Book Review: Letting Go of the Words

Posted on April 20, 2009 by admin

Summary

Letting Go of the Words is an example-driven tour on how to write content for the web. It’s 350 pages are full of clear, before and after examples, of good and bad web pages. In less than a day, Janice (Ginny) Redish will transform the way you write for the web. Ginny is clearly an accomplished author. During the day, she helps people create usable and useful web sites. This book is more of a handbook, jammed packed with great tips and explanations of why stuff works and other stuff doesn’t. What Ginny manages to do is communicate practical web writing guidelines to experienced web readers like us.

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From Web Sites to Digital Solutions

Posted on April 6, 2009 by admin

Web sites are easy

When I start a new project, particularly with a new customer, I pay close attention to how they use the term web site. Customers arrive wanting a web site. They walk out with a digital solution. The web site is the easy bit. The hard part is defining, creating and rolling out a digital solution specifically for them.

marauders-mapSo what is a digital solution? For me, its a dynamic map that continually adapts as you journey through a project. A bit like Harry Potter’s Marauders Map. Sometimes it actually feels like we’re using the map to guide our customers through the project pitfalls but without the protection of the invisibility cloak. So to be clear, a digital solution takes a customer from what they want to what they need. And for me, this is the key differentiators between happy and unhappy customers.

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The Information Architect and The Developer

Posted on February 21, 2009 by admin

About 10 years ago I was brought into a digital agency, with a burgeoning technology arm, to help them get better at delivering websites. At first, I was sat with the web developers, but over time my audience widened to include both Information Architects and Designers. That’s when the sparks started to fly and I was plunged head first into the world of mutual disrespect between all parties.

Things have moved on (a little) since then but I would like to share some of things I learnt back then, and mix that in with what I still see today. If you have any thoughts in and around this area, I would love to hear them. Be sure to let me know from which vantage point you’re coming from when commenting though… 🙂

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Delivering Content is Hard – Where’s my Content Strategy?

Posted on January 20, 2009 by admin

There are projects, and then there are content management projects. The latter are the ones that keep me awake at night. The challenges seem to have no bounds. There don’t seem to be any knowledge ceilings in sight. You are constantly learning (which is good), sharpening your tools and/or adding new ones to your content toolbox to successfully deliver these kinds of projects. So why are content management projects so damned hard then?

Now I agree with the folks back at CMS Myth when they say:

“CMS is a technology, while content management is a discipline.”

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