the Content Doctor

10 problems with content

2011-02-27T10:39:00.006-05:00

From the 3 Step Method of website creation (getting a domain name, choosing a webhost and signing up for an account, designing your webpage), to the 6 Step Method, which adds in testing, SEO and money making, it might look like web developers are ripping you off. I mean, how hard can it be?

Well, check out 12 Steps to Creating a Professional Web Design for another perspective. But even within this 12 step process, little emphasis is placed on content. Buried within the multi-stage design process, you’ll find two lines: determine the volume of content required, and creating the content. Step 6 is dedicated to content, but it deals primarily with the importance of correct grammar and spelling in a website. Oh, and the content should be “interesting.”

Want to know what Web Developers really think about content? Let me share.

“By far, the biggest challenge I have with nearly every client is developing content and getting the client to understand how important it is.”
“Everyone wants a website, but they don’t know what they want to say, or they don’t know how to say it well.”
“Content is the most important aspect of a website. Design is useless if you cannot relay your message to your visitors.”
“Content determines the site’s layout and navigation. Sometimes, it even determines the design.”
“When you start with content, the design that displays the content in the best possible manner evolves from it.”
“The remedy for lack of content is making professional content generation a mandatory part of the project.”
“My pain points are: lack of preparation by client, unorganized content, lack of content, and long wait for content to be sent by the client.”
“Transferring the old site's content to the new website. Often the design and organization are completely different.”
“Getting content from client.”
Client`s expectations: “I haven’t had time to generate any copy, when will you be delivering the site?”

Oh, right ... that’s just one problem, isn’t it? Content. It might be a chicken and egg thing. You can’t have the chicken without the egg, and you can’t have the egg without the chicken.

But you get my point.

Stolen content

2011-02-08T07:34:00.012-05:00

You know the screen that appears when you first pop the DVD into the player? The FBI warning about the penalties for copyright infringement? Five years in prison, a $250,000 fine?

Ever think about where web content fits into the picture? Images, photographs and illustrations, written content? You probably already know that copyright law applies to more than videos. It applies to all types of content, in fact, all creative endeavours.

Sure, we’ve heard the argument that anything posted online is public domain, whether it’s a YouTube video, a photograph posted in Facebook, blog content. Of course, it isn’t.

It’s not even necessary to state that the material is copyrighted; you don’t have to display the copyright symbol; you do not have to file a copyright application, and you do not have to state that you own the copyright. It’s implicit. Any original work on your computer, a notebook, a scrap of paper, is automatically protected. It is your intellectual property.

Content Sharing

But a lot of what we do online relies on content sharing, particularly when it involves social media.

So where is the line in the sand that distinguishes “sharing” from plagiarism? Simple. Credit must be given where credit is due. And appropriate methods of citing the original source are as easily discovered as the copy we are interested in using. Of course, when it comes to crediting the source of online content, it’s as easy as a hyperlink to the original page.

SEO

Aside from being caught in the act of plagiarism, there’s another consequence to stealing copy. The penalty imposed by search engines. According to Greenlight, an updated Google algorithm “tightens duplicate content filters and attempts to identify the original source of duplicated material.” Duplicate copy affects page rank. In a bad way. Whether the copy is duplicated within your site, or “borrowed” from another site.

Original Content

There are lots of legitimate ways to obtain “original” content. On any imaginable subject. The price (and quality) of the content varies according to its creator, their geographical location, their skill, and whether they rely on the sale of that content for survival. You can even obtain “free” content from sources such as the Creative Commons.

Protect your work

How do we prevent our work from being plagiarized? We can’t, really.

Graphics and images can be digitally marked, which permits them to be traced electronically. Typing a sentence or even a phrase into a search engine can turn up instances of its re-use.

And guess what? There are web sites out there that will scan chunks of copy or entire web pages for duplicate copy. For example, Article Checker, Copyscape, Duplicate Content, and Wordsfinder.

Need fresh content? Get out your pen and paper. Or hire a copywriter.

Writing about Science? Know your readers.

2010-10-24T11:53:00.007-04:00

Credible scientific information can be found in various places. It's the audience that determines the genre. Scientific writing is written for expert audiences, whereas science writing is geared toward non-specialist audiences. So, if your goal is to keep abreast of scientific discoveries, grab the current issue of Science, Nature, or other peer reviewed journal. But if you’re after the Coles Notes version, pick up a trusted source where the scientific jargon has been translated into easy to understand language and the take home message is explicit.

Other types of Scientific information are literature reviews and research grant proposals. In both cases, their audience accessibility lies somewhere between focused primary research articles and science reporting in the “popular press.”

Regardless of the genre, the goal of Scientific/Science Writing is to present scientific information in enough detail so the reader can critically evaluate the work. To accomplish this, the writing must be objective (unbiased), clear and precise.

According to Judith Swan, Associate Director for Writing in Science and Engineering’s writing program, the lack of guidance in scientific writing has resulted in a body of scientific literature that is often ambiguous and poorly written.

Tips and Tools:

Quantify, rather than qualify, descriptions. If you know the percentage or can calculate it, include it.
Use the active rather than passive voice, but avoid beginning sentences with “I” or “we.”
Avoid emotive words like “I feel” or “we believe.”
Pay attention to the organization of the paper. For the most part, journal articles contain the following elements: Abstract, Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, and Literature Cited. This format allows readers to know where to look for the information they are seeking.
Write clearly and simply, with the reader in mind. If the reader cannot understand what is written, the information is not usable.

Increase your readers’ recognition of important details by placing them at the end of sentences.
Each sentence, regardless of its length or complexity, should make a single point.
Verbs should follow the subject as soon as possible.
Establish the context, and then provide the information (i.e. x,y).
Familiar information should precede new or unfamiliar information.

Useful writing links:
Achieving the Scientific Voice, advice from Colorado State University.
Science of Scientific Writing, Gopen, GD and Swan, JA. (1990) American Scientist 78:550-558.
Guidelines for Writing Scientific Papers, from an Honors Organismal Biology Lab Manual.
Canadian Science Writers' Association.

Social media and SEO

2010-09-26T20:41:00.037-04:00

Before settling in to work in the morning, I check the traffic report. Strange behaviour for someone who works from a home office? No, not that traffic report. I log on to Google Analytics and check for changes in trends on the sites I monitor with respect to the number of visitors to the site. Any increase in traffic is always the result of a specific activity.

One of these sites is owned by a client that doesn't tweet, doesn't blog, doesn't have a facebook fan page, and doesn't advertise. The traffic to this site comes from a variety of sources.

Organic searches account for ~ 52%.
Direct traffic (bookmarks) makes up ~ 16%.
The remaining ~32% comes from referring sites – inbound links.
18% (or 58% of referred traffic) comes from some form of social media - in this case, mostly from chat rooms where people are talking about the product.

It's important to note that my client does not participate in the conversation. He does nothing to initiate it and does not respond to comments. But he is a fly on the wall and he knows what people are saying.

What’s my point? Simply that when people talk about us online, traffic to our website is affected. Which means we have an opportunity to increase traffic by initiating a conversation. But remember, I said conversation. Not sales pitch.

Strategic use of Social Media

Now that I've told you why you should think about starting a conversation with potential customers using social media, I'll give you some ideas on how to do it.

Start by learning about your ideal audience, their online behaviours and preferences, their methods of publishing and sharing. Do they tweet? Are they on facebook? LinkedIn?
Know what you want to achieve. Keep in mind that social media is not direct marketing, so results should not be measurable in sales. Perhaps you want to position yourself as an expert through education. Maybe you want to develop a strong brand – who you are and what you stand for – so people will want to do business with you.
Make a plan. A strategy. How will people find you? If they’ll use particular keywords, you may need to publish new content, keeping in mind that it should be easily shared.
Invest (time or money) in relationship building.
Disseminate your content where your target audience is most likely to find it. Don’t limit yourself to one form of social media over another. Use them all simultaneously. When you post a new article on your blog, let your contacts on LinkedIn know, tweet about it, link to it on facebook. Each audience is slightly different, even though there may be some overlap. And optimize it for keywords.
Track your efforts and the results they generate.

The take home message

High traffic doesn't always mean quality traffic. But traffic coming from social sites that are relative to your business is quality traffic.

Once a visitor lands on your website, the ball is in your court. What the visitor does once they've landed depends on website communication and on your product. Can they get around? Can they find the product? Is the information they seek easy to find? Is it credible?

How many times have you landed on a website, only to leave immediately because it wasn't what you were expecting, or you couldn't immediately find the information you were after?

What you can do with this information will depend on your business. And your website.

Blog vs Website – what’s the difference?

2010-09-14T08:33:00.003-04:00

It’s true, a blog is a website. But a website isn’t necessarily a blog.

Just like an eggplant is a vegetable, but all vegetables aren’t necessarily eggplants. Truth is – eggplants are fruit. But all fruits are not… never mind. You get my point.

Which is most appropriate for your organization’s needs – a website or a blog? Or maybe you need both. Before you decide, let’s look at some of the differences.

Tone, style, voice

A website tends to be formal, corporate. It is the collective voice of the organization.
A blog, on the other hand, is informal. It represents the human element and values of an organization – the voice of one individual at a time. Think chorus versus solo.

Ownership

A website is owned. The files are located on a company server (yours or your web designers), backed up on a disk, or ideally, both. You pay for hosting, design and content creation (anyone who has been involved in creating content for a website knows the project requires a significant investment of time).
We like to think we own our blogs, and in a sense, I suppose we do. But most blogs are hosted on a third-party site at no cost. And I don’t need to remind you, there’s no such thing as a free lunch. The actual files are located on a server somewhere – and the reality is, we have no guaranteed access to them.

Investment

Websites represent a high initial investment, whether you create them yourself, or pay someone else. Design, content creation, hosting, domain name registry, etc. But once the site is live, maintenance costs are relatively low.
Initial investment in a blog is minimal to free. Pick a host, choose a name, a free template, and write! And write. And write. And write. And write. And write. And write.
Kind of like housework - it never ends.

Size

Websites have multiple pages – home, about, contact, services, etc.
Most blogs are a single page. Of course older posts “live” somewhere, but visitors don’t usually have the option of jumping from page to page, looking for information. That said, entries usually have labels (subjects), which can be listed to make it easier to find posts on specific subjects.

Content

The content on a website is usually static, updated as the need arises, when products, services or the organization changes. The content is focused. Think of your website as an online brochure. Writing is concise, to the point, just the facts. It’s all about data and functionality. Websites contain direct links to contact and other vital corporate information.
Blogs are dynamic. Content is often diverse and varied. Updates are frequent, bi-weekly, weekly or more often! They bring readers timely news updates and product developments, or consumer tips. Blogs are magazine or diary-like. Blogs needn’t be about business at all; many represent someone’s ideas on a subject of interest.

Purpose

Everything associated with business activities must have a purpose. The difference between your website and your blog is the difference between e-commerce and brand development.

Your website establishes your presence. It tells visitors what you can do for them. It provides quick and easy access to information about your products and services. And it provides contact information.
Your blog builds relationships. Ideally, a blog is a conversation, a dialogue between blogger and reader. It’s a starting point for discussions. It plays a supporting role to your website, offering information related to your products.

YOUR BLOG DOES NOT SELL!

Summary

Your blog and your website should work like a tag team. Regular posts on your blog will keep you in the minds of your customers. It’s social media, after all. Be sure that your website includes a highly visible link to your blog, and vice versa. Complete the circle each time you post something new on your blog. Email, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook – update them all.

I hope this gives you a better sense of where your time and energy should be focused. The answer isn’t the same for everyone, it isn’t a one size fits all solution!

Taking Inventory

2010-09-03T09:43:00.010-04:00

I’m working on a major renovation of a business website. Like many website owners, Pricilla wanted to maintain control over her site and its contents. And she was doing her best to follow “best practices” when it came to content and SEO. She optimized her site for the highest ranking keywords that kinda sorta came closest to the products she sells. And she did her best to cover all possibilities in the process.

Pricilla does a great job promoting her business off-line. She knows that the build-it-and-they-will-come principle no longer applies. She’s got a larger than life personality, and she loves to talk to real people about what she does.

The problem is – Pricilla isn’t getting conversions. Lots of traffic, not so many sales.

Okay, I’m going to just come out and say it. My background isn’t marketing. Whew. I feel much better now. My background is actually research – observing trends and figuring out what might be responsible for them. I love data.

So where do I start with a project like this?

Over the years, I’ve been involved in some major home renovations. In an up-close-and-personal, hands-on, kind of way.

So what does this have to do with website renovation? Everything, really. I approach a website reno just like I approach a home reno. Before I start tearing down walls and moving plumbing, I need to know what’s there, what works, and what doesn’t. Can I get to the bathroom from the master bedroom without walking through the dining room? Seriously, these are important questions when laying out a house. And navigation is even more important for a website. If your visitors can’t quickly and easily find the information they came for, they’re out the front door!

Why not just start from scratch? C’mon, in this age of reduce, reuse and recycle?

Actually, there are a few reasons to renovate rather than start from scratch. Branding is one. Content is another – and by content, I mean not only words, but graphics, images, video, meta data, etc. After all, you’re not recreating your business; you’re just renovating your website. Which isn’t to say that existing content couldn’t benefit from a little editing – editing is always a good idea. Usually, graphics and photos will benefit from a bit of freshening up, product photos should be the same size, and for goodness sake, make them line up!

On the other hand, make sure you have 1-800-GOT-JUNK on speed dial.

Overwhelmed? Just breathe.

Open up an excel spreadsheet. Save it as content-inventory-date.xls (e.g. content-inventory-2010-09-03.xls). I always include the date, and I change the file name accordingly when I make significant changes to the structure or content of the file. Create columns for the URL, page title, meta data (keywords, description, etc.), images, content, links to other pages. Go nuts. But make sure you include a column for notes. And record your thoughts about this page, keep, discard, changes, etc.

Now start filling it. This will be a tabulated version of your site map. You can even start with your site map (if it’s accurate), and go from there. How do you know if you’ve got all the pages? Type “site:www.yoursite.ca” in the search bar (any search engine), you’ll pick up all indexed pages.

Keywords

2010-05-16T22:20:00.000-04:00

Keywords are the words people will use to search for your products or services, so you really need to understand how customers might search for them online. Ideally, your primary keywords should appear in the first paragraph of your copy, as well as in your page title and heading tags. And use keywords as the anchor text for internal links within your website.

Keyword density

Although some recommend aiming for 5% keyword density in copy, keyword density is less important than quality content written for your visitors. Higher rankings will come if you can obtain back-links from quality websites in appropriate fields. Within reason, highlight important keywords in bold or italics.

And don't spam by overdoing it with keywords, or search engines will boycott your site!

Keywords, image file names and alt tags

The file names of your images should be descriptive and include keywords. Search engines read hyphens as spaces, so use them to separate keywords in these file names (i.e. /images/keyword-phrase.jpg). Keywords should also be used in the alt tags of images. These tags appear when graphics are disabled and describe the image to visually impaired people. Alt tags allow images on your site to be cataloged by Google image search.

Meta description tag

2010-05-12T12:43:00.003-04:00

Meta tags are invisible elements on your web page. They are written in HTML or XHTML code and provide structured data that allows information about your web page to be catalogued and stored by search engines.

These elements are located in the "head" section of your HTML document, following the "title" tag (more on this later). Meta tags include, but are not limited to, page "description" and "keywords".

Your meta description tag should consist of 1 or 2 sentences (sentence case), no more than 160 characters long (including spaces). Most search engines (including Google) use description tags verbatim, underneath the title, to describe your site.

Think of your description tag as a mini ad for your site. It’s one thing to have your site come up in a competitive search, but you still need to convince the user to click through. That’s the job of your description, so make it interesting and accurate, with a call-to-action. Highlighting targeted keywords in bold can also help increase the click-through rate.

Is a meta description always a good idea? Not always. If your page targets 1-3 general search terms, write a description. But if the subject matter of your page is broad, it is often better to let search engines extract appropriate text on a search by search basis (based on user search terms).

SEO and the Title Tag

2010-05-10T09:22:00.003-04:00

Title Tags or Page Titles - unique and accurate
The Title Tag, although it isn’t visible on the page, might be the most important on-site optimization factor. Not only is the Title Tag used as the heading of the listing when a search engine lists your site, it is also what a visitor sees in the browser tab when your web page is open.

Search engines (Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc.) catalogue each page of your site, so the page your visitor lands on depends on their search term. Ideally, the Title Tag also identifies the website it belongs to.

Keep in mind:
•    65 characters is the cut-off for headings in Google’s organic search results.
•    Place keywords near the beginning of the Title Tag. Search engines tend to look at the first three words; make them count.
•    Include important information like the physical location of your business (home page Title Tag), main focuses or offerings, and of course the name of your website/business.
•    Use consistent branding in your Title Tag. For example, “description of page | company name.” If your company’s name is long, consider a short version or acronym.
•    Make the Title Tag for each page unique and descriptive – it should describe what the page is about and who you are.

Do not:
•    Use a title that has no relation to the content on the page
•    Use the default or vague titles like "Untitled" or "New Page 1"
•    Use a single Title Tag across all of your site's pages or a large group of pages
•    Use long titles that are unhelpful to users
•    Stuff unneeded keywords in your Title Tags

Branded!

2010-02-17T13:26:00.003-05:00

Every business needs a marketing/brand style guide, right? Well, sure. Regardless of whether it’s formalized or not. And when you think “branding,” you think “logo.” So let’s start there.

No, wait a minute. Let’s not. Let’s begin with an audience analysis. Audience? Yes, audience. Who are your clientele and what are they buying from you? Are they young? Not so young? Senior citizens? Single, families, rich, not so rich? Educated?
Before you even begin to think about your logo, make a list of the various media in which your logo might appear: business cards, print brochures, signage, and websites are just a few. And don’t forget social media - Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn. Consider appropriate and prohibited uses, with examples.

Logo design

Books have been written! At the very least, your logo should provide clear identification of your business. It must also differentiate you from the competition, establish credibility, and communicate your message. Are you selling fun? Novelty? Energy? Professional? Serious? Stability? Reputation? Health? Environment? Your products and/or services will inform your logo design.

In his Logo Design Workbook, Adam Morioka’s lists ten good rules:

answer who, what, why
identify, don’t explain
understand limitations
be seductive
make mnemonic value
pose a question
design for longevity
make the logo the foundation of a system
design for a variety of media
be strong

Design components

Colours

Colours are important in design! Check out this site and this one to learn more about the meanings of colours.

Think about the buffer zone or amount of white space around your logo. How much space does your logo need so it stands out and looks its best? Check out a black and white version of your logo and try inverting the colours. Color schemes should be defined both visually and by their values. And make sure to define the colour specs (HEX, RGB, SMYK, Pantone, etc.) for web, print, display, and paint if applicable.

Fonts

Define the typeface (font) to go with your logo, if it isn’t included in the image. Identify the colour, name, size, weight, location, position. Define them for text, headings, subheadings, etc. and make sure to keep font family files with the package. It’s best to use/purchase Open Type Fonts.

Tagline

You know, that little phrase following your logo or company name describing your organization's mission that's so hard to write! For some tips on writing effective taglines, go to here.

Sizes

At what sizes does your logo look best? How much can it be reduced or enlarged and still give the right impression?

Coming next: Uses

Testing the waters of social media

2010-02-04T13:52:00.006-05:00

This morning I attended a Strategic Web Marketing seminar by Rob McLean, Sociable Communications. Rob talked about the range of marketing opportunities facilitated by Web 2.0 and I left understanding that for me, a blog might be the best vehicle to provide supplementary information to my clients, without crossing the line of content overload on my website.
Whether or not I succeed remains to be seen.

My initial plan is to migrate some of the text-heavy content from my website to this blog. The result should make my website less about "stuff" that I think is important and more about the needs of my clients. I'm hopeful that I'll be able to set up reciprocal links between the Content Doctor blog and my website, so movement between them is seamless.

But maybe not today.