Introduction
This is not a book about how to do content design. It’s not about how to write error messages, blog posts, website pages, or onboarding guides. It isn’t even about how to do the research, discovery, and exploration necessary before all the writing begins.
You probably already know how to do all those wonderful things. And if you don’t, or you need a refresher, there are some truly superb books, courses, and conferences out there that cover these topics in loving detail. You can check them out anytime—but please don’t take them for granted. Not too long ago, you’d have been seriously hard-pressed to find high-quality resources that focused on content design as a fully fledged discipline. It wasn’t that long ago that it was just as difficult to find other practitioners working on content design as their full-time job.
But in the past decade or so, all that has changed. Content design is everywhere now. It’s a term people in very different disciplines throw around with abandon. And it has never been easier to learn the fundamentals of content design, content strategy, and user experience (UX) writing, or to find a job that requires these skills.
And yet.
Even now that we have a bookshelf full of books, now that we have content design courses we can take online or at a handful of accredited schools, now that we’re surrounded and supported by a global community of like-minded friends, content designers still struggle to drive visible impact, influence strategy, and drill down to the real core of what content can do.
Some of this is perfectly fair, because the discipline is still an emerging one compared to other disciplines we often work alongside (UX design, engineering, or product management, for example). It’s no wonder we sometimes feel that few people in our own organizations really know our true worth. Sometimes we’re still figuring it out for ourselves.
But we’re not that new. The value of content design isn’t completely unknown, unproven, or unquantified. Let’s be honest: content design has been around long enough, and has made enough of a difference to businesses, organizations, and users all over the world, that we should all feel we’re standing on firm ground by now.
Do you feel like you’re standing on firm ground?
You’re not alone
The content people I talk to tell me they feel hampered by process and politics, by a dearth of respect, and by a chronic lack of investment and head count. They’re often solo practitioners working in a sea of people who clearly want and need their help, yet don’t consider them to be strategic partners. They say they’re brought into projects too late to be of any but the most superficial assistance, and are rarely, if ever, given the chance to demonstrate clearly what they can do.
Does any of this sound familiar?
Here’s what I’m guessing. I’m going to bet you’re already really freaking good at your job. I bet you have incredible editorial, content-strategy, and content-design chops. And for the skills you still want or need to develop, you have the wherewithal to find the books, courses, and conferences that can help. (You can even start with the Resources section of this book.)
I’m also betting that you long for the chance to exercise some of those content chops even more—that what you really struggle with is the chance to do the work you know you can do, at the right stage of the game, with partners and stakeholders who know exactly the strategic value your presence brings.
You’re tired of being pulled in at the eleventh hour to provide the “magic word” that will make a poorly planned product launch suddenly snap into sense, when the real problem is that no one clearly articulated the target audience for it eight or twelve months ago—when, as usual, you weren’t in the room.
If that sounds like you, you know firsthand the pain of polishing content that has been built on a faulty foundation. It feels like you’re always frosting a really terrible cake, but you don’t know how to get your hands on the recipe book—how to change the way content works in your organization.
You might be thinking, That’s why we need to hire more writers and content designers for my team. Or, That’s why we need to change our project management process, so I’ll be involved in projects from the start.
But I will firmly yet lovingly disagree. Because while these solutions might help in the short run, they won’t really strike at the heart of the matter. If the teams you want to embed with don’t know what content people can do, it won’t do you much good to hire an army of writers. And, frankly, you’re unlikely to get more people hired unless people at the higher levels of your organization have a real, bone-deep understanding of what it is people like you can do and how your work advances your company’s real business needs.
People don’t get a bone-deep understanding of something by hearing you say it for the hundredth time. They get it when you show them what the work looks like when it’s done right, when you meet them where they are, and when you use the language, metaphors, and metrics that matter to them.
More than anything right now, what you need is some way to create the conditions in which you can do great content design. That’s what I hope to provide in this book: a way for you to stretch your wings and really get a whack at the full suite of content work that I call full-stack conten**t design.
Full-stack content design
Full-stack content design can only become a reality across your whole team when they’ve had a sort of content conversion experience—when something so radical has happened that they’ve changed their minds, their approach, their entire outlook on life. It’s what some people might call a fundamental psychic change. And keep in mind you’ll probably have to go through a shift in mindset yourself. This book is here to help you do all of that.
I know. That sounds like a lot for a relatively small book. But it does offer a path forward if you’re stuck. It offers a way out of feeling like it’s you against the world, like the deck is stacked against you, like content can’t win. Because that mindset is probably getting you nowhere. And if this book gets you anywhere, it’ll be somewhere better than that.
This book covers principles I worked out for myself long before I was even working in tech. Since then, I’ve worked with other content people in a variety of different settings, on different team sizes and types, helping them find their voice, express the voice of their company, and grow the impact a content practice can have on their organization’s success.
Will this book apply to every content person, on every team, everywhere? Certainly not. It’s likely to be most useful to folks working in-house on a fast-growing product, marketing, or services team. You might have to tweak it to your own purposes here and there. But regardless of your situation, it can work for you if you give it a try.
The change starts with you
Before you can change how other people see you, you’re going to have to change how you see—and present—yourself. You know you’re much more than just a proofreader and polisher of punctuation. You’re a full-stack content designer, or you wouldn’t have picked up this book.
You know that full-stack content design involves much more than just correcting grammatical errors or striking the right tone; after all, it does little good to correct Oxford commas if the ideas, format, structure, or delivery method aren’t the right fit for the audience and their needs. That’s why full-stack content design has to start with scoping out projects and deciding on goals; continue through research, testing, iteration, and change; and keep right on going through launch, publication, and continuous improvements.
But how do you get your hands on that kind of work?
What you need is to be working inside a full-stack content organization: one where every person on every team:
- sees the full content stack clearly,
- knows why it’s important to the work they do,
- knows how to do some of it themselves to a baseline of proficiency, and
- knows when they’re in trouble and need professional content help.
So the question really is this: How do you transform your organization into a full-stack content powerhouse?
It’s a process, not an event
The process laid out in this book will help you change your organization from the inside out with love, empathy, and a deep concern for the things that matter most to the people you work with. Yes, you will find new ways to demonstrate how great content works and the value you offer. Better yet, you’ll find new ways every day to drive real value in your company, and make a real difference in your coworkers’ and customers’ lives.
Because it’s not about the silos that separate us in organizations. It’s about how far we can go when we travel together.
Here’s how it’ll go:
- In Chapter 1, we’ll explore how full-stack content design works. You’ll get a clear picture of what it should look like, how you’ll know if it’s working, where it might need some help, and what you’ll want to accomplish at each stage of the game.
- In Chapter 2, you’ll learn how to spark a love of great content across your whole team, guide your colleagues to ask better content questions, and teach them how to use you as a strategic resource (instead of a human proofreading machine).
- In Chapter 3, we’ll discuss how to design content workshops that speak meaningfully to your team’s goals while opening hearts and minds to the real business impact of full-stack content work.
- In Chapter 4, you’ll create a plan for prioritizing and championing great content at scale. You’ll build on the strong culture you’ve created around content design, and you’ll get more strategic about how you support others in their work.
The work does carry a risk of some intriguing side effects. Among other wonderful things, finding yourself within a full-stack content organization means you—and other content folk like you—will have the breathing room you need to be able to pick and choose where you can add the most value. It means you can step in and out of projects—or leave projects in others’ capable hands—without needing to micromanage every little part of the content process yourself. You’ll be focused on meaning, not minutia. And you’ll have the power to be a real catalyst for change.
That change starts with you. It starts by changing your perception of the world you’re operating in. It’s not a world of us versus them, of people who love words and people who don’t, of grammar fanatics and philistines. It’s a world composed of people striving for an identical goal, curious about new ways to serve your customers as best you can. It’s a world full of content champions, and content champions you just haven’t activated yet.
This book is about how to ignite them—how to light them up from the inside with the power of content and create an organization that shines like a beacon of full-stack content design.