Getting senior management’s attention is about showing how costs can be reduced and/or value created. Content needs to show how it will reduce costs by X percent and increase productivity by Z percent.
Content management has been a fuzzy, poorly respected discipline within many organizations. Its related discipline, communications, is often seen as peripheral and non-strategic.
Content is a cost to most senior managers. It is seen as not key to achieving results. It does not affect growth, profitability, or productivity, nor does it impact the value of the brand. [...]
Can you show a reduction in the average time it takes to support a customer as a result of better search? Can you show that, by improving the content quality on your website, sales leads increase? Can you show that a poor quality web experience leads to a negative impression of your department with the public?
There are quantifiable benefits that a quality public website or intranet can deliver. There are quantifiable drawbacks to giving your staff or customers a poor web experience. You must identify them and you must prove them with hard numbers. You must show that content can deliver quantifiable value. [...]
Content means business. Quality content delivers. However, you need to clearly articulate the value your content delivers. Too many web managers try to do too much with their websites. They have so much content to manage they hardly even have time for metrics. [...]
Obviously, nobody in his web team had told him that hits are a totally useless measure of success. The only reason they are quoted is because they are the largest number in the web metrics report. (Everyone loves big numbers.) Sooner or later, this senior manager will be informed that he is making a fool of himself talking about hits, and he won’t be very happy.
Senior management loves numbers. The more useful numbers you can feed them that illustrate the value the website is creating, the better. But get away from volume of visitors; that’s so crude.
Instead, talk about a five percent reduction in time per support call, a ten percent increase in sales leads, or a two percent increase in customer satisfaction.
Excerpts from the [Gerry McGovern] News Letter. One of the best sign-ups I’ve done recently. You should join it. He’s got great insights.
[WEBLINK FOR THIS ISSUE] to read the entire letter.
Also read :
Content management measurables and
Subject classification for New Thinking