Content should be at the core of your internet strategy. Yes, think about balancing sales channels, connecting the site’s goals to your organizational objectives and getting your look and feel right. But content remains king, so knowing how to effectively deploy and manage it will be critical to your online success.

Before presenting at the Gilbane San Francisco conference, I was able to take in a few of the sessions, and two in particular provided excellent insight into the role that content can play in achieving business objectives and the business considerations that must go into being able to manage content.

Actionable content

Gilbane Consultant Bill Trippe discussed this useful concept in a presentation to the CM Professionals Spring Conference, which started the day before the Gilbane event.  Bill explained that Forrester originated the phrase “transactional content,” which Mary Laplante and Bill Zoellick from the Gilbane Group have defined as:

Transactional content can be defined as shared information that drives business-to-business processes. It is the content that flows through the commerce chain, initiating and automating processes such as procurement, order management, supply chain planning, and product support. Transactional content is shared in the sense that it is exchanged among partners, suppliers, customers and distributors who each can contribute to it.

Bill and Gilbane colleague David Guenette have taken to calling it “actionable content,” and Bill provided some eye-catching stats explaining why the concept is so important:

• Less than 10% of users will contact a supplier whose Website does not provide detailed product and service information (2004 Content Solutions User Needs)
• 91% of industrial buyers rely on the Internet to collect information and 90% of industrial buyers visit the Web and eliminate potential suppliers before they even consider calling (Outsell, Inc, ICR Research, others).

While understanding actionable content is critical, implementing it is complex and difficult. As Bill notes, it requires multiple media, multi-platform integration, and cross-functional teams.

In our experience, many companies are beginning to recognize the important contribution content makes to their business goals, even if they are not yet familiar with “actionable content.” And, once they accept the need to tackle an important business challenge, they recognize the importance of developing an effective plan.

Managing content

In his outstanding tutorial called “Web Content Management Systems: Architecture & Products,” Tony Byrne of CMS Watch provided a comprehensive overview on the topic. Among the key messages that emerged was that acquiring and implementing a CMS is not a straightforward business decision due to:

• Complexity of choice. Tony estimates that there are approximately 2,000 systems available, although about 1,600 are “consulting-ware” that have only been implemented a few times.
• Wide variance in price points. With Enterprise Web CMS solutions starting at $250,000 and Open Source options beginning at $1,000, assigning a budget prior to searching for options may prove virtually impossible.
• Estimating Total Cost of Ownership. TCO can be summed up with a simple question: what does a free dog cost? Open Source provides a great example of why a TCO model is very important for a CMS. As Tony pointed out, these “cheap” solutions often require extensive integration, a cost for which many companies fail to budget. He suggests that for every $1 spent on software, you allocate between $2 and $8 on services.

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(San Francisco) There are three certainties in life: death, taxes and, if you manage a website, you will acquire a content management system. Attendees at this week’s Gilbane San Francisco received in-depth information about how best to make this inevitable purchase. They also received an important reminder: content still ends up on paper.

For the first time, the session featured a track on automated publishing. The sessions were organized by Gene Gable, with assistance from Thad McIlroy, who are well known in publishing circles for their work in documenting the digitization of the production value chain.

The track provided the opportunity for participants to learn how the printed page can best be managed in a broader content management plan. It also enabled them to understand how new publishing technology can benefit all players involved in creating and distributing content.

For example, I presented in a session called “Accommodating creative needs in content management.” The key message was that when planning to implement a solution that will have a profound effect on the way an organization communicates—whether it’s a CMS or automated publishing system—success depends on understanding two phrases:  who is “in the tent” and who has put “skin the game.”

In the tent

Prior to beginning to evaluate new technology, the project manager needs to determine who to put on the project team. In other words, who should be in the tent? It sounds like common sense, but we still see too many examples in which one department acquires a system and then starts approaching other groups to gain their support. The required buy-in is often secured, but at the expense of precious time and energy that delays the implementation of the system. Or worse, the company discovers the system is missing critical functionality.

Putting skin in the game

Aside from not putting the right people in the tent before initiating the search for a new solution, another common problem is allowing an individual or a department to develop and implement the acquisition plan on their own. Not only does this approach mean that there’s no load balancing of the work, it also creates the impression that it’s “their plan” not “our plan.”

There are many reasons why people don’t get behind other people’s plan. Some are negative, like if the plan fails you can preserve the ability to say it’s not my fault. Some are benign, like you don’t understand it and can’t see why it should be a priority. Once it becomes “our plan,” however, we take partial ownership for its success. In other words, we’ve put skin in the game.

The approach is important when evaluating any major content management system, but so is remembering that content still ends up on paper. Frank Gilbane deserves a lot of credit for bringing Gene and Thad into the conference and making sure that paper stays in content’s tent.

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Tuning in the right employee communication channel

With some rare exceptions, the answer is likely “very few”. According to a new Forrester research study podcasting is more hype than reality. The report Podcasting Hits the Charts reveals that only 1% of U.S. households regularly listen to podcsts.

Anecdotally, I have to tell you, I don’t know a single person that listens to podcasts except for one or two people – and they’re hard core tech nerds that have their own podcasts. And I know and meet a lot of like-minded people who are hardly luddites. They’re technology savvy and have iPods. But they have no interest in listening to an amateur broadcaster talk about their favorite (fill-in-the-blank).

Does that mean that all podcasters are amateurs and geeks? No certainly not. All listeners are nerds? Absolutely not. However, the medium is primarily dominated by tech enthusiasts with very, very few average everyday workers or families partaking.

While some of you iPod fans reading this will be shocked and angered by these low numbers (as some podcasters such as PodTech.net founder John Furrierh who has already expressed his outrage over this study) there is a difference between hope and reality. The hope – and certainly all expectations – is that podcasting will explode with millions of users by the end of the decade. The reality is that this media is limited in use and practice to just a few techno geeks.

Does that mean you shouldn’t launch your own podcast? No. If you have a desire to do so then go for it. It’s practically free (if you have a computer and microphone). But temper your expectations regarding potential listenership. Unless you only plan this as a side hobby there are far better media for reaching your target audience – unless that target audience is hardcore tech fans. If you plan to start a business podcast for employees or customers you better know what you’re doing and a well-defined plan is a must. If you want to build an attentive listener base you’d better understand your target audience and market to them accordingly.

A good podcast is more than an investment of 15 or 20 minutes a week. Understand that the return on your time in these early months and years of podcasting likely won’t amount to much despite all the hype indicating otherwise. But the future looks bright…

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A new report form the Annals of Family Medicine finds that the computer, if used well by a skilled physician, can enhance the patient-doctor relationship.

Physicians, Patients, and the Electronic Health Record: An Ethnographic Analysis finds that when used,  the electronic health record (EHR -  the medical record, patient education materials, and Internet search capabilities) can add a valued dynamic to the patient relationship and enhance therapeutic relationships.

However, the computer can weaken the patient-doctor relationship if the physician uses it as a substitute for dialogue with the client. Therefore, it depends on ‘how’ the doctor uses the computer.

Whether the computer enhances or weakens the relationship depends both on how easy it is to use and how skilled physicians are in making use of it.

These conclusions were derived from a study of participant observation (80 hours) in 4 primary care offices and individual interviews with 23 physicians, 52 patient and other support works. This was accompanied by 5 focus-groups of participants.

"Physicians were often conflicted between recording data in the EHR and giving patients one-on-one attention," wrote the study's authors, led by William Ventres of Multnomah County Health Department in Portland, Ore.

Ventres (et all) found four key factors in influencing this relationship:

• Spatial Factors - for example, how the physical location of the computer monitor influenced dialogue between the patient and doctor (“Large, fixed monitors located in the corner of the examination room caused consternation among both physicians and patients, whereas flat-screen monitors on mobile arms were universally praised.)

• Relational Factors - how doctors and patients used and perceived the computer. "There are times where it’s obvious you’re going through a structured way of dealing with a presenting problem. It’s click, click, point, and your note is done. Then there are these much more complex, human interactions. It just isn’t appropriate to be sitting there typing at the time,” was a quote offered by one of the study’s participant doctors.

• Educational Factors – how skilled and experienced the doctor in using the computer and EHR.

• Structural Factors - factors such as the cost and funding for EHR, and how the host organization (e.g. clinic or hospital) perceived and influenced (culture) the use of EHR.

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A lot has been written about the evolution of content management and the CMS market. This emerging but uneasy market has been around for a number of years now but is still very immature (see CMS market evolution and Content Management Trends – Growing upward, outward and onward…).

There are literally thousands of solutions. No hyperbole – thousands of solutions. They range from free to millions of dollars and most are horribly user unfriendly, complex and over-priced. As such, this nascent market relies on a lot of smoke and mirrors to sell their products as true success stories are rare and ephemeral.

Case in point: I was recently invited, as was our VP, Carm Porco, to an upcoming Ziff Davis seminar next week called Content Management for the Rest of Us. I was not able to attend but I sent the invite to our resident CMS expert Tom Marciniak.

Both Carm and Tom were confirmed to attend this event that featured ‘wine tasting’ (perhaps not smoke and mirrors but you get the point). Today Carm and Tom received notice that they were uninvited – there’s no room for them. Both however RSVP’d and had received confirmation of their attendance.

So, it is perhaps good news for Ziff Davis that their event is ‘oversold’ and they have to turn people away. It shows the degree of interest in the CMS market. However, to underscore the reality and my point about a very immature market relying more on ‘smoke and mirrors’, here’s a little perspective as to why someone like Ziff Davis should rollout the carpet for Carm and Tom at Prescient Digital Media. In the past year and a half Prescient has been involved with and recommended the implementation of 7 or 8 content management systems for our clients including Scotiabank, the Ontario Ministry of Health, BC Lottery Corporation, Atomic Energy of Canada, Ontario Realty Corporation and others. These are not insignificant companies – nor were the size of the contracts. On top of that, Carm and Tom both have written articles on the subject and spoken at conferences as well.

These guys are key influencers in this market. In short, they’re VIPs and absolutely ideal target audience for Ziff’s event. But they were uninvited. Needless to say this ‘un-invite’ from Ziff Davis does not look good on them or the sponsor Oracle. Worse yet, in addition to being known consultants that influence the CMS purchasing at some big name organizations we are also an organization of writers and our blogs receive on average 2,000 visitors a day – clients, prospective clients and other consultants with influence in the content management space.

Now if I was a vindictive sort I might look into the event to try and determine the exact sales pitch and make light of it. However, that’s not the point nor my desire. The point is this: the CMS market is incredibly immature and many solutions in fact represent a dangerous investment. For example, I’m talking with a client that spent $2.5 million on implementing a CMS and they’ve contemplated scrapping a little more than a year after going live). Buyer beware has never held so much urgency for businesses looking to buy a CMS.

Now I won’t rule out ever working with Oracle or Ziff Davis on behalf of a client, but you can be sure the mention of either won’t have me running to hire either.

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