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Author: Sarah O'Keefe

Content management Content reuse Localization Structured content

Content operations (content ops)

Content operations (content ops or ContentOps ) refers to the system your organization uses to develop, deploy, and deliver customer-facing information. Rahel Bailie refers to it as the way that your organization operationalizes your content strategy.

Over at easyDITA, there’s a more aspirational definition, which includes the purpose of good content ops:

Content Operations — ContentOps — is the infrastructure that maximizes your content creators’ efforts and guards against procedural errors by automating as much of the content development process as possible. 

Sarah O'Keefe
March 29, 2021
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Podcasts

The personalization paradox (podcast)

In episode 84 of The Content Strategy Experts podcast, Sarah O’Keefe talks with Val Swisher of Content Rules about why companies fail and how to succeed at delivering personalized experiences at scale.

“It all has to be completely standardized in order to be successful. There have to be small, individual, standardized chunks of content that are devoid of format that can be mixed and matched. Then the output can be personalized to the person who asked for it and sent to them at that moment in time.”

—Val Swisher

Sarah O'Keefe
November 16, 2020
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Brand credibility Structured content

Enterprise content strategy maturity model

“Whether you like it or not, your prospects already use technical content.” 

In the paper age, it cost money to distribute information. That gave big organizations some control over information flow. A prospect interested in purchasing a product would get “pre-sales” information–marketing materials, sales pitches, and perhaps a data sheet. Only after buying the product could the prospect access “post-sales” information, such as technical content. (Buyers could and did request technical information from their sales representative, but the decision whether or not to provide the information rested with the organization.)

But in the digital age, information distribution is free, and that makes it difficult or impossible to control what information people receive. As a result, the distinction between pre-sales and post-sales content is blurring. If you are in the market for a new desk, and you’re considering “some assembly required” options, you might take a look at the assembly guide. If the build process looks daunting, a not-so-handy person may look elsewhere. If you’re considering a piece of software, you might glance at the user documentation to see whether tasks are explained clearly at a level that makes sense to you. 

Sarah O'Keefe
July 27, 2020
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DITA

Improving DITA workflow

An organization’s first foray in DITA and structured content is most often driven by one of the following:

  • Merger or acquisition: After a merger, the organization needs to refactor content workflows and so they decide to move into structured content and DITA.
  • Localization: The organization is growing and needs to ramp up content production in many languages.
  • Smart content: The organization recognizes content as a key business asset and wants to wring maximum value out of the content lifecycle.

Sarah O'Keefe
June 8, 2020
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Structured content

The challenge of digital transformation

Digital transformation touches on every aspect of business operations. At Scriptorium, our focus is on high-value content, so our definition of digital transformation is also content-centric:

“Digital transformation is the use of technology to enrich information delivery.”

“Enriched” information is usually divided into two major categories:

  • Content delivery
  • Context

Sarah O'Keefe
April 27, 2020
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White papers

Content accounting: Calculating value of content in the enterprise

The challenge of content value

Content value is a hot topic in marketing and technical communication. In the publishing industry, the connection between content and value is clear. A publisher sells a book (or film or other piece of content) and gets book sales, ticket revenue, or streaming subscriptions in return. But what if your content is a part of the product (like user documentation) or used to sell the product (like a marketing white paper)? In these cases, measuring content value is much more challenging.

It is tempting to fall back on measuring cost instead of value. The cost of content development can be a trap, though. Eliminating wasted effort and optimizing content workflows is sensible, but too much focus on cost leads us toward content as a commodity.

Sarah O'Keefe
November 11, 2019
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Podcasts

Subject matter experts as authors and reviewers (podcast)

In episode 63 of The Content Strategy Experts podcast, Sarah O’Keefe and Chip Gettinger of SDL chat about subject matter experts and their role as authors and as reviewers of content.

“One of the most important things about working with SMEs is to meet them where they are. It’s important to understand where they’re coming from and their perspective. Understand what issues matter to them.”

—Chip Gettinger

Sarah O'Keefe
November 4, 2019
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