Calculating the ROI forXML and DITA

Topic-Based Authoring

Sarah O’Keefe, Scriptorium Publishing

background imageflickr: thelastminute

Sarah O’Keefe

! Founder and president, Scriptorium Publishing

! Content strategy fortech comm

! Interested in collision ofcontent, publishing, andtechnology

Twitter

! My ID: @sarahokeefe

! Scriptorium: @ScriptoriumTech

! #techcomm or #dita may be appropriate

Housekeeping notes

! Everyone is muted except for the presenter

! Please ask your questions through the Questions area in the webcast interface

! The presentation is being recorded; attendees do not appear in the recording

Overview

! Business case examples (with numbers)

! YMMV

! IANAL

! WYSIOO

! Big-picture musings on other issues (without numbers)

Localization provides aneasy cost justification.

Flickr: iancarroll

Localization cost

! Estimate 30–50 percent of total localization cost is desktop publishing

! With XML-based publishing, you can squeeze that cost to under 10 percent

! Cost savings: $20K–$40K per $100K in localization cost

Increased content reuse

Flickr: a-m-photo

Content reuse

! Baseline assumption:

! DITA = increased content reuse!

! 10,000 topics

! Development cost: $200 per topic (4!hours x $50)

! 5% more content reuse = $100,000 in savings (and additional savings in localization)

Are you copying andpasting?! Calculate cost of updates in multiple

documents

! Consider error rates

! Don’t forget the mental health toll

External content reusefor increased ROI! Software error messages

! Product specifications in product database and datasheets

! Product descriptions

! Training

! Tech support

Non-DITA problems forcontent reuse! Improve collaboration among writers

! Develop and enforce consistent style standards

A wise man once toldme…

“You should not implement XML as a substitute for creating a style guide.”

Also…

“Structure is no substitute for management.”

ROI depends on team(dys)function.

Flickr: kevenlaw

A high-functioning teamis a prerequisite to…! Share topics

! Communicate updates

! Minimize content “ownership” issues

! Smooth out inevitable conflicts

! Cooperate on assignments

Complex conditionalcontent may require XML.

Photo: www.christianholmer.com

XML can help with…

! Multiple conditional dimensions (platform, customer, audience, product)

! Huge number of possible variations

! Dynamic versioning instead of static publishing of a limited number of variations

Quality justification forcomplex conditional text! Eliminate redundancy

! More targeted information

! Meet customer requirement for personalized documentation

! Enable more versioning than supported in current toolset

! Enable dynamic publishing

Complex conditionalexample! 40 variations of a deliverable

! Configure and publish one at a time:

! 1 hour per variant

! 40 hours of work per deliverable, per release ($2,000)

! Dynamic publishing: publish once

Assumptions

! Tagging work does not change for static versus dynamic publishing

! Programming effort to enable dynamic publishing included in implementation cost

Complex conditionsrequire careful design.

Photo: Rachel Houghton

Yesterday’s content…

flickr: uhop

Time to market

Flickr: chris_radcliff

Time to market

! If product revenue is $1M per year, then each week of availability is worth about $20K in revenue.

! Accelerate delivery of first language

! Reduce delays in shipping localized versions

Newpublishing

architectures

Flickr: ccharmon

“One of the greatpowers of XML is tofree information

from being merelytext on a page, and

to give it otherkinds of roles.”

www.scriptorium.com/blog/2010/09/the-promise-of-xml-publishing.html

David KellySenior Technical Consultant

Integrating with user-generated content! Source content in XML

! Transform to accommodate user-generated content

! Use metadata to support unified search

Just-in-time publishing

! Topic-based rather than deliverable-based publishing

! Incremental deliveries for localization

! Content deliveries decoupled from software deliveries

Analytics

! Measure how topics are used

! Act on information about:

! Popular topics

! Unpopular topics

! Unsuccessful searches

! Topics with lots of comments

DITA implementationcost averages $106K.! Source: “The state of structure in

technical communication,” 2009. www.scriptorium.com/blog/2010/05/the-state-of-structure-in-technical-communication.html

Your business case needsto show more than $106K.! Localization

! Increased reuse

! Support for complex conditionality

! Faster time to market

! Support for new publishing architecture

Factors that increaseimplementation cost! Software integration issues

! Complex output/formatting requirements

! Inconsistent source files

! Source files that are not topic-based

! Content management system

! People

Change management iscritical

A few of my (not) favoritethings! Dysfunctional teams

! Information hoarding during implementation

! Tool-specific blinders

! Using XML/DITA to clone an existing, problematic workflow

Dysfunctional teams

! Improve communication

! Improve collaboration

! Build trust

! Provide project roadmap early

Information hoarding

! Do not reward this behavior

! Implicitly

! Explicitly

! Avoid communication bottlenecks

! Document project decisions

! Distribute project information

Tool-specific view of theworld! Ask for open minds

! Consider new features, not just cloning old features

! Try out a variety of XML tools

Cloning an existingworkflow! Identify best and worst features of

current workflow

! Identify new requirements that can’t be met with current workflow

! Understand how new workflow affects authors

Match any two forinstant XML justification

Topics 2,000+Writers 10+Supported languages 3+Deliverable formats 2+

flickr: booleansplit

Structured authoringsurvey! Researching adoption rates, issues, tools

! Open until March 1

! Participants get free results

! http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/structure

! Please participate, and tell your friends!

Coming attractions

! February 8: Attractive DITA output (it IS possible)!

! March: Trends in technical communication, 2011

! April: Structured authoring survey results

Questions? Comments?

Contact information

! Sarah O’Keefe

! www.scriptorium.com

! okeefe@scriptorium.com

! @sarahokeefe