This month we will look at where content is going to go in the next decade – and a little bit beyond.
Where it will go will, of course, be defined by where customers want it to go facilitated by the rise of new available technologies like artificial intelligence, mixed reality, natural language process all along the content lifecycle, and real-time experience analytics across all our channels. Join us a group of futurists – with decades of combined past experience – who will collaboratively help you pivot your mind's eye from where the ball is, to where it's going.
Weekly Content
The Future of Content Aligning content, design, governance and systems around omnichannel journeys.
Market demands have outpaced enterprises. It has never been easier to research suppliers and potential new relationships. Content is the cornerstone of modern business because it represents our brand when we're not there, it serves as the collective memory of our staff, and it extends our reach across the globe. However, the proliferation of new channels, paired with constantly rising expectations of convenience, speed, and personalization on every touch-point is taxing even the largest budgets and enterprises in the world. The answer is a new approach to how we plan, create, manage, govern, and deliver our content. We need to evolve beyond traditional document-, campaign-, or channel-based deliverables to well-designed, omnichannel content created everywhere, ready to be orchestrated anywhere. By staring down the modern reality and taking on the new required capabilities, it becomes feasible and economically viable to create content that can be personalized and contextualized on any device, take full advantage of artificial intelligence, and be localized to meet the varied needs of our global customers.
Week 2
Historically, technical communication has been seen as a cost-center that was working best when its financial burden was minimized, rather than a contributor to customer experience or top-line revenues.
However, globalization and omnichannel, agile, and service design methods are all breaking down silo wall. Content is being given a seat at the table as part of the post-sales experience and due diligence research in pre-sales phase. But now that we’ve been invited to the conversation, the question is what do we say? My foreword and chosen curated article seek to help answer it.
Panel Discussion
Sarah Richards – Founder of Content Design London, founder of the Content Design discipline, and Author of the book “Content Design”.
Rob Hanna – Founder and Principal, Precision Content Authoring Solutions Inc.
Hilary Marsh – founder of the Content-Strategy.com community and Founder, Chief Content and Digital Strategist
Jeff Eaton – Snr Digital Strategist, Lullabot
Noz Urbina – founder of the OmnichannelX Conference and Urbina Consulting.com, author of “Content Strategy: Connecting the dots between business, brand, and benefits”
UXPRESSIA – A rare-but-needed product endorsement.
I almost never, ever endorse specific products. This is because it’s almost never the technology holding back a team, but the way of working. The only exceptions to this rule are when there’s a confluence of factors: There’s very little in terms of good offers on the market, and the need being fulfilled by the tool is extremely valuable for the industry it’s trying to serve. UXPRESSIA meets those criteria. It’s a tool for creating cloud-based, easily shareable Personas and Customer Journey Maps (and Impact Maps) that features built-in guidance and templates to help those new to the disciple to build, share, and present effective assets. Sharing a detailed, rich understanding of customer experience and targeting content to specific user processes, across channels, and in a way that is maintainable over time by a collaborating group of stakeholders, is one of the most difficult but vital challenges of today’s enterprise. UXPRESSIA is one of the few tools on the market aimed at really supporting you in this process. Check it out on uxpresssia.com
Resources
What is Omnichannel?
Explore how Omnichannel unifies engagement and communication strategies so that they complement each other – rather than run in parallel – to give our audiences what they really need.
Adaptive Content
3 adaptive content strategy trends for omnichannel marketing.
The Loyalty Economy
This series from the Harvard Business Review includes these three articles:
- Are You Undervaluing Your Customers?
- How To Value A Company By Analyzing Its Customers
- Over Time, The Market Will Demand This Information
Books
Curator Bio:
Noz Urbina:
Noz Urbina is a globally recognised leader in the field of content strategy and customer experience consultancy. He’s well known as a pioneer in customer journey mapping and adaptive content modelling for delivering personalised, contextually relevant content experiences in an omnichannel environment. He is also co-author of the book “Content Strategy: Connecting the dots between business, brand, and benefits” and lecturer in the Masters Programme in content strategy at the University of Applied Sciences, Graz.
In 2013 he founded his own consultancy Urbina Consulting and in 2018, co-founded the omnichannel events organisation OmnichannelX.
Noz has recommended solutions that have avoided headcount increases, designed interfaces and processes that have saved organisations hundreds of thousands per year, and delivered dozens of budget-winning internal presentations. He is comfortable working with the world’s largest organisations and most complex content challenges, to which he has repeatedly proven to be an effective contributor.
He has assisted dozens of multinational organisations with developing or improving their content strategies, managing tool selections, pilot projects, delivering training and guiding implementations. Clients have been in the manufacturing, mechanical engineering, medical devices, semiconductors, and enterprise software industries, among others.
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