Recently someone asked me what the steps were to create a website from a content strategy perspective. Always a fan of “boiling it down”, the below list are my thoughts in brief. Obviously, I’ve skipped many many sub-steps. Obviously, I’ve over simplified. But this is a repeatable cycle that MUST happen for every site. And, preferably in this order.
1. Business strategy alignment: You must align your business strategy with the content you are creating or preserving for this new site, or site redesign. DELIVERABLE: Creative Brief
2. Content Audit: if you have an existing site, this step is critical. You must capture the content that is viable, as well as what is out of date. If your site is thousands and thousands of pages, you may need to figure out a technical solution to this problem, but there's nothing like actually "touching" each and every page. DELIVERABLE: Content Audit
3. User Task Analysis: Gerry McGovern talks about this just brilliantly in this podcast with Randall Snare. We need to stop thinking about pages as units of content, but rather tasks as units of content. Therefore, users come to websites (or applications) to accomplish tasks, and the content should support them in completing those tasks. DELIVERABLE: A List of Tasks
4. Page Specs: Different than wireframes, page specs exist to list for IA’s what types of content should be available from each template. DELIVERABLE: Page Spec
5. Information Architecture: IA is really web design, or so says Dan Brown. But it’s not visual design—it’s the guts of the website, the spine. Information flow, as well as how users will interact with the website are where those very important, handy IA’s come in. DELIVERABLES: Wireframes and Page Templates
6. Visual Design: Visual designers decorate and cue the user with visuals. They should be using the Creative Brief, as well as any other valuable research about the company, goals, etc. that they need to match the tone and messaging to a visual feel. DELIVERABLE: Visual Design Comps
7. Content Creation: This comes in many forms—text, video, audio, slideshows, PDFs, etc. DELIVERABLES: Copy Decks, Scripts, Whitepapers, etc.
8. Production: This is where templates are built, content is slid into place and quality assurance is performed. DELIVERABLE: The Finished Product
So, what did I miss? Go ahead, boil it down for me.
POST EDIT:
Kristina pointed out below that content governance is a critical part of this process. Since I say in my introduction that it needs to be a repeatable process, then I do think we need to add that 9th ongoing step. So whether you think of it as a step, or a process that completes itself AS a cycle, you must make sure that there are steps in place to ensure that someone is taking care and feeding your content.
I like the clear and concise breakdown. In fact, you almost make it sound *gasp* easy.
ReplyDeleteIt's nice to see the revival of task orientation; I've spent too much time arguing for this across both user assistance docs and site content.
Thanks for capturing this and sharing!
-Michael
I really like your writing and simplified steps! Helps to explain to clients. Curious, how do you deliver these steps to clients? Mix of meetings, docs, emails? Or something more sophisticated for all parties to monitor the steps?
ReplyDeleteOverall, love the post to itty tiddly bits, niggle: in pt 7, you say 'content creation' without mentioning anything about the (potentially enormous) amounts of existing content (some of which may never have been online before) that you touched in pt 2 - content audit. I think that the point needs to be create/migrate. I might be niggling, but I think it's a often overlooked point and so I wanted to raise the profile.
ReplyDeleteThis is a very nice explanation of content strategy. One thing, though. You do not mention content quality control measures, like using needs assessment and clear writing as in plain language process, nor do you mention the user-testing phase. Are these just outside your purview?
ReplyDeleteGreat post! I think two critically important things that must be added to any CS activity/deliverable list are workflow and governance standards. It's a lot of work to complete the steps you've listed above, but suggesting that production and launch are the end of a CS to-do list is a recipe for content ROT. When your core strategy can inform process and deliverables focused on both the product (content) and the people (content owners), you have a winning formula.
ReplyDeleteThanks for all the great comments. @Noz--I agree with you about content creation being a bear, especially when there is existing content to migrate. As a writer, I'm a huge believer in scrapping some, saving some and not migrating content wholesale just because it's there. But sometimes when you have thousands upon thousands of pages, it's just not possible.
ReplyDelete@Stephens--I agree with you about content quality control measures being an important step and they are certainly within my purview--I'm a writer! However, here's the real truth--what success looks like to the user is not sucess to the client may times. So that has to weighed--many times clients LOVE the content and users have no idea what it means. So there's a tension that has to be sorted through.
@ PJ--Usually in the proposal phase I map out deliverables that match to each of these steps. Sometimes I use basecamp, sometimes emails, calls, etc...but mostly documents that back up statements like, "All of your content is crap and here's why..."
@Kristina--you are right--governance is huge. It's like you say, "By the time you launch, it's out of date." I guess my steps function as a set of guideposts, in a linear function, rather than as a cycle. Great point!
I work to this:
ReplyDeleteIdentify business objectives of website
Define content (to achieve 1)
Identify SEO keywords based on user volumes and competition (from 2)
Confirm site map (based on navigation levels for 3)
Create wireframes (for all content within 4) including calls to action
Create Content Management System for creating and editing pages
Define text parameters and image dimensions (for content within 5)
Create Word Documents for content (based on 6) with SEO keyword advice (from 3)
Create hieracial files and folders (for 4 based on 3)
Source images and video content (based on 2)
Create live pages (and fill with content from 6 and 9)
Optimise internal links and calls to action (based on 3 and 5)
Optimise META tags (based on 3)
Proof read for grammatical consistency
Ensure legal obligations are met
Send live page links to stakeholders for final changes
Launch website pages live online
Transform site map text to live hyperlink when pages launch
Post link to individual live pages on Twitter
Revert to regular update schedule (including monitoring monthly SEO rankings)
This is cool @Iworkonline. Have you ever thought about putting it into a check list?
ReplyDelete