Creek Content

End content chaos. Communicate clearly.

Have We Removed the Art From Writing?

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I’ve been waiting for a couple of years for someone to talk about removing the art from content creation. Most writers/editors/creative types I know got into their business because they loved the lyrical potential of the written word, or the emotional response they could provoke with video, or at some level, they appreciated the potential poetry in connecting one human to another with the intermediation of communication channels.

I’m not sure I fit into that category of person, honestly.

If I’d grown up somewhere else, I have a sense that I would have ended up in a far more technical field than the one I’m in. When I was 12 or so [early 80s], my dad got a computer for the family, and back then, computers tended to come with programming manuals. How quaint. I taught myself BASIC, and I had a lot of fun with it. But I didn’t know anyone else who had a computer, even, or have a sense that I could have connected to other computer users. In the early 1980s in rural Tennessee, you didn’t run across a lot of computer pioneers.

But that early exposure to computing did teach me that talking to a computer, and searching on a computer, and using a computer to work for you or help you in communicating, meant that you had to first learn to communicate with the computer. And looking back, that’s the part I always liked the best. I appreciate great writing. I enjoy it. I am lucky to call several great writers my friends…but I’ve always been more utilitarian in my focus.

When I was on the college newspaper, sure, I could write a feature story. But I really loved spot news — breaking news, to a more common parlance. Something’s happening now? Great, let me get all the facts, and figure out the most compelling way to share them with you — including how we lay that out on the page, design a graphic to tell part of the story, and how do we work the publishing system to get ourselves 30 more minutes past deadline, and still print the paper on time? That was what I loved. Working the system to get you the right information at the right time.

So maybe it’s no surprise that as I’ve gotten older, I’m less concerned with writing a Great American Novel, and more concerned with:

  • How do people access information?
  • How do we design information to get people to act?
  • How do we design information to get people to think?
  • How do we design systems to best allow computers and people to use information together?

That latter question is the direction we’ve pushed our content strategy and information architecture practices in at Creek Content, and it’s not by accident.

But these questions don’t have a lot to do, on the surface, with what we think of as really great writing. Hear me say — if your writing sucks, your audience knows, and they’re unlikely to be your audience much longer. Yes, invest in top-notch writers. Yes, pay them well. But for most business purposes, you don’t want a creative writer. You want a writer who understands your business goal and understands how to marry that with your audience’s goal. It’s a specialty, and not just any writer can do it.

All that to say, no, I don’t worry about losing the art in writing as we’re building the discipline of content strategy. It’s a different field. But I don’t recommend you come to content strategy if what you want is creative, lyrical expression [through writing, video, photography, or any other medium]. This field is about effective communication for a purpose. Yes, you’re going to get to use your creativity — but in ways you can’t even imagine now if you start as a writer. Content strategy pushes you to be creative in both technical and more traditionally creative pursuits — and often, in dealing with people and their challenges as well.

Applying New Interface and Technical Thinking to a CMS

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Have you used a legacy content management system? An enterprise CMS? Something a little older and stodgier than WordPress? How about SharePoint, even — either as a document management system or a CMS?

Now…think for just a minute … Imagine that you’re 24 years old, on your first job. You’re experienced in using Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, and [don’t admit it out loud] even Facebook. Imagine your reaction to seeing how the guts of that legacy system work. It’s not a pretty picture.

Once you get past Tumblr, Twitter, or a social system that relies heavily on APIs or drag and drop [both simple and seamless for the user], content management feels very awkward at best. When you move past WordPress, it becomes quite complex.

Some of that complexity is for good reason. Enterprise-scale content management systems are complex partly because the work they do is complex.

Many of the trickiest issues lie in how the content management system is created and customized, far more technical than the day-to-day work of a typical content creator. Some content management systems tie into other systems and databases for rules, templates, data storage and presentation, while some are all-in-one products. The more platforms you add to the work, the more complicated things get for the content creator.

And yet.

I’ve worked in many systems that can’t get beyond the document concept for each piece of content in their user interface representations, even if the way the system works is far more flexible than simply displaying a facsimile of a piece of paper. When we represent to users that they’re creating documents, their mental model thinks “page.” In many CMS today, we need to think chunks, not pages. Not articles. Even if we put chunks together in the end in a way that resembles an article, our mental models need to change to allow us to do other things, as well.

And we need user interfaces that help content creators visualize these content chunks, and their broad [or specific] applicability in a complex system.

And let’s not forget — we need to meet content creators’ increasingly sophisticated expectations of how they want to interface with technology. While unicorns are awesome, most people using most systems won’t be so ambidextrous. We need systems designed for real users that allow us to efficiently solve complex content problems.

 

How I Know Content Strategy Is Real

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A few weeks ago, I stumbled across this post by Olivier Blanchard at Brandbuilder.com, and I haven’t been able to get it out of my mind ever since. Yes, it is a bit dated (posted in October 2010), but that doesn’t change the fact that I took offense to this particular paragraph:

2010’s Social Media experts, especially those who came to their impressive expertise by way of writing blogs about writing blogs, will magically transform themselves into “Content Strategists” (a term stolen from either the SEO world or that of content fulfillment firms keen on the fact that “content strategy” sounds a lot sexier than “content fulfillment”). Though for some, the transformation will take place sometime between the hours of 4am and 9am (GMT) on 1 January 2011, the vast majority of the metamorphoses will take place based on Social Media conferences’ need for Content Strategy speakers. Expect a deeper ‘content strategy’ track at SxSW, and a rapid addition of ‘content strategy’ to most failing digital agencies’ service offerings.

Ever since I laid eyes on that portion of the article, I have been mentally defending content strategy. Here are a few points I’d like to make in defense of content strategy:

  1. Content strategy is actually a communications strategy. Perhaps if we think of the way we deal with content in terms of the way we communicate to our friends/readers/visitors, it’s easier to understand how it works. To date, few people think about the usability of content on their website until it’s too late. All it takes is the implementation of a basic strategy to make your content do what you want it to do. I’m going to steal a phrase that Laura loves to quote from Ann Handley, and point out that everyone is a publisher. If you have a blog, Facebook page, Twitter account or even an email address, you create content every day. Content strategy is simply a buzzword for making that content work in a way that helps you reach your business goals.
  2. Content strategy is a system. Though content strategy can’t be explained in terms of a tangible item (for example, it’s not a pretty website that’s you can see and interact with), it is a system of its own. The term “content strategy” describes a system that nurtures and maximizes the capability of your content from the time it’s created until it becomes outdated or you remove it from your website.
  3. Content strategy is measurable. Maybe this is too easy, but in my opinion, if you can measure results of a service, it is real. Measuring the ROI on a content strategy starts by identifying your goal. Do you want more readers? Focus on page views and the average time spent on your website. Are you trying to generate more leads? A good content strategy will increase the quality of your leads and shorten your sales cycle. Of course, this isn’t going to happen overnight. But if you give us some time to use content to reach your goals, we can make it happen.
  4. Content Strategy effects change. If you don’t believe me, just read about how strategically-placed content related to tobacco cessation inspired me to nip my smoking habit for good.

 

3 Reasons Why You Need a Style Guide

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Besides making things look uniform and inviting, a style guide will help improve your workflow and the usability of your content, among other things. Here are three reasons why you need a style guide to improve your business:

  1. It reduces your workload. Once you have a detailed style guide handy, you don’t have to spend as much time thinking about the details. It only takes one glance at the handbook to figure out how to format photos or where you’ve stored certain documents. It will also reduce your time spent maintaining content, since you can set your own standards for consolidating blog posts, updating content or removing posts altogether.
  2. It can support your marketing objectives. If your style guide encapsulates your standards for branding your website and/or your business, it will have a significant impact on the way your readers perceive you. Instead of using predictable words to describe your company, you can find a way to describe your business and use it consistently to make your voice unique. Be honest and be memorable when creating the guidelines for your branding. Find a way to break the mold and set that standard for all of your content. Over time, a professional image and consistent branding will build trust between you and your audience.
  3. It makes your content more usable. Your style guide will make your content more consistent — and consistency  signals to readers how they are supposed to view your content. For example, a bold sub-headline might signal to readers that you are about to change the subject. A numbered list might signal import information that is easy for the reader to take away. Consistency will also keep your readers from asking nagging questions like, “Why do they keep changing the headline format?” You might think that grammar nerds have gone by the wayside, but trust us, there are readers out there who still care about consistent, correct content.

While some people argue that a style guide is an unnecessary distraction, we believe that a good style guide is essential to consistency and professionalism. Once you set the rules, it won’t be long until they are etched in your mind for good.

Ready to get started? Get our tips on creating a style guide.

Our Tips on Creating a Style Guide

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A style guide is a detailed description of the standard format you want to create for your content. Whether you have one source of content or multiple contributors, a style guide helps track style decisions across channels and over time.

The guide should systematically present the standards you want to set for your content. Standards may need to adapt to the requirements of different channels, but the really tricky part is making the style guide a part of your team’s everyday process. Here are just a few things you will want to include in your guide:

  • Punctuation and style: How will you capitalize your headlines? Will you use the Oxford comma or not?
  • Formatting preferences: How do you treat subheads within articles? How will you format quotations? When should you use a table or a list?
  • Design help: Should images be justified to the right or the left? What font size do you use? When should you use bold or italics?
  • Some style guides are also operational manuals, and they include brand, process, and governance information. Who reviews the content before it’s published? Where are images stored? When is it appropriate to use the company logo?

These are the kinds of details that make a site look and feel professional. A style guide will help your entire company create consistent, professional content.

Style Guide Formats

There’s plenty to unpack in those 4 bullets, and many organizations end up with 100+-page documents. It won’t surprise you to learn that that kind of style guide isn’t often as effective as you’d hope. When the document is too complex, it’s a barrier to use. So if you must use a document [digital or paper] to convey style information, focus on the critical information that will create the image and level of professionalism that your brand and message demand.

If you’re using certain content systems, or add on content automation/evaluation tools to your workflow, you can embed more of the style guide in the technology itself. It doesn’t completely remove the creator’s need to understand and use the style guidelines, but it can enhance standardization.

Make It Easy

A simple, accessible way to get started is to adopt an existing style guide. Several comprehensive guides are available online for free, though you’re always at the mercy of the organization that originally posted the guide. Others are available for purchase or online subscription. But you need to first discern which guide fits your organization best. Today, the AP style guide is commonly used by many US businesses, but your organization may need the more formal style used by The New York Times, or even the Chicago Manual of Style. You also may need to consider industry-specific standards, especially for terminology.

But then customize — figure out what makes your organization unique, and understand how that should be reflected in your style. This will probably be a fairly compact document that you can distribute along with the adopted guide of your choice.