Many thanks to guest blogger Becky R. Schoenfeld for this great write-up of my session at Association Media & Publishing's 2015 Annual Meeting. Becky is managing editor of QST, the monthly membership journal for ARRL, the national association for amateur radio....
Content strategy
Join me for the Content Managers’ Playbook course on February 23
On February 23, 2011, I am teaching a day-long course for Web Manager University in Washington, DC. Content Managers' Playbook: Proven Strategies for Getting Readable Content is ideal for anyone who manages content and the people who write it. I've provided the full...
8 Ways to Get Your Manager to Focus on the Content at Your Company’s Website
If you are a web writer, web editor, or content manager, you often find yourself trapped. You have loads of responsibility for publishing user-focused content, but too little authority (or none at all) over the people who contribute that content. You can't "make" your...
For Double the Value, Cut Your Web Content In Half
Sometimes the best solution to a problem is the simplest one. Overweight? Eat less. Low on funds? Sell the flowery china you inherited from your great aunt. Flabby, non-engaging web content? Cut it in half. Sometimes the best thing you can do to your web content is...
“If Your Web Content Is Good, You Don’t Need FAQs”
That's what a participant said during a web writing course I taught recently for the Federal Library and Information Network at the Library of Congress. "We Don't Need No Stinkin' FAQs" I've heard this opinion before. Lots of people object to websites that segregate...
Action Buttons Confuse When There’s Nothing For The User To Do
This strident pop-up from my bank (note the huge exclamation point) has a simple message: Sandy Spring Bank is improving my ebiz reports. I'm happy. And they've provided me a nice little bulleted list of the four ways the new reports will be better than the old ones....
Social Media Press Release: A New Approach to the Old Problem of Getting Noticed
When more than 50 people lost their lives in a train wreck in 1906, Ivy Lee—the father of public relations—issued the first-ever news release, a public statement about the crash from Pennsylvania Railroad officials. The New York Times was so impressed with this...
Web Writing That’s Hardwired to Confuse
Here in DC, our Metro system has had a rough summer: a tragic train accident in June killed 9 people and injured 76. Throughout this summer of investigations, track repairs, and service disruptions, Metro has used Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, eAlerts, and LunchTalk...
Wikipedia: A Bold Experiment in Community
I’m a big fan of collaborative writing. So no wonder I found Andrew Lih’s book about the world’s largest collaborative writing project fascinating: The Wikipedia Revolution: How a Bunch of Nobodies Created the World’s Greatest Encyclopedia. Wikipedia is often my first...
What Makes Web Content Compelling?
I had a chance this week to play catch-up and take a look at blog posts that I’d flagged as interesting but hadn’t the time to read. One of the posts was from Copyblogger: “Everything You Need to Know About Creating Killer Content in 3 Simple Words.” Guest writer...
