Socializing Content Creation

Socializing Content Creation

Leona Campbell, Marya DeVoto, Melanie Jennings

@runleonarun @medevoto @seniortechwritr #socializingcontent @LavaCon

Presenters


Melanie Jennings @seniortechwritr

Senior Documentation Engineer at Jive Software since 2011. Loves DITA and single-sourcing.

Marya DeVoto @medevoto

Documentation Lead at Jive Software since 2010. Recovering Victorianist, emerging content advocate.

Leona Campbell @writeleonawrite

Senior Documentation Engineer at Jive Software since 2010. Mushroom hunter, DITA lover, geek whisperer.

About the Speakers

• We’re the technical documentation team at Jive Software.

• We’ve been using social business tools to create technical documentation.

• We’ve seen massive improvements in process and product.


Your Community: Mass of Untapped Potential

Make Social Business Work for You


How Can You Use Social Technology to Improve Content?

1. Brand your expertise. 2. Make your group a destination.3. Draw collaborators in and give them a stake.4. Use the social web to document information

decisions.5. Listen to customers and engage them

collaboratively. 6. Show your org the value of socializing content

creation.


Brand Yourself and Your Group


Are you social?

• You and your team are a brand.• Social and PR are your friends.• Your workplace will become increasingly

dependent on social business tools.• Using social business tools at work will help

you create better content.


Personal Profiles and YOU

• What: Tells your story succinctly.• Why: Your skills and knowledge are valuable;

share them with others; write better content!• Where: Your community, LinkedIn, Twitter,

and wherever you socialize online for work.• How: Use 3-5 keywords in your headline,

summary, photo, specialties, job desc’s, skills; search LI for people you would hire.


Your Profile Checklist

• Name, photo, contact info• Headline: Title | My Value | My Skills or Certs• My Statement: passion, philosophy, invitation

to connect (written in the first person)• Specialties, skills, job desc’s• Each field uses a keyword


Setting Up a Team Page

• What is the value of your team?• What are the strengths and specialties of team

members?• How do you communicate those to the

organization?• How do you want the organization to engage

with you?• Where can people find your content?• Engage!


Collaborative Energy = Better Content


Drawing in Collaborators

• Create content in public where possible.• Think of your colleagues as collaborators, not

reviewers.• Court drive-by opinions and dissent.• Provide public thanks.• Use public signoff to ensure stakeholders are

happy.


How?

In Jive, create content in a public place and @mention the people you want.

Outside Jive, post content or links to content:

•In an activity stream

•On an Intranet page

•In a blog or wiki

•Anywhere people can see the content and argue about it


Making Conversations Public and Permanent

• The social Web isn’t ephemeral. It’s permanent.

• Get your information decisions out of email and into an online format.

• Make conversations searchable or bookmarkable whenever possible.

• Especially for reference material, this saves endless time and money.


How?

In Jive, status updates, blogs, discussions, documents, and comments are all searchable. We’re so lucky! Outside of Jive:•Use wiki comments attached to documents, like Wikipedia does. •Use forums, newsgroups, or any other linkable discussion technology for reviews of controversial content.•If you have a feedback element in your documentation output, use it in an internal instance for reviews•In a pinch, publish meeting notes!•Bookmark relentlessly.


Get Closer to the Source


Engage With Customers: Why?

•Reduce customer support by finding out the real customer questions.

•Understand the customer's needs by asking them what they need in the docs.

•Be available to customers to build relationships that get you better info.

•In the end, we write better content.


Engage With Customers: How?

•Introduce yourself, and give them a way to reach you.•Status update and blog about your latest changes to the docs.•Monitor public support site.•Follow up on customer inquiries.•Listen to what customers discuss and find confusing.


Social is worth it

• Social business provides two-way visibility.• Turn frustrations into wins by engaging with

customers.• Customers proactively contact us with helpful

suggestions for the docs.• Internal teams see the value of docs and champion us.• Stakeholders have learned to become more engaged in

the docs both as requesters and contributors.• We use our time more efficiently.


Oh yeah? Prove it!

• Monitor/evaluate analytics and impact.

• Use page views and hits to show the value of docs. People are paying attention!

• Get the numbers and analyze them. Use charts to map trends.

• Publish internal and external blog posts outlining conclusions.


Getting Started with Social

• What social tools do you already have?• Who are your stakeholders and where do

they talk to each other?• What are some new ways you might use

them?• What communities already exist in your

organization or your field?• Start having conversations online where

more people can participate.


Go Forth and Be Social!

• Marya just published a blog post on the Jive Community about how using Jive has changed the way we write documentation.

• Link: https://community.jivesoftware.com/community/documentation/blog/2013/10/21/why-technical-documentation-needs-jive

• We’d love to hear your feedback!


Career

Socializing Content Creation