I asked technical writers about problems they have with the content development process and, if I didn’t know better, I’d say they copied each others’ answers.
Everyone needs to vent some frustration once in a while. Even the content industry -- the whole goal of which is to solve problems -- just needs some time to air some widely-shared grievances.
These shared grievances aren’t anything new, but as solution architects, once we hear the problem, we try to fix it!
Let’s check out some problems and see what we can do to solve them.
Problem #1: Keeping Content up to Date
Consistency across multiple different content channels is a hassle to maintain, especially when it comes to large content libraries that require frequent updates.
In technical organizations, one of the most common content issues is the gap in communication between software engineers and content creators. Not merely the disconnection between the two groups, but their messaging, explanations, and inconsistent language.
Technical product documentation has to describe the technical aspects of the product while simultaneously maintaining organization-specific tone, voice, and messaging, all while keeping the content engaging for users. That's a tough balance to strike.
Thus, updating content on several different publishing mediums can pose a formidable challenge. Rebecca Berbel, the Content Manager for OnCrawl, a technical SEO software platform echoes these sentiments:
Keeping content up to date is one of the most challenging elements of content management, particularly in-app, web, or software development with a small company… Just knowing what needs to be updated and how versus whether new content is needed requires:
- A complete, detailed view of what content exists and where content coverage is thin
- An understanding of the best ways to search, bulk-edit, batch, and replace content in your content management and publishing systems.
- Access to details on all development projects, and knowledge of exactly what content is affected by each project.
- Coordinated content and development timelines, particularly around releases, and particularly where user-facing content is involved.
What can make this problematic is that, as the body of existing content grows, it’s a challenge that doesn’t always scale well. And because of the many touchpoints with other teams, it’s an issue that can’t be addressed by efforts from the content team alone.
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Solution: A Single Source of Truth & Freedom from Formatting
Certainly not an uncommon problem, but the solutions are more accessible than you may think. A Single Source of Truth (SSOT) for your content makes sure that it’s all kept in one place. With a structured content standard like DITA XML, you have a single source of truth that connects the source of your content to all your publishing channels.
Another piece of the issue is content formatting, which can be incredibly time-consuming. DITA content is written free from formatting, leaving authors, reviewers, etc. strictly concerned with making the content as effective as possible. Once it’s written, formatting is published automatically.
This way, when changes need to be made, they only have to be made in one place and the updates will populate -- automatically formatted -- in whatever places those pieces of content are published. From here, the trouble is connecting the review process between separate teams, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
Problem #2: Chaotic Content Development & Review Process
With documents bouncing back and forth between teams for writing, reviewing, editing, approving, and publishing, a lot of time is wasted in the content development process.
Your content can only be as good as the operational structure it passes through from conception to publication. Despite our efforts, the space between the beginning and end of the content development process can be cavernous.
Eleanor Bennett, a Digital Marketing Specialist with the UK-based software company Logit laments an important stage in this process:
It is easy to identify when B2B SaaS companies have hired agencies whose content writers have little understanding of the topic and it reads as if the content was spun through an article rewriter quite often.
As someone who is relatively new to writing content to support optimizing configuration guides and creating landing pages targeting senior decision-makers, I find that a lot of my time is spent researching over writing.
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Solution: Fully Collaborative Review
Because content is the true bridge between your product, personnel, and potential users, it needs to be done well. This, in turn, means that the writing, review, and editing workflows need to be as seamless as possible.
Heretto features a real-time, fully-collaborative document review screen that acts and looks like Google Docs. Multiple people can be in the same document writing, editing, reviewing, and commenting at the same time if they want. Every change to the content is tracked and can be accepted or rejected by authors; no editorial guesswork. This is all in one platform, keeping the documents in one place while assigning to different teams based on its place in the content development process.
No more lost emails, ignored Slack messages, and document accessibility issues.
Problem #3: Disorganized Content Repository
Everything is scattered throughout a massive library of content with no easy way to locate and update the content you need.
If your content team is having trouble finding things in your content library, I can guarantee it’s more difficult for your users to find what they need. The best-developed content can’t do much if it’s hidden in a disorganized content repository.
Sarah Simpers, a Technical Writer for cloudtamer.io, has an interesting take on content organization that many businesses fail to heed:
As a technical writer documenting complex software, it’s a struggle to organize documentation in a way that all customers will find useful. Software companies serve lots of different types of users, so the technical writer needs to identify the paths for content consumption that make the most sense for their customers.
After they get connected and learn the basics of the platform, what will users want to do next?
The answer is always, “it depends on the user,” which makes it a challenge to organize content in a way that informs those who want all the info without overloading those who do not.
The best solution I’ve found is to structure content like a “choose your own adventure” story. Give the most important info to everyone, and then branch off into collapsible sections for those who want to dive deeper into a given topic.
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Solution: Structured Content & Audience Filtering
Content isn’t truly useful unless the people who need it can readily find it. It’s hard for users to find it if it’s not well-organized with an organization’s content library. This is why a strong information architecture rooted in structured content works wonders for content organization.
If you’re looking for your users to choose their own adventure through your content, it’s important to make sure their options are relevant. An organized library of structured content in DITA uses semantically rich metadata, customizable taxonomies, and audience filtering to ensure your content developers can find what they need to publish tailored content to the appropriate audiences.
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Want to hear more? If these issues sound familiar and you want solutions, we’re ready to show you what Heretto is capable of.
