Key Messages from the Gerry McGovern Masterclass, Ottawa, May 5-6, 2008

photo credit: dandy_fsj

To wrap up this interview series with Krista Vieira, we’re featuring the Key Messages generated by conference attendees.

If you missed the interview series read these:

• Gerry McGovern Masterclass — essential content for content managers (part one)
• Gerry McGovern Masterclass — essential content for content managers (part two)
• Gerry McGovern Masterclass — essential content for content managers (part three)

We need a clarity of understanding of what our website is for. To much choice = no choice. We must focus on what our customers want. Why are they coming to our website? What task are they trying to complete?

Customers

Customers are:

• Harsh, demanding and difficult
• Skeptical and cynical of authority
• Have the power on the web – not the organization
• Dictators, not kings
• Impatient
• Quick to use they’re favourite button – the Back button

Web reality #1: The web takes the power to control information away from the organization and gives it to the people.

The web is about giving real information and facts. The web allows people to get to know a subject better or make a better decision. People can comparison shop; read reviews; find out what other people think, etc.

The web is the land of A.D.D. We live in a money rich, time poor economy. Time is our most valuable resource. We measure our website’s success by the time it takes users to do something; the quicker they perform the task, the better. The sin of the modern economy – though shall not waste my time.

Web reality #2: Using the web is not a planned activity; it’s rushed, impatient and hurried. People are searching the web in between commercial breaks, after they’ve put the children to bed, when they’re tired. Accept this: the web is ALWAYS fitted in between something else.

Building Trust

• People trust people like themselves, not authority figures. They will trust the factory worker more than the CEO.
• Give the truth on the web not PR or marketing. This will build trust.
• No one believes an organization is perfect, so they don’t expect it.

Importance of Simplicity

• We read on the web like we’re riding down an escalator.
• Content needs to be direct and to the point. Think speed of action and clarity of message.
• The web is an active doing medium, so use the language of action. Don’t talk about what you’ve done or what you’re going to do. Don’t become the passive communicator, become the active facilitator of the content.
• Every time you add to your website, you complicate things. There is always a trade-off with simplicity. To make something more simple means something else will be more complicated. Focus on doing your top task well, then worry about the rest of the website.
• Something that’s easy is immediately doable. Show by doing; don’t talk about it. For example: Google doesn’t have to explain to you how to search. The simplicity of it immediately makes it usable.
• Don’t talk about an application form, let people use it.

Remember, websites are built from, and function, on words.

The Web is Self-Service or Having a Customer-Centric Website

Only having information on the web is the greatest mismanagement of a website. People are not coming to websites looking for information. Do you go to an information booth and just ask them to give you information? People come to the web to solve a problem.

Information only has value when associated with a task. Identify the most important tasks and make sure your customer’s can find them and complete them quickly.

Web reality #3: Sometimes we spend so much time doing things wrong, that we don’t have the time to do things right. The best websites focus on their top tasks and keep improving them. They find out how people are reacting.
3 core rules of self-service:

1. Convenience
2. Speed
3. Price (the web is the land of the cheap deal)

If you can’t do price, you’d better do the other two really well.

Web reality #4: Having a customer-centric website means the content focuses on what the customer wants. When an organization doesn’t know its customers or what they want, they end up with a put-it-upper website: can you put this up for me by Thursday? The 20,000 page website is built by put-it-uppers.

Economies that aren’t successful put numerous steps in the way of their customers. For example, in Peru it takes 289 steps to set up a company.

We measure web success by the amount of time it takes people to do something.

To have a customer-centric website:

1. Identify the top tasks
2. Speak the language the customer is using. Don’t make them use the organization’s language.

The web is where you go to do stuff. In order for a person to do something, a website must be useful. We must potty train our websites so we get rid of the we-we’s: We did this; we launched that.

We must focus on what the customer wants to do.

Additional Resources:

• Gerry McGovern’s website
• Masterclass conference website
• Killer Web Content – the book that started it all

Content Management Solutions: Upcoming series on Gerry McGovern’s web writing masterclass

photo credit: visualpanic

*** Update ***
Oversite on my part, here’s some links to the articles in the series directly:

• Part One
• Part Two
• Part Three
• Key Messages

This brief post is just to let you know that I’ll be taking a road less travelled this week by introducing an interview series with a cool co-worker of mine. She’s cool because she was able to dodge my Zombie-brain-eating-behaviour while enlighteningly (new word alert) engaging in an interview.

As you’ve no doubt gathered from the title of this post, we’re talking about her recent visit to a Gerry McGovern Masterclass on web content management. Put another way, the guru of web content was spilling the beans on engaging writing for the web…not easy stuff to do!

The series will run for 3 days, and the 4th will have a great summary / key messages document that was produced at the end of the two-day conference.

So if you’ve ever wondered what a Masterclass with Gerry McGovern is like, then check in daily. Sign up for the RSS feed (if you’ve not already) to ensure you don’t miss an installment. If you’ve read Gerry’s book ( Killer Web Content ), then some of what we’re talking about will be old hat…but there should be a surprise or two in store for you as well.