Content strategy – Complete or Done?
When I was 18 years old, I realized I didn’t know much. I also knew this was the nature of being 18 but I still felt I should fix it – I should know more. I was a US Army wife, living in Naples, Italy and for reasons I don’t remember, we had an encyclopedia set. I decided to read the encyclopedia, starting at A and reading to Z. I felt this was a reasonable solution to not knowing. It was, in a way, a content strategy. Complete information? My reasoning was something along the lines of “I don’t know anything....
read moreWrapping up your content strategy
Here in inland So Cal, it’s a cold and pretty year thus far in 2015. Here’s hoping your content strategy heats up this year! The 5 top content development articles last year 2014 was the year when everyone discovered the importance of effective content strategy and content management. Pre- and post-sales content is starting to get the attention it needs to improve the customer experience overall. I thought I’d share the top 5 articles I wrote from last year. Your content or your product will never be Jimmy Buffett. Read...
read moreAre you helping your customer segments?
Customer segments are the definable differentiations in your customers. For example, your customers over or under XX number of dollars in size, or the number of Spanish speaking customers or really any other way your customer base can divide out. Why is customer segmentation important? Customer segmentation is getting more important to businesses as big data becomes more available. It allows us to better understand who our customers are, what they are doing, and what we can do to help them stay engaged with us. Engaged customers are worth...
read more5 reasons why content creation/development vendors have it wrong
Note: Since I wrote this, I’ve discovered 2 other blog posts on this subject: Mark Baker JoAnn Hackos Clearly, this is an issue. [update added 11/14/14] I’ve spent the last few months getting new content development tools set up or helping to change the workflow. And (in my opinion), no content development vendor has it right yet. Here’s my top 5 reasons why: 5. You have to be an expert in the tool The vendors assume people will become expert in the tools. This is dumb for many situations. For example, in the oil and gas...
read moreNeither your content nor your product are Jimmy Buffett
Recently, I saw a vendor advertising a webinar on Twitter, which at the time, was about 10 days away. It looked interesting so I clicked the link to sign up. The description looked even more interesting but I didn’t sign up. Why? Because the sign up link is “Check back soon for registration details!”. Today, Just under Less than a week before the webinar, there’s still no finally a signup link. I assume some time before the webinar, there will be a sign up link but I have no idea when. At this point, I’m I was...
read moreWhat’s clear communication and how do you get it?
We all know that content is King, or Queen, depending on your point of view. But regardless, content that communicates a message that resonates with the audience is critical, pre- and post-sales. All content is not created equal, though. Content that powerfully gets the message across in a way that makes sense to the receiver is the best content of all. This content is typically clearly communicated. Clear communication doesn’t happen by accident. And it’s too important to hope and wish it happens. Clear communication webinar...
read moreCustomer experience and product instructions (part 6)
In previous articles, I’ve talked about some business/customer experience basics, like what is customer experience and customer churn, and the value of customers and the pyramid of customer experience. I’ve covered the Customer Experience pyramid and the Content pyramid, the cost of customer support centers as they impact the Customer Experience, and the expense of product returns and how it impacts the customer experience. In this article, I cover my thoughts about customer touchpoints and how they impact the Customer Experience. Customer...
read moreCustomer experience and product instructions (part 3)
So far in this series of articles, I’ve covered some business/customer experience basics, like what is customer experience and customer churn, and the value of customers and the pyramid of customer experience. This article is focused on that pyramid and on another, related, pyramid a very smart person blogged about the other day. Content Needs Sarah O’Keefe over at Scriptorium blogged about a proposed hierarchy of content needs. Her point is that there are levels of content needs that your customers have and these needs are...
read moreCustomer experience and product instructions (part 2)
In the last article, I discussed customer churn and how it’s a bad thing. I also talked about the cost of acquiring customers. In this article, we’re going to look at resell and incremental spending and how they impact the company bottom line. An average company loses between 10 – 30% of its customers annually – McKinsey Incremental spending Incremental spending is when your customers like your product(s) or services so much, they buy more. This is a good thing for many reasons, but it’s especially good in terms of dollars...
read moreCustomer experience and product instructions (part 1)
At this point, most products that do the same thing do the same thing. For example, most cell phones do the same stuff. Most cell phone companies do the same stuff. Most products are commodities, in that they all do the same stuff. So how do we as business people differentiate our products? How do we make the case that dealing with us is better than dealing with our competition? Customer Experience This is where the rather new field of customer experience comes in. From the Customer Experience Professionals site (of which I’m a member):...
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