Empowering higher education to create and sustain web content that works
Learning the principles behind creating and sustaining effective web content is important, but it’s always helpful to see how someone else has put them into practice. With that in mind, we reached out to Tim Jones, executive creative director at North Carolina State University, to talk about how he is using content strategy at his institution. Jones came to content strategy through journalism, working as a newspaper reporter for almost [...]
Our top concerns in planning web content should be our goals, message and audience. What are we saying, who are we saying it to, and why? But with regard to our audience, we also need to consider the “how.” What devices are they using the view the content? Do they have limitations in perceiving certain content, such as visual or rich media? How do we publish content in a way [...]
When we create content—whether it’s a tweet, a blog post or a program description—we can no longer anticipate the default experience to be the desktop web browser. Our content is going places—sometimes places we can’t predict. It could be an iPhone, a Kindle, even a Nintendo Wii. As it is dispatched to digital corners far and wide, is it equipped to do its job, no matter the context? Will content [...]
During our first Meet Content webinar, an attendee asked a great question: where do you start with web content governance? It’s a challenging question to answer because content governance requires that you first have a content plan. Content governance — a process of managing content roles, responsibilities, processes, documentation, tools and training — can’t be distinguished from your content strategy. In order to manage the elements of content governance, you [...]
A couple of weeks ago, I talked about how longform content is a growing trend that merits consideration in higher ed. A topic often discussed in tandem with longform content is time-shifted reading. Sometimes called “DVR for words,” time-shifted reading is an increasingly popular option for content consumption. Before diving into this post, you really need to read (or re-read) Rick’s excellent overview of how we as publishers must plan [...]