The Tendo View » Christine Zender

A question of tone: 2 pitch-perfect companies

Christine Zender — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 18:52:21 +0000

I’ve just returned from a Thanksgiving trip to China. It was one of the best vacations of my life—great food, good people, amazing sites—and a truly challenging language.

I learned that the Beijing dialect of Chinese has four “tones,” which make it possible to say the same combination of characters four totally different ways, something that’s not feasible in English. As a newbie to the tones, I was terrified of using the wrong one and accidentally calling someone’s antecedents into question, while I was simply trying to find the toilet.

The question of tone and how it paralyzed my communication skills got me thinking about the importance of tone in American communications. While the consequences for using the wrong tone probably aren’t as severe, it can still alienate your audience, create misunderstandings, or detract from your campaign.

So, for this end-of –year post, I’m celebrating two companies who do tone right. They use words and images in pitch-perfect harmony to enhance, augment, and advance their cause.

Luxe City Guides
Tone: Sophisticated, stylish, and smart
Audience: Travelers who want to experience the best of a city and won’t be satisfied with run-of-the-mill recommendations.
How do they do it: The guides come in a pocket-sized (really!) format, feature consistent categories of information no matter the city, and all of them—and the site—showcase razor-sharp writing. Every word is carefully curated, there’s a definite point of view, and they’re not afraid to be a little naughty. Take, for example, this intro on Paris: “…while this lulu of a city can be sweet and coquettish, she can also be a very snooty grande dame indeed. We’ve taken her over our knee, given her several smacks with the manners stick and she’s promised to behave.”
Genius: The guides feel exclusive, but never exclusionary.

Droid
Tone: Strong, capable, “doing”
Audience: Anyone looking for an alternative to the iPhone
How do they do it: Early ads for the Droid phone went a little overboard in the testosterone department, but in 2010 they’ve found their tone by sticking to one key message: Droid Does. All words and images focus on what the Droid can do, not what it can’t do. The gravelly-voiced announcer (men want to be him, women want to be with him) calmly lists the phone’s capabilities, the TV ads show the “doing” power, and the site features sci-fi graphics and reads like Earnest Hemingway wrote it—if he worked for an ad agency.
Genius: Strong enough for a man, but made for a woman.

These are just my two favorites. Are there sites, companies, or products that you think use tone well? What about those that get it wrong? Email me and let me know.

Author Chris Zender wants you to watch your tone when you email her.

Don’t use that tone with me!

Christine Zender — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 05:00:36 +0000

A big part of my job is to consult on, create, evaluate, and distribute content. As such, I spend a lot of time writing about content. Some days, however, it seems as though a disproportionate amount of that time is spent trying to communicate what I think/recommend/need in a clear, emotionally neutral way to coworkers, clients, vendors—and yes, even my family—via email.

My default setting is “direct” (those who know me would probably say “blunt”), so in order to ensure my email does not unintentionally offend, I often put them through a “bitch-check.” But starting today, that’s going to change.

Julie Jares just sent me a link to a product called ToneCheck. Developed by Lymbix, ToneCheck is an email plugin that “ensures your tone is clearly communicated and understood before you hit the Send button.”

Genius.

ToneCheck evaluates the language in your emails, assigning “questionable” phrases one of eight Emotional Ratings that range from affection/friendliness to humiliation/shame. Users can edit their settings to accommodate their tolerances for negative or positive language so your emails will still sound like you—just less offensive.

Check it out.

Content strategy Q&A

Christine Zender — Tue, 18 May 2010 20:53:45 +0000

Content strategy has come of age. While consumers continue to embrace social media and emerging Web channels and turn away from traditional media, large corporations are being pushed into a more direct relationship with their customers. Along with LinkedIn and Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, corporate websites are becoming the main channel for this new relationship marketing, and marketers are challenged to deliver relevance and value to earn the loyalty of their customers. But most large corporate websites are a mess—difficult to navigate, stuffed with outdated and/or incorrect information, and geared for promotion and transaction rather than offering value to their audience.

Enter content strategy.

Tendo has been delivering content strategy services long before the term could be found on Wikipedia. We asked one of our most experienced content strategists, Vice President of Content Services Chris Zender, to answer some common questions about this “old but new again” discipline.

Q: How do you define content strategy? What is it? When you conduct a content strategy, what’s the deliverable?
A: Content strategy is the road map for planning, developing, creating, and executing content that will achieve your website’s goals. There are a couple of key phrases in there. First: Planning. It’s the linchpin to success—I’d rather spend three weeks in planning and one week in creation than vice versa. Second: Achieving your website’s goals. Content should support the goals of a website.

When people hear “content strategy,” they sometimes think it’s a dense, complicated document that’s going to give them a lot of theory and not a lot of practice. The truth is that the best content strategies tell you the best route to your destination and how to get there—not one or the other.

Q: How has the discipline of content strategy evolved or changed over time?
A: Most companies weren’t thinking about “content” as a strategic asset five or more years ago. There was, and still is, a tendency for companies to take what I call the Billion Dollar Bucket approach to building websites. They spend an inordinate amount of time and resources building a gorgeous shell—the bucket—then they fill it with any old crap: old and outdated content, broken links, images and videos that don’t reflect current brand standards, etc.

It’s only been in the last three to five years that people have started to appreciate that what you say or view is as important as how you get to that material.

I think there are a few reasons for this shift: The rise of social media and the increasing importance of SEO. Think about it: Before social media, people received information and opinion from “sanctioned” sources—traditional media outlets like magazines, newspapers, TV, or radio, or from sources they trusted like friends and family. But social media gives (almost) anyone, anywhere the ability to broadcast their content. As these voices multiplied and grew louder, they created a need to figure out how to balance this information. And as the volume of content grew, the need to find a way to search for a specific topic also grew.

Q: When Tendo delivers a content strategy, are the website goals already defined, or do they change with the content strategy?
A: We’ve created content strategies for both scenarios. We don’t create any kind of strategy—marketing, messaging, content, etc.—without knowing two things: the goals of the website and the target audience the client wants to attract. So if the goals and the audience haven’t been defined, then that’s the first step in our process. You’ve got to know who you’re talking to and assess what their information needs are, then you marry that with what you want them to do and/or what you want them to know. That marriage is the essence of a content strategy.

Once you know the site goals and the intended outcome or action of the audience/user, then you can create content that meets both objectives. There are certain things that go into every content strategy—site goals, audience profile, content organization, frequency of updates/refreshes, and how to staff or organize or assign roles and responsibilities for content creation and development.

Q: What are the primary benefits of conducting a content strategy? Why is it needed? How does having one, or not having one, affect a company’s bottom line?
A: Content strategies provide several tangible benefits:

They focus all stakeholders around the company’s and the website’s goals. In larger organizations different divisions often have different priorities, which results in the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing. A content strategy that supports the overall website goals can provide a unifying foundation around which all divisions can stay focused on their priorities without undermining the total site experience.

They ensure cost-effective content creation. By standardizing the types, topics, and frequency of content you put a series of checks and balances in place that help create content strategically. The content has to adhere to the plan or it doesn’t get funded. We’ve been called in to edit content that was off message or just plain incorrect because the division that commissioned it wasn’t operating strategically—it can be a drag on resources.

“Write once, use many” is our Web content mantra. Create content once and leverage it in different ways to amortize the cost—site material, newsletters, syndicated content, etc.

They position content as a measurable asset. Deciding on and building in consistent metrics for content—something that’s not done nearly as often as you might think—enables you to determine the value of a piece of content.

Q: How does content strategy intersect with user experience and information architecture?
A: Content strategy informs user experience and information architecture; if you don’t consider the type of content, the frequency with which it will be refreshed, or even who and how it will be updated, how can you construct a cohesive information architecture or user experience?

Content strategy, user experience, and information architecture are three equal components that need to work together to deliver the highest value experience. Just as a driver might navigate a city by a roadmap, street signs, and visual landmarks, the absence of any one of these compromises the ability to effectively get to your destination.

Q: Does content strategy also include SEO strategy? What about social media strategy?
A: It should include both—and more. A content strategy, depending on what the content is for, should include a social media strategy, a syndication strategy, an SEO strategy, content analytics and metrics, etc. SEO and metrics in particular are always bolted on at the last minute in a kind of “Oh, shoot! We forgot about that” way.

The challenge is that in many organizations, these functions are handled by different people who aren’t working together or aren’t working toward the same goals. If you treat each of these very important strategies as pieces of a greater whole, you’ll increase the effectiveness of all of them.

Q: Isn’t every client’s website goal to generate leads, gain customers, and sell more product?
A: Not necessarily—and not in that order. Toyota has launched content recently in which the primary goal is to manage their reputation, influence public perception, and generate awareness. The secondary goal for this content is to sell cars. Almost every company website in some way builds or supports the brand. But sometimes a site is intended to offer customers service or support, to offer unique insight not directly related to a specific transatcion or sale. The goal of your website and the unique promise of your brand inform how you approach content.

Q: What are the top three challenges you encounter in creating content strategies?
A: First, the people and processes part of the strategy. In many cases, defining roles and processes for content creation creates an organizational shift that is uncomfortable for many companies. Second, once companies realize the importance of content, they often have unrealistic expectations about what content can achieve for them. Many expect content to propel them to a permanent place at the top of search pages or increase their sales by 500 percent. Third, and it’s more of a surprise than a challenge, clients are always taken aback by what’s on their website. We get a lot of “THAT’s on the site? Why?”

Usually it’s because there was no strategy in place.

HomeAway.com targets “Vacation” audience

Christine Zender — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 23:10:30 +0000

Now that I have a DVR I usually zoom through commercials, but there’s one that I’ve been watching lately. I missed its debut during the Super Bowl but, luckily for me, it’s been on pretty heavy rotation in the past couple of weeks. It’s for HomeAway.com and features Chevy Chase and Beverly D’Angelo reprising their roles as the Griswolds.

In the clip, the Griswolds check into a hotel expecting a spacious room, gracious service, and reasonable pricing. What they get, of course, is the exact opposite.

What I find fascinating about this commercial is that it combines broad appeal with some very specific jokes. I’m guessing that most folks age 30 to 50 know about National Lampoon’s “Vacation” movies, and most folks will find the scene with the valet kicking the door of the iconic “Griswold Family Truckster” funny. But a smaller percentage will get why the “Napoleon” suite is funny (very low ceiling), and an even smaller percentage will understand why the Griswolds are being charged for the “complementary” water (“It complements the room.”).

The fact that the commercial debuted during the Super Bowl supports the overall strategy. It’s audacious to debut a commercial that assumes the majority of its viewers know—and appreciate—the difference between compliment and complement during the Super Bowl. For that alone, I have to give credit to HomeAway.com because I believe their target audience is me. So, the next time I think about booking a hotel, I’ll be checking out HomeAway.com first.

What about you? Have you seen a commercial lately that’s moved you to action because you thought you were the target audience?

Our 5 favorite jargon words for 2010

Christine Zender — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 20:41:15 +0000

We’re pretty optimistic about the opportunity 2010 brings for new jargon words. It’s early days yet, but we’re seeing—and creating—some good ones. The following list includes our early favorites.

1. Advertubing (noun)

Definition: Advertising created specifically for online mediums, a la YouTube.
Why we hate it: If we don’t watch ads on TV anymore, do we really need them on YouTube?

2. Bitch-check (noun, verb)

Definition: The act of asking someone to review a written communication for potentially inflammatory language. “Bill, can you bitch-check this email for me? I don’t want to make David mad.”
Why we love it: It’s much easier to say than, “Can you review this communication for potentially inflammatory language?”

3. Buffering (verb)

Definition: The period of time that you’re technically disabled while learning to use a new technology or device. “Don’t text Chris right now; she has a new phone and she’s buffering.”
Why we love it: With the speed of technology change and the necessity of being wired 24/7, we need a term for this.

4. Squirrel! (interjection)

Definition: From “Up,” one of our favorite movies of 2009, this interjection denotes an abrupt break in thought or attention.
Why we love it: We love the idea of 1. Talking dogs, and 2. Talking dogs as a symbol of our increasingly fractured attention spans.

5. Social netlurking (noun, verb)

Definition: This one comes courtesy of Daily Candy. Spending time on a social network for the sole purpose of stalking a member.
Why we love it: Oh, come on! We all do it. It’s time we put a name on it.

Project Runway: naughty or nice?

Christine Zender — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 20:56:14 +0000

The seventh season of Project Runway starts on Thursday, January 14, and I await it with the same feeling of anticipation and dread that I experienced when watching Star Wars Episodes I-III: I wanted to love these movies as much as I loved Episodes IV-VI, but they just kept disappointing me.

As for Project Runway, it was love at first site. The show weaves several of my interests and preferences into one neat cloth: sewing, fashion, creativity, problem solving, TV shows that start and end a story arc in one hour, etc. So, a series that offers 16 aspiring designers the chance to launch fashion careers by responding to a series of very creative challenges was a delight.

In contrast to other reality shows, Project Runway managed to capture the personality of these contestants without chronicling the petty moments, and the feedback from the judges, while not always positive, was always balanced and professional.

At least, that was the case for the first five seasons. Season six? Not so much.

After a much-publicized brawl between Bravo, The Weinstein Company, NBC, and Lifetime—and a delay of nearly a year—season six aired on Lifetime in August 2009. The network assured viewers that it had no desire to tinker with the show—it would keep the same format. It was true to its word: With the exception of the location change to Los Angeles, the show remained the same.

Except that it didn’t.

Season six was demonstrably different than the previous five—it just felt, well, wrong. It puzzled me: The episodes were, shot for shot, structurally the same format as the previous seasons, so why did it feel so off?

It took me a couple of episodes before I could put my finger on it: It was mean. The whole tone of the season was mean. Host Heidi Klum was mean, the other judges were mean, and the contestants were mean. The only non-meanie was, of course, series mentor Tim Gunn. Tim is never mean.

I do not enjoy mean. I enjoy nice. I enjoy creative. Season six was none of those things. Seasons one through five centered on the creative challenges the designers faced; season six focused more on the interplay between the designers. Which was mean.

Yet Project Runway is (ostensibly) a reality show. So, the designers and judges aren’t (supposed to be) reading lines. Unless that changed, the fact that season six felt different means that someone edited it to be different. It was edited to change the tone.

Editing and tone are a couple of things I feel pretty strongly about. Editing should sharpen language and/or visuals, keeping the intent of the content creator intact. Editing should help clarify tone—not create it.

Yet tone is a tricky thing. It’s how you connect with your audience. To hit the right tone, you need to know your audience, and their preferences and habits, so you can weave in the proper language, visuals, music—anything that shows your audience that you understand them.

Seasons one through five of Project Runway had a much more balanced tone. The show managed to convey the designers’ struggles and triumphs without focusing on name-calling, hissy fits, and backstabbing. Unlike season six.

Is this new tone something Lifetime wanted? Do they think their demographic responds better to nasty exchanges and snide comments than they would to truly creative challenges and the innovative solutions provided by the designers in previous seasons? I guess I’ll find out on Thursday.

Let me know what you think of the “new” tone on Project Runway—or if you think I’m way off base.

FLOR’s design contest wins hearts from carpet

Christine Zender — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 18:02:41 +0000

I’m obsessed with FLOR. Everything about the company—from the cool, slightly Scandinavian-sounding name, to the environmental friendliness of its products, to its inspiring catalogs—makes me want to cover every surface in my house with carpet tiles.

And now FLOR has given me yet another reason to love it. Last month the company emailed me about its first-ever design contest. Readers were invited to submit area rug designs using FLOR tiles. Winners would receive their FLOR design (complementary); have their winning design featured on FLOR.com; and have the chance of seeing their rug design sold through FLOR in the future.

In my mind, I can see the marketing meeting that engendered it:

Head Marketing Dude: What’s the biggest reason folks don’t buy our products?
Team Member: Most people can’t visualize things that aren’t in front of them. So, they don’t understand that they can use FLOR tiles to create an almost infinite variety of patterns—not just the ones we give them.
Head Marketing Dude: How can we fix this?
Team Member: Let’s invite folks to design new rugs for us. That way people will see the possibilities created by folks just like them. How about running a design contest?
Head Marketing Dude: Genius.

It is genius. It’s also a perfect example of audience engagement. Ask your audience to think in new ways about your product and build buzz around it. I know it’s not a new idea—food companies like Pillsbury have been using this tactic for years; I just appreciate FLOR’s take on it.

I thought about creating a new rug and submitting it, but I got sidetracked and didn’t do it. I did, however, vote for a winner by going to the FLOR site and checking out the finalists. Last week, FLOR sent me a follow-up email inviting me to check out the winners. And one of the ones I voted for won.

So, it looks like I’ll be getting a new area rug for Christmas. Thanks, FLOR!

Is Bing the new Google?

Christine Zender — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 23:57:19 +0000

I originally sat down to write about how much I disliked Bing. But as I explored it further, all of my arguments fell apart; I found myself coming back to “but it’s not Google” again and again. And while I applaud brand loyalty, my job is about using the best tools and technologies for the job—whatever the job is. So, “It’s not Google” isn’t really an argument—that’s just being resistant to change. Which I’m not. Or, I shouldn’t be…

My initial reservation was that Bing just wasn’t that good at, well, searching. It’s billed as a decision engine, and it definitely slices and dices information in new, sometimes helpful ways, but before it helps me decide something, it should give me the best possible choices from which to decide. Yet it didn’t find the results I needed for pretty simple searches. For example, I wanted to know more about an information architecture company called EightShapes. Last week, a search for “eightshapes” in Bing pulled up lots of results on mathematical principles, but no company website. This lack of results was repeated with several other simple searches—so I switched back to Google, which gave me the EightShapes site as the top search item. Just for fun, check out Bing vs. Google to compare search results in each engine.

Today, however, if you search for EightShapes (or any of the other search items I tested) on either engine, you get roughly the same results. So, perhaps Bing, like HAL, is learning… The bottom line is that Bing gives you the ability to search text, images, video, news, maps, and shopping. So does Google. Bing helps shortcut your search by linking directly to specific pages within companies. So does Google. Bing provides sponsored links. So does Google. One nice feature that Bing has that Google doesn’t, however, is the ability to save and share search histories on Facebook and email.

Where Bing really excels, however, is by leveraging the awesome marketing power of Microsoft. The Redmond giant’s ability to develop and coordinate a truly impressive array of marketing and promotional campaigns is awe inspiring.

It’s not just the standard deals to make Bing the default browser on HP and Dell PCs and Verizon smart phones. Here in San Francisco, not one week after Bing launched, DJs on every Viacom-owned radio station in the city suddenly stopped using “Google” as a verb and began using “Bing.” As in, “We should Bing that to see if it’s true.” Coincidence? Probably not. And then there’s the Bing Cashback program, which rewards shoppers for purchasing products on Bing by giving them a percentage of the purchase price as cash. Sweet.

Is Bing a better search engine? The jury’s still out for me. Is Microsoft better at marketing and promoting the product? There’s no contest.

Heels.com walks a mile in your shoes

Christine Zender — Tue, 12 May 2009 21:08:55 +0000

I watch a lot of video during the course of my day: Video data sheets, video news, video conference recaps, and so on. But until now I haven’t really realized the power of video to make a case for a product.

Good for fashionistas and foot fetishists alike, heels.com provides contextual video that demonstrably helps the presale experience. All video should be this helpful.

If a picture is worth a thousand words…

Christine Zender — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 23:13:39 +0000

How much is a word worth when it describes a sound? I’m searching for stock music on a site called StockMusic.net and having more fun than I thought was possible while performing this mundane task.

Why? Whoever wrote the descriptions for the music clips is a genius. A demented and (quite possibly) chemically altered genius, but a genius nonetheless. I’ve searched a lot of stock music sites and the descriptions usually say things like: “Great for travel, vacation, holiday, etc.” or “Spanish guitars, percussion, clapping, castanets.” Helpful, but not inspiring.

StockMusic.net’s descriptions, on the other hand, say things like: “These clowns sound like they’re pretty confident and they just might take ice cream away from children—but then they would give it back.” Or “If Ozzy’s family and Alice Cooper’s family were having a feud, this is the theme for it.”

I may not be sure what I’ll hear when I download the demos for these clips, but I know that I need to listen to them both. —Christine Zender, VP, creative services