Inventory to Insight to ActionContent Auditing WorkshopPaula Land

Content Insight

IntroductionsPaula Land

Co-founder and CEO of Content Insight

Owner and Principal Consultant at Strategic Content

Today’s goalIntroduce the concepts and value of the content inventory and audit and get practical, tactical tools and experience in conducting an audit, extracting insights, and presenting the findings

Introduction to content inventories and audits

What we’re going to talk aboutThe

WhoWhatWhenWhereWhy*How

What next?

*Not quite in that order

Content inventories and auditsEarly steps in a content project

Form the foundation for the larger initiative

StrategyGap

AnalysisAuditInventory

Inventory vs. auditInventory - Quantity Audit - Quality

Another way to think of itInventory - Data Audit - Analysis

Yet another way to think of it

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"Not doing an inventory is like starting to bake when you don't know what ingredients you have in the house.“ – Rahel Bailie

Why?

Why inventory?• Assess as-is landscape of a site or content set

• Scope a project for resource estimation

• Identify patterns in content structure

• Set a baseline to measure to-be site against (ROI)

• Establish a basis for migration tracking

If you don’t know where you are, how do you map to where you’re going?

Why audit?

• Assess current state of content to inform strategy

• Identify whether content consistently follows brand, template, editorial, style and metadata guidelines

• Assess whether content supports business and user goals

• Establish a basis for gap analysis between content you have and content you need

• Prepare content for revision, removal and migration

• Uncover patterns in content to support structured content initiatives

• To develop a deep understanding of the content

Business Goals

User Goals

Content

“When you take the time to understand the content that already exists, not only will you be able to ensure that it’s supported in the new design, but you’ll actually make the entire design stronger because you’ll have realistic scenarios to design with and for…. chances are there’ll be stuff out there that you’ve never thought about, much less designed for. ”

–Sara Wachter-Boettcher

Organizational value of auditsBecome the content expert

Be the content advocate

Drive change forward

Image by Thibault fr (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0) or GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html)], via Wikimedia Commons

“[Use] the content audit as a platform for facilitating often-difficult conversations with stakeholders about the purpose of the site, the priorities of users, and the operational constraints and opportunities.”

– Christopher Detzi

When?

When do we inventory and audit?• Planning and executing a content strategy

• Website redesign

• CMS implementation

• To guide a governance initiative

• Ongoing

Who?

Audits aren’t just for content strategists

Content strategists

Information architects

Project managers

Site managers

Everyone who interacts with your content

Where?

Where do we look?

How?

How do we create a content inventory?

Automate your inventory using CAT, the Content Analysis Tool. Free trial available at www.content-insight.com.

What goes into a content inventory?

Data captured by CAT:• URLs — How many pages are there on the site?• File types — What are all of the formats?• File size — How large are the files? • Level — How deep does the site go?• Images — How many of them, what format, where do they live?• Media — How many audio and video files exist, what format, where do they live?• Documents — How many, what format, where do they live?• Metadata — What title, description, and keyword metadata is on each page?• Links in and out — What links to and from each page?• H1s — What is the H1 text (matters for SEO)• Analytics — What traffic is each page getting?

How do we turn an inventory into an audit?Scope the audit

Gather information

Analyze

Scoping the auditWhy are you auditing?

• Scoping a project

• Content strategy initiative and/or site redesign

• CMS implementation

• Ongoing

What do you need to learn?

Who is your audience?

How much time do you have?

What’s your project timeline?

Assembling the audit ingredientsInformation to gather before beginning:

• Inventory data

• Business requirements

• Analytics data and other metrics

• Editorial and brand guidelines

• Personas

• Customer journey maps

• Customer feedback

• Search logs

Example: Business goals

• Increase sales by x%

• Achieve a high level of content engagement

• Decrease customer service calls by x%

• Create brand loyalty

Example: Guidelines and standardsEditorial

Brand

Legal / Regulatory

SEO

Example: Voice and tone guidelinesAttribute Content characteristic

Friendly Written clearly and conversationally

Uses short, simple sentences

Uses familiar, common language

Approachable Gives users ways to contact you

Content is easy to scan

Conversational Written as if you’re speaking to a friend, and want

your friend to know what you know

Written informally

Uses contractions

Written in the second person: “you,” “your,” and

“yours”

Energetic Uses the active voice

Empowers the customer with action verbs: Find,

Search, Explore, Get, Shop, and so on

Example: Voice and tone table

Source: Kevan Gilbert, https://blog.gathercontent.com/a-simple-tool-to-guide-tone-of-voice

Examples: Tone MailChimp

We’ll start by getting a few definitions out of the way that should help you understand this policy. When we say "we," "us," and "MailChimp,” we’re referring to The Rocket Science Group, LLC d/b/a MailChimp, a State of Georgia limited liability company. When we say “you” or “Member,” we’re referring to the person or entity that’s registered with us to use the Services.

Microsoft

This privacy statement applies to Microsoft.com and Microsoft websites, services and products that collect data and display these terms, as well as their offline product support services. It does not apply to Microsoft sites, services and products that do not display or link to this statement or that have their own privacy statements.

PersonasFictional characters based on real users

Represent key characteristics, motivations, goals

Example Persona: VolunteerName: Sonya Role: Volunteer Occupation: Former Tech Worker

Quote: “I really try not to spend a lot of time online, I focus on the face to face stuff. Last year we went on a trip to Montana and there were forest fires. This is what Twitter was made for!”

Wants: To grow as a person and give back to the community.

Pain Points: Doesn’t think the website is useful or updated. Sometimes there are closures due to weather, she’d like a way to be informed without being inundated.

Motivations• Find volunteer activities that keep her

active and outdoors and working with horses.

• Originally had no history of working with children and was intimidated by the idea. Little Bit gave her an opportunity to become more comfortable with working with youth.

Goals• Continue to learn about hippotherapy and be a useful volunteer• See that it’s a good use of volunteer time• Spend more time doing and less online in general

Behaviors• High usage of smartphone, Twitter and Facebook judiciously. “It bothers me

to have to be on Facebook to get something. So, I just won’t go on it.”• Reads the newsletters. Doesn’t visit the website, doesn’t think it is updated.

“I imagine people go there when they start, then don’t go back.”

Example: Customer journey map

Source: Adaptive Path

Customer actionsContent engagement

Customer feedback

Search logs

What we audit forQuality

Breadth and depth

Performance and effectiveness

Competition

Auditing for content qualityWhat to assess:• Content is relevant• Content is current• Content is accurate• It is easy-to-read/scan• Tone is audience-appropriate• Content communicates key messages• Content facilitates key user activities• Content is engaging• Content presentation is consistent• Nomenclature is clear and consistent

What to assess against:

• Editorial style guide

• Brand guidelines

• Voice / tone guidelines

• User research

• Personas

• Customer tasks

Auditing for structure and functionWhat content elements and interactions exist on the site?

How well do they perform?

What are the implications for redesign or migration?

Auditing for breadth and depthWhat to assess:

• Range of subjects covered

• Comprehensiveness of coverage

• Format

What to assess against:

• Competitor sites

• Business requirements

• Personas

• Customer journey map

Auditing for content performanceWhat to assess:

• Analytics data

• Site metrics

• Search data

What to assess against:

• Business goals

• Personas

• Key performance indicators (KPIs)

• Search rankings

Auditing against competitors What to assess:

• Audience(s)

• Type and quantity of content

• Formats

• Language (tone and voice)

• Contributors (numbers, names)

• Community features

• Frequency of publication

• Overall impression

• Stand-out or differentiating features

What to assess for:

• Breadth and depth

• Consistency

• Completeness

• Currency and frequency

• Findability

Example: Scorecard

Turning insights into action

Presenting audit findingsKnow your audience

Choose your focus

Select format

Presenting audit findings – contextWho are the stakeholders and what will persuade them?

What decisions need to be made?

What change are you trying to drive?Context

Content Users

Presenting audit findings – focusWhat are the most compelling data points?

What is the call to action?

Presenting audit findings – formatPresentation

Document

Graphics

Example: Audit infographic

Source: Christopher Detzi, uxmag.com

Delivering the news

Stay in touchpland@content-insight.com

@content_insight https://www.facebook.com/content.insight Content Analysis Tool (CAT)

www.content-insight.com