Web publishers, like myself, often promote best practices: design with web standards; think like a publisher; develop a content strategy; make your site accessible, usable, and SEO friendly. Most advocates talk from experience, which makes the advice more meaningful. After all, practice makes perfect (or at the very least, better).

However, I was recently reminded that “saying and doing” are very different. It’s important to recognize this so you can take necessary steps to support best practices as a discipline, not just a topic of discussion.

A colleague of mine shared a moment when he had been communicating a rationale for best practices. The person responded with a nod and said, “Yes, yes, that’s all well and good, but best practices are not real world.” Instead of regarding best practices as a practical discipline, the person viewed them as ideal or “preferred” strategies.

In web publishing the opposition to best practices often arises when people are faced with the need to build or update a website quickly. They might say we don’t have time for best practices or we don’t have the resources to do it the right way right now. This thinking leads people to discount best practices as rhetoric that doesn’t deserve real time or commitment. Others see it as a struggle between theory and practice, when in fact it is not theory, it is practice.

"Real world" truth

In the “real world” customers don’t forgive businesses for bad websites.

The challenges of managing time constraints and heavy workloads are understandable, but this means you need to make a choice: you either support best practices to plan, develop and maintain your website, or you do things "quick and dirty." But if you choose the latter, don’t expect to accomplish your goals quickly or make the process easier long-term, because those outcomes are the result of best practices.

For example, quickly adding webpages without consideration for page titles and descriptions, semantic markup, and web content keywords has huge implications on findability (SEO) and usability. You may solve the immediate need of publishing information, but does that meet your goal if people can’t find and access it?

Businesses frequently claim to recognize the importance of best practices in web publishing. This is illuminated by their awareness of and increased need for web publishing specialists, such as information architects, user experience designers, content strategists, and web writers. However, many of these same businesses still can’t appreciate it as an actual discipline, exemplified by web professionals often having to defend the very roles for which they are hired.

Talking about best practices is not enough

In response to my post Content First: Step One in Web Marketing where I make the case for content related to best practices, Amanda VanLente-Hatter commented:

My current position was created solely to have someone to create [web content], but I find I’m still having the discussion you describe [convincing people of the need for content].

In this instance, the need for a web writer implies support of best practices, but the employer still does not fully appreciate the value of effective web content. There’s a big difference between saying content is needed and actually making content a priority.

Make a better website (support best practices)

Best practices are hard to follow. This is why there are so many bad websites. But if you’re committed to doing better, you have to follow through and support the discipline. Best practices are not simple or easy, but they are worthwhile.

Rather than try to solve the problem of enforcing best practices in a blog post, I want to open the topic for discussion. Whether you’re someone charged with supporting best practices or someone who feels the responsibility to effectively meet goals, what is your perception of best practices? What role do they play—or should they play—in your organization?

I often find myself having to convince people of the need for and value of content in web marketing. Valuable content is necessary to attract and retain readers. I recently participated in a web marketing planning session where we addressed concern over lack of repeat website visitors, especially within the organization. The problem seemed apparent to me: outdated content. However, making the case for web content is challenging.

What follows is a case example of traditional marketing vs. web (content) marketing. The dialogue is edited for length, particularly because I was repeating myself to make my point (I’m a more concise writer than speaker).

"We need a new plan for marketing our website. People aren’t looking at it, even though we promote it constantly."

I raise my hand. "The website needs new content."

"Excuse me?"

"People need a reason to visit your website. They need to anticipate new content if they are to return. If the "news and events" section hasn’t been updated in four months—if the pages contain static content–people have no incentive to return."

"We can do that, but how do we get people to look at it? We need a marketing plan."

"That is marketing. Content marketing. If you consistently create new content—if people can rely on that—they will return."

I received a grin as if I didn’t understand the problem. "People need to know it’s there though."

"Yes, but you need to have content before you can promote it. You can’t tell people to use a website without giving them something useful."

"I think this is a case of the chicken or the egg."

Respectfully, no. This is not a question of the chicken or the egg. You can’t convince people to visit your website "for the latest" when there is nothing new to see. People have no reason to trust you if your track record doesn’t support your claim.

Developing and maintaining web content is hard. But you can’t ignore it, save it for later, or separate it from your marketing plan. Marketing cannot make up for valuable content. (Admittedly, I sounded just as preachy during the meeting.)

Step one

Develop current, relevant, useful content.

Yes, this means you need a content strategy. Yes, this means you can’t jump straight to marketing. But as part of developing your content strategy you gain an understanding of what content is needed to attract and retain your visitors.

Joe Pulizzi, Founder and Chief Content Officer of Junta42, explains in his whitepaper How to Attract and Retain Customers With Content:

Once you have delivered relevant content, you become a trusted resource. Content marketing enables companies to build a level of trust among their customers that makes it easy for those customers to buy.

"Buy" here refers to what you want your visitors to do, whether it be purchase a product, learn a skill, download a PDF, be informed of current news and events, or subscribe to your RSS feed to keep up on your great content.

Step two

I’m not addressing step two until I’m convinced you understand that content is step one, or when I write another post, whichever comes first.

But how does the story end?

I’m pleased to say that the web marketing meeting ended favorably. We discussed a plan to better involve the key web content stakeholders in the maintenance of the website and have them accept more ownership of the content that pertains to them. This does not constitute a content strategy—much more needs to be addressed—but good topics were discussed, including performing a content audit and developing a maintenance plan. The seed was planted and hopefully more is to come.

More on content strategy

Content strategy is a fast-growing topic in web publishing. It’s exciting and encouraging to see an increased awareness of the need for good web content. Here are some "current, relevant, and useful" resources for learning more:

More on content marketing

What about you?

Chime in! What challenges do you face marketing your website? How does content fit into your strategic plan?

Benefits of a FAQs page:

Common problems with a FAQs page:

Tips & suggestions:

What would you recommend? Do you find FAQs pages useful? Do you have examples of ones that are either well designed or poorly managed?

Below are three people I follow on Twitter because I appreciate their contribution to the field of web publishing and I benefit from their tweets.

Kristina Halvorson

http://www.twitter.com/halvorson
Influence: Web Content Strategy

Who she is: Kristina Halvorson is the founder and president of Brain Traffic (@BrainTraffic), an agency specializing in content strategy and delivery. Brain Traffic describes quality content as "Useful. Useable. Contextual. Consistent." which illustrates their view on content strategy. Halvorson is a positive contributor to the "dialogue" on content strategy, asking good questions and promoting best practices.

Why I follow her: Being obsessed with content strategy myself I really appreciate Halvorson’s passion for the craft. I have a lot of respect for her perspectives on the need and role of content strategy in web publishing. I pre-ordered her book, Content Strategy for the Web, and really look forward to reading it.

Brian Hoff

http://www.twitter.com/behoff
Influence: Graphic Design

Who he is: Brian Hoff is a self-employed graphic designer and founder of The Design Cubicle, a blog focusing on "design, creativity and learning." Like all good users of social media, he opens the door to conversation through his blog and is very active on Twitter.

Why I follow him: Hoff provides a continuous stream of useful design-related resources and topics, but what distinguishes him for me is his endeavor to use web publishing for teaching and learning. His business is not quite a year old, but that’s actually an added benefit for his followers who are able to watch him develop his business and expertise. A good sample of Hoff’s approach is his blog post: The creative process for the Design Cubicle’s logo.

Erika Napoletano

http://www.twitter.com/RedheadWriting
Influence: Style & Voice

Who she is: Erika Napoletano is owner of RedheadWriting, a blog with "a candid view on writing, SEO and social media." The operative word there is "candid." Napoletano has a brazen assurance which permeates her writing on Twitter and her blog. Basically, she tells it like she sees it. Did I mention she’s candid?

Why I follow her: Napoletano’s writing style and voice. It’s a challenge to balance a social media presence professionally and personally. Most people are afraid of being too honest in their writing through fear of offending someone or being judged critically. While writers should be mindful of their audience, the tendency to censor opinions to accommodate the status quo can dilute the impact of their writing. It is refreshing to read unexpurgated views–it motivates me to write more transparent and honest. Napoletano is also a really good writer.

All three of these #FollowFriday recommendations are case examples of why I use Twitter. Maybe I would have discovered Halvorson’s book or Hoff’s and Napoletano’s blogs on my own, but their perspectives wouldn’t be as meaningful to me as they are when I follow them–follow their discoveries, challenges, accomplishments, and yes, weekend vacations and hiking trips. Twitter is social media, after all.

This is not an uncommon occurrence with higher education or business brand management. It’s a challenge to balance the message you want to convey with the needs of your visitors–it’s a matter of image versus service. Both are vital. My rationale for keeping the links did not discount the importance of brand management, it aimed to keep a balance. I felt by advising students to borrow the recommended books from the school library in the page introduction (with no mention of Amazon.com) it made the intentions clear while providing easy access to additional information. The school bookstore didn’t carry the titles because they were so specialize, so I couldn’t include them.

The original book list included titles and authors, but no links. Without them, visitors would be forced to copy and paste a book title in order to search for more information. I’m not suggesting this added step is the end of the world. However, I draw attention to it because it’s part of the larger matter of customer service, which must not be trivialized.

One of my favorite topics from the recent eduWeb Conference was: "Answer the questions people are asking." In other words, give people what they’re looking for. This should be a primary goal of a website. And, like the Content vs. SEO debate, the solution should not be either/or. You can accomplish both with careful planning.

What do you think? Are Amazon.com (or other bookseller) links inappropriate for a school website or can a balance be made managing brand image and maximizing customer service?

I consider myself a lifelong learner with an insatiable appetite for knowledge. I’m motivated to share and teach others what I know so I can continue to learn and grow myself. I don’t want to do be static and I consider this attitude a value to my employer and clients. Every time I learn something new I am able to make a fresh contribution. I subscribe to the mantra: “there is always a better way.” It’s simple. If you collaborate with others, you increase your options. Problems are solved and people learn.

I marvel at the success of social media (including blogs) to engage people in discussion. It’s a contagious sensation igniting people’s natural inclination to share. It also causes the publishing elite to scramble for a new definition of publishing. When I was working on my masters in publishing, I was drawn into many spirited debates on the role and effectiveness of electronic publishing. Although everyone agreed on where publishing was going, there were disagreements about how it would affect the quality of the industry. Then and now, I like to take the role of devil’s advocate to keep the conversation going. And, it’s a great conversation.

Today I am relaunching the ePublish Media business site as a blog to contribute to the web publishing community and help educate and promote best practices. This is also my new learning sandbox—for testing theories, experimenting, and allowing others to watch me work. My hope is that this will encourage people to engage in dialogue with me on topics of writing and electronic publishing, web design, marketing and communications, and technology. I look forward to learning from you.