purposes, personas, conversations (ginny redish)

Purposes, Personas, Conversations

Janice (Ginny) Redish, Ph.D.

Redish & Associates, Inc.

Bethesda, Maryland

301−229−3039

ginny@redish.net

www.redish.net October 19, 2012

Chapter 2

Redish & Associates, Inc.

© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 2

Halvorson and Rach, 2012

Develop and follow a content strategy

Content strategy =

Thinking strategically about your content

Aligning content with business goalsAhava Leibtag who blogs athttp://onlineitallmatters.blogspot.com

Redish & Associates, Inc.

© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 3

Content strategy = governance

Content must be

planned

coordinated

reviewed

managed and maintained

removed

Break down those silos!

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© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 4

Content strategy = resources

People

Who will write? edit? illustrate? produce?

What skills do these people need?

Technology

What systems and templates will you use?

How will people be trained to do what they must do?

Flickr cc photo by Rowens27

Redish & Associates, Inc.

© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 5

Content is everything you have on the web site

text

illustrations

charts

graphs

tables

forms

pdfs

videos

podcasts

blogs

forums

other social media

− and in all your other communication channels

Redish & Associates, Inc.

© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 6

Content strategy = messages and more

Messages

Tones

Styles

Right contentin the right amountto the right personat the right timein the right medium

Media

Redish & Associates, Inc.

© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 7

Plan at every level

Of course, content strategy = planning.

Every piece of content also needs a plan.

Answer these 3 questions:

Why? (your purposes)

Who? (your site visitors)

When, why, and how?(your site visitors' conversations)

Redish & Associates, Inc.

© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 8

Why? (Purposes) Align with the agency's overall strategy and goals

Be measurable

Focus on what you wantyour site visitors / readers to do

Be specific

$

Redish & Associates, Inc.

© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 9

Focus on what you want your site visitors to do

to sell lots of shoes

site visitors to buy lots of shoes from us

to inform doctors about the new network

doctors to join our network

to tell people about this topic

answer site visitors questions about this topic

We want

Redish & Associates, Inc.

© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 10

Be specific

http://www.manageyourwriting.com/

Kenneth W. Davis

Redish & Associates, Inc.

© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 11

Who are your site visitors? Name the different groups.

What should you keep in mind about these people? Write down adjectives or phrases.

attitudes

knowledge

context of use

not what content they are looking for − that's the question after this one.

Who? Personas

Redish & Associates, Inc.

© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 12

What is a persona?

a fictional person who realistically representsa major group of site visitors

composite

based on data about demographics goals and tasks contexts of use (environments) values

User profile:• system administrators• guys, 25 – 40 years old• know terminology• on the computer all day

Art

Words like "people""users""site visitors""readers"are all too vague for good conversations.

Redish & Associates, Inc.

© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 13

Persona from Epcor Utilities, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, used with permission

Redish & Associates, Inc.

© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 14

Site visitors come with their own goals, tasks, scenarios, = conversations.

Visualize the persona coming to your content.

When? Why? How? Conversations

Redish & Associates, Inc.

© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 15

Let's apply this planning to a real example

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© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 16

My current draft revision

Redish & Associates, Inc.

© 2012, Janice (Ginny) Redish User Focus 12 Slide 17

Ginny Redish

ginny@redish.net

www.redish.net

@GinnyRedish

Ginny Redish

Thank you

2nd editionAugust 2012

Questions? Comments?

Purposes, Personas, Conversations