fiends and their friends

Many real-world Coke fans are more than enthusiastic. Fiendish, even. They already devote status updates to the brand. I've seen more than one person add it to their social network bio. With this level of devotion, a does a considerable opportunity await? YES.

The Freestyle machine begs for deeper engagement. It already has a touchscreen and an OS, for Pete's sake. Just think of the possibilities. A couple of examples:

• Challenge drinkers to try all 100+ choices, track progress and share
• Award badges for different achievements, share them via Twitter and Facebook
• All Coke flavors tried
• All sodas in orange flavor tried
• Number of different machines visited
• "Mayorship" of machines (to borrow from Foursquare)
• Facilitate the invitation of friends for competition
• Issue QR codes from the machine send status updates via the app to Twitter and Facebook ("Drinking a Pibb Zero from @ccfreestyle.")
• Create a Freestyle Re-mix: make-your-own mix of sodas, name it, and submit it

These things go one step beyond brands interacting directly with the consumer. They allow people to have a conversation facilitated, originated, and/or augmented by the brand that bridges the gap between the real world and the online world.

B2C interaction is VERY important. But, the brand-facilitated consumer-to-consumer interaction is more organic. It's happening between one brand advocate and other potential brand advocates.

Cue the QR code

Bridging the gap between online and offline

Tosca Fasso, Content Strategist at Razorfish, recently wrote a blog post about the blurring of online and offline worlds. She writes:

"Publishers are creating linkage points between offline and online media to build an ecosystem of opportunities for audiences to connect with their brands."

There is a major shift happening. It's already having a significant impact on content creators and those tasked with content governance.

The technology now exists to make these online/offline connections in a swipe or two on a mobile device. How does that fit within the core strategy and business goals, if at all? How can these advances be shared across department lines? Shared across other spaces? How can they be best put to use?

Ms. Fasso continues with this in her closing paragraph, detailing the impact this has on content strategy:

"It’s time to start thinking about handoff opportunities, places where our work can pass the baton. Done right, these integrated efforts can help build optimal experiences for users while helping brands meet users where they are..."

Coke has built some of the foundation for bridging the gap between online and offline worlds with the Freestyle soda fountain. They are engaging people on Twitter and Facebook. They've got social-graph connected apps with game layers and rewards.

By further fostering that online/offline connection, Coke could enjoy even greater brand loyalty and engagement.

Not all brands can do this. Not all brands have 100+ of anything worth sharing. And not all brands have Coca-Cola's brand recognition.

As any wise content strategist will tell you, it is not about the tactics. It's about the approach. Tackle those content strategy and social strategy projects with an eye on bringing real-world experiences to the now-ubiquitous social graphs. You'll be even closer to fulfilling those core business goals.

Or one step closer to the Borg. Either way...

Online Endeavors Need a Spare Tire

You need a spare tire in your content strategy. Otherwise, you’ll end up stranded with a blowout on the information superhighway.

Be Prepared

The Boy Scout motto is a simple two words: Be Prepared. (I am an Eagle Scout, you know.) I think of that motto often, in both personal and professional settings.

We’ve all encountered unexpected situations and issues of one sort or another while working with online projects. The anxiety level is usually in direct proportion to the lack of preparedness.

• Online content emergency + no plan = TIME TO FREAK OUT
• Online content emergency + content strategy = cool as the other side of the pillow

Preparedness is not always black and white. It’s more of a spectrum, really.

For example, I saw the cutest car in the parking lot the other day—a Fiat 500. I went right to my desk to look for more info on their website. While clicking through the options, I discovered an odd one: A SPARE TIRE.

A spare tire. As an option. Really? (Click to inflate)

Some car companies now include a “tire repair kit” instead of a spare tire. It’ll fix some minor problems like a slow leak or a nail puncture. No biggie.

But, if you hit a big pothole and completely destroy your tire, you’ll be left stranded. This happened to me earlier this year. No repair kit would have helped the shredded remnants of my tire. To be fully prepared, I needed a spare.

Issues Known or Unknown

In 2002, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said the following quote. It remains relevant, yet somewhat garbled, today:

[T]here are known knowns; there are things we know we know.
We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns—the ones we don't know we don't know.

Believe it or not, spare tires and unknown unknowns can have an impact on what you do online.

Online Content with a Slow Leak

The known/unknown quote serves as a reminder to account for the most likely and obvious things that might affect an online endeavor in some way. Take these flat-tire scenarios, for example:

• Staff changes disrupt content workflows
• A CMS update breaks your current site
• Third-party content provider folds

These things can and should be anticipated. They are “known,” as Rumsfeld would say. Contingency plans to deal with them can be crafted and shelved until needed. It’s all in a day’s work for a sustainable content strategy.

Online Content-Shredding Blowout

But what about those pesky “unknown unknowns” that Rumsfeld talked about?

Plan as we may, there is always something that comes along to break even the most carefully assembled contingency plan. Often, the unknown unknowns are major and abrupt. For example, some tire-blowout-level  scenarios:

• New laws or regulations change your content ecosystem
• Upper management changes the overall business objectives
• Competitor innovation changes the market landscape
• Technological innovation changes the industry

What can we do? Develop a fast and flexible approach that allows content teams to address those unknown unknowns as they come up. This is not meant to be an explicit plan. Instead, it should be a modifiable process that is informed by the foundation work that goes into every solid content strategy.

Using Your Spare Tire

When the unknown unknowns make themselves, um, known, established roles and responsibilities become even more important. Some things to consider when establishing your “unknown unknowns” approach:

• Include the proper staff and stakeholders. Not every person needs to be at the table for each discussion, but the right ones should be.
• Keep an eye on sustainability. Changes must be realistic, and within the true scope and capability of those involved (as with any content project).
• Set everything in alignment with your core strategy and business goals. Any one of the tire-blowout-level scenarios can lead endeavors off course.

Take the time to put together plans for issues and situations that might threaten your online endeavors. Then, create a process that will allow you (and your team) to address any other situations that come up.
Before long, issues will be resolved and you’ll have your tires on the road again.

("Tired Tire" image by WheresWilson (cc: by-nc-sa ))

(This post originally appeared on the Brain Traffic blog.)

Is Your Metadata Miles Away from Complete?

Whether your content is produced in-house or licensed from a third party, make sure it’s complete from top to bottom. Otherwise, you might send someone off in a JAZZ RAGE.

Listening to music has changed

I love music. After a lifetime of being hooked on CDs and LPs, I recently jumped into the realm of getting a music subscription online. The charm of these services is that they don’t require any downloads—all of the music is streamed on-demand.

Services like this are not new. They’ve been around for some time, actually.

I took the plunge because one of the services, Rdio, had finally created an online experience with the things I wanted. It’s easy to use. And easy to sync across different devices and locations. BUT, there are some common content issues that keep it from being a fantastic experience.

Providers need content

Services like Rdio work by licensing content, making it available each month to eager listeners for a subscription fee. Record labels strike deals with these online services to provide access to their catalog of titles.

Rdio has done their part, making the layout and features downright lovely. So lovely, in fact, that I’ve been going about as if I were a salesman for the company, begging people to sign up.

Being a jazz nerd, I immediately typed “Miles Davis” into the search box on my first visit. This is where the trouble started.

But something makes me kind of blue

First, some jazz history: Miles Davis played trumpet with bebop sax legend Charlie Parker early in his career. They made fabulous recordings. Rdio makes enjoying these rather difficult. To illustrate, here are the entries for Miles and Charlie Parker:

Figure 1. Miles is agitated. (Click to enlarge/exasperate.)

Although it’s likely not the fault of Rdio, there are some serious content problems here. Content is duplicated. Other content has frustratingly incorrect or incomplete metadata. Some content suffers both problems.

Some of these distinctions make sense. But others feature almost comical misspellings or strange divisions (comma or hyphen or slash or semi-colon or … ).

A careful audit of this content prior to publication would have surfaced these content classification crimes. Miles himself would arrest you for such offenses against his music.

Figure 2. The Miles Davis album “You’re Under Arrest.”

At any rate, this many misleading options will bewilder even seasoned enthusiasts.

Content milestones of the unwanted sort

Even more jazz history: In 1958, Miles recorded a classic album titled “Milestones.” Get it? Miles? Tones? Milestones? (This is as good as jazz humor gets, folks.)

That search I mentioned earlier? For Miles Davis? It yields 368 separate album choices. If you wanted to listen to the “Milestones” album on Rdio, you would be presented with yet another content conundrum:

 Figure 3. (Click to enlarge/enrage.)

When faced with 368 album choices, a listener can get overwhelmed, to say the least. They may switch from navigating the search results via text to relying on visual cues (in the form of album covers).

In Rdio’s case, album covers and artist names are considered metadata.  Inaccurate and incomplete metadata makes navigating the options difficult, if not impossible.

When metadata is incomplete or inaccurate, people will flee. They’ll unsubscribe from your service and take their money with them. You don’t want that.

Metadata to the rescue

In the interest of creating a satisfying user experience, the record companies would do well to clean up the catalog they license to services like Rdio. As newer editions of “Milestones” are released, this user experience will only become more unwieldy.

Complete and accurate metadata will make your life easier now.

New technology and its applications will find new uses for content in coming years. Make sure that your content—and by extension, your metadata—is complete and accurate. Because it just may make your life easier in the future, too.

(This post originally appeared on the Brain Traffic blog. )

Happy 200th Post, Content-ment. Plus, a Look Ahead.

Cheers, mate! (image: The Contented Drinker, by Adriaen Van Ostade)

In July 2006, I started a blog. This blog, in fact. Because I needed to know what blogging was all about.

Now, my CMS tells me it this post is my TWO HUNDREDTH POST.

So, instead of baking a blog cake with 200 candles, I thought I would do something more fitting. Like writing a blog post with both a look back and into the future.

Where this blog has been

I started this blog under the moniker of "Superfly Media." I even had the URL for a while. The name was a bit of an inside joke.

There were lots of posts about online and mobile technology and how it related to broadcasting. (I was working at Public Radio International at the time.)

In the meantime, some exciting things have happened.

One of the posts, "BBC and DRM, OMG," from this humble blog was excerpted on the BBC's Backstage blog. OMG, indeed.

Another post, "Content Curation versus Content Aggregation: A Velvet Mr. T Painting," was featured prominently in Steven Rosenbaum's book "Curation Nation." (Rosenbaum's book excerpt is on the Brain Traffic blog.) A book? My words, in a book? Even more OMG!

In 2009, I changed the name to Content-ment because:

• It was a clever play on the notion of contentment and content
• The old blog name lost its appeal and utility, as inside jokes do
• The URL was available

The emphasis of the writing here has always been on content strategy, production, distribution, consumption, and its value. And it always will. For instance...

Where this blog is going

There is a big project coming.

A fun project. An exciting project. It'll happen right here, on this blog. Mostly.

I've been sketching out a series of posts about the changing dynamic of content ownership, consumption, and its impact on the content lifecycle. There are going to be a bunch of them. There will be infographics. Interviews. Probably more references to Miles Davis.

I can't wait to get it out into the open. And share it with you.

This project will end in a grand experiment, of sorts. In the cheeky tradition of Internet, I shall keep some of it a secret for now. That'll be part of the fun.

And, thanks for reading thus far

Some of you have been reading since day one. Others have just found it. Some have shared it, some have left comments. Some agreed with my thoughts, others not. I thank all of you for spending the time with it. Really, really, for real.

When I started in 2006, I just assumed that no one would read it. I am still in awe that anyone does. Thanks!

And now, The Dells singing "Dreams of Contentment."

Station Wagons and the Content Audit

A content audit will reveal many things about the state of your online content. That audit must be used wisely. Decisions must be made to keep, discard, modify, or acquire content based on an audit's results. DO SO WITH CAUTION.

Recently, there have been a good number of articles written about the content audit. Abby Gilmore wrote a great post about a content audit's assembly and importance.

The decision to create content should always be approached with reverence. It should carefully informed and considered in the light of your larger business goals. And the the most base level, it should be A GOOD IDEA.

Automobiles, viability, and the content audit

Auto makers have wrestled with the concept of the content audit ever since Henry Ford decided to make something other than the Model T.

To their credit, the car giants examined their "content audits" with an eye on efficiencies. In this case, the content audit would inventory the parts, assemblies, and processes available for making other cars.

If they could make a 1956 Ford sedan, they could make a 1956 station wagon with many of the same parts. Efficiency!

Boy, they made beautiful wagons. (See above image.) Keep in mind that this was a golden era for the station wagon. The post-war baby boom created a need for cars that could hold the growing American family. The station wagon became an art form. So much so, books about "Station Wagon Living" were written, even.


Auto makers saw a need not met fully anywhere else. Their then-current sedan platform and common selection of parts made the station wagon's manufacture relatively simple. And, the designers knew the medium. Magnificent vehicles were created.

In 1966, Ford was presented with the idea of making that rambunctious, sporty Mustang into a STATION WAGON. Really. After all, station wagons had been selling. So had the Mustang.

Luckily, they passed on the idea. Sure, a few would have sold, but at what expense to the brand? They realized that it would have been a ridiculous idea. (See for yourself, in the image at right.)

Accelerate to 1996. An ugly station wagon came on the market. Saturn foisted the abomination of the model SW1 station wagon onto the innocent buying public during the height of the station-wagon-shunning SUV boom of the mid 1990s.

Sure, ugly station wagons had appeared before. The 70s saw the Pacer and Gremlin station wagons, after all.

But, Saturn wanted a part of the market. They saw things in the same way as Ford did in 1956, but without the demand of the marketplace or the design sensibility. And this is what happened:

Ugh. Enough said.

It looked as though they had, at the last minute, carelessly grafted the bits of a station wagon on the back of their sedan.  Despite Saturn's marketing claims of being a "different car company," they delivered a turd.

Website content, viability, and the content audit

Many of us have personally witnessed online content audits that highlight poor content quality, inaccuracy, and a considerable disregard for sustainability. Those findings are often ignored. More content with those same attributes finds itself on websites.

The content audit can make the task of determining what stays online and what gets dismissed a much easier and presentable endeavor.

Hard questions will get asked in the audit process. Basic business principles will get called into question. Someone might say, "This sounds like a bad idea on par with making the classic Mustang into a station wagon."

It may be difficult, but that is part of what makes the content audit such an effective tool. Nothing else lays bare, in black and white, these things:

• What is being done internally (workflow, ownership, governance)
• What content is being presented to the public
• What constitutes the public image of the company

On the other hand, audits also present some gaps, some opportunities, that might seem like good ideas. Some will be. Those revelations should be tempered by examining them through the lens of your overall content strategy.

Many of those ideas won't fare as well. Though bright and shiny on the surface, they will ultimately prove unsustainable, unwanted, and unwise. Like that appalling Saturn station wagon.

The content audit has a great deal of power. USE IT WISELY.

Here is an advert that shows the marketing behind that beautiful 1956 Ford station wagon:

Questionable Business Goals and Bad User Experience

What happens when a content strategy is based upon a suspect business concept? The user experience will become the first casualty.

It has been a long time since AOL's CD-ROMs were as ubiquitous as today's Facebook comments. AOL is foisting ubiquity of another sort upon us in the form of dubious content.

Business Insider just posted a leaked 58-page guide AOL provides to their editorial staff. Titled somewhat ominously "The AOL Way," the guide resembles a proper content strategy in many ways, replete with a very basic wireframe, a page table, some content production workflows, audience info, and more.

Yes, content strategy is the way

There has been quite a bit of discussion around The AOL Way document leak. Much of it points to the abhorrent content-farm practices at the core of their business strategy.

Regardless if one agrees with the content farm method or not, (and I do not), this leak points out that AOL has a thoroughly considered content strategy. The goals in the document are a stretch. The means of getting the content created are dubious and unsavory. But, this fact remains: they have done their homework.

But, you have to start with a sound premise

This raises the larger, more frightening question: What happens when a client’s business practices, aims and goals are suspect? How does a content strategist resolve the cognitive dissonance that this brings about?

The first reaction is to question a business' decision makers and stakeholders in the project. But, often the business aims, goals, and directives will come from much higher in an organization. Legacy mindsets and practices hold firm. Shareholders and boards must be appeased. A certain strata within the company may want change, but others do not.

Ultimatum situations of "change this or I am leaving with my principles" may be too scary for most employees to consider. Those charged with creating a content strategy in a situation like this will follow Theodore Roosevelt's maxim of "Do what you can, with what you have, where you are." Improvise. Make do.

Could this have happened at AOL? If it did happen, what's next?

Bad content = bad user experience

A few years ago. I had a need for a clock radio. I went to the store and bought one. It was cheap. It didn’t hold a radio station in tune. The buttons were SERIOUSLY fragile. Some didn't work at all. One day later, I returned it, and vowed to stay away from this clock radio brand for life.

It seems that AOL is doing the same thing as this shameful clock radio manufacturer:

That clock radio maker tried to fill an unmet need. They designed and manufactured something that was technically a clock radio. There was a fancy, full color box. The chrome buttons were shiny. It was sold where clock radios were sold. On the shelf, it sat right next to others that were more expensive and more substantial. A clock radio that does not work does not meet a user need.

A portion of AOL's plan uses the content farm production method. As The AOL Way guide shows, vast amounts of this low-quality content will be produced. (See a "farmed" example below.) It will be written in a way that games search engine algorithms, launching it to top spots in searches. This content will clog search engines, crowding out other, more viable content. Just like that clock radio.

Content creators and publishers need content to fill a business need. That content must be useful and usable. A business' reckless disregard for the end user or the end product will invariably create a poor user experience. No matter how carefully they craft the content strategy.

Perhaps the new head of content at AOL, Arianna Huffington, will make some changes for the better. Let's hope so, anyway.

For an example of questionable content as produced by a content farm, see this video tutorial on how to use the Caps Lock and Shift buttons on a keyboard:

("aol free time" image from Flickr user dehub (cc: by-nc-sa 2.0))