Philip Berne at SlashGear (http://www.slashgear.com) published an article late in June this year titled “You Get What You Pay For” (http://www.slashgear.com/you-get-what-you-pay-for-2391228). The article is an interesting comparison of two approaches used by traditional publishing houses to engage their audiences in the Web 2.0 arena, and questions the value of comments and posts by under-qualified, non-expert contributors, basically concluding that for the content to have real value the contributor needs to be someone with expertise, experience and reputation within the field. Oh and how are we paying for this free content? As Philip points out we are all paying with our time, and let’s face it, in this day and age, we are all time short and deadline pressured. It is an interesting read and I would recommend having a look at it. Philip certainly has expertise, experience and reputation in his field.
His opinion and arguments set me thinking about the whole issue of the ‘free’ internet, and ‘getting what you pay for’ in the wider context of the World Wide Web. We are often approached by SME business who verbalise that their web presence is important to them and has a high profile within their business. They are often experienced internet users who have previously had classic brochure-ware sites and are looking to move to the next level. Many will have pre-assigned a budget but have not defined a requirement or functional specification, let alone the user journeys or usability considerations. Basically they know what they want in broad terms, and I quote “we like the BBC site and want to have something like that”, but believe that a free internet means this is a free or low cost method of marketing.
Let’s look at a couple of assumptions we regularly hear:
I won’t carry on and list lots of further examples as I am sure you see where I am coming from. The fact of the matter is that you can engage with the internet and World Wide Web at whatever level you wish to. Web design and delivery can be from next to nothing for a simple brochure-ware site to millions of pounds for a fully integrated internet delivery (BBC 2008 web spend was £110 million (source http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/may/29/bbc.digitalmedia )). But you must always bear in mind that when you enter this arena you only get what you pay for, be that in purchased professional services, engagement with your suppliers and copywriters and investment of your own time. If you like the BBC’s approach and want to do ‘something like that’ then go and do it, just don’t expect to emulate a multi-million pound site for a few thousand, and expect to continue your investment every day, with new content, site evolution and engaging more staff in your organisation into your vision of your company on the web.
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Although it is effectively a bit of 'self promotion', the advise that it contains about creating and sharing video content is relevant and thought provoking for any company considering using YouTube as part of their communication strategy.
Furthermore, the underlying principles of good content creation, regular uploads (tweets/updates/comments), cross promotion, tracking and analysis etc. etc. etc. are all equally relevant to Twitter and Facebook.
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When considering social media as part of your marketing strategy there are a number of key things to remember:
You need to take a strategic approach to ALL these things and should be considering these as part of a cohesive online and offline communications approach. That means a concerted effort in formulating a plan, implementing it, managing it and refining it. Overall this means ensuring your company to takes communications via the web SERIOUSLY!
As long as you consider these core points then social media platforms can certainly be a key element of a successful’ joined-up’ communications strategy.
]]>Existing technology, in common use today, means we can add the content to a web server and then link to the files for download. You can also generate RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds and make these available. But in reality none of these items really provide a great solution for the distribution and syndication of audio. That's where podcasting comes in.
Podcasting combines the ability to have audio on your website for people to enjoy with the ability to syndicate the content via a RSS style feed. The big difference is that when the feed is consumed by the user, they can subscribe to it and automatically download the content. Or more importantly they can automatically synchronise it with either an external player, like an iPod or Zune, or a podcatcher program such as Feed Demon or even iTunes. That is the essence of podcasting and why it is becoming so popular, its simple for the user to consume the content they want.
There are many MP3 players on the market and the sophistication of the devices and the software supplied with them is increasing rapidly. Nearly all of the major MP3 player manufacturers provide podcast synchronisation software with their units. Apple provide the iTunes package, Microsoft provide the Zune application, Creative provide Zencast, Archos provide Archoslink, the list goes on and on. All have a commonality in the fact that they support an industry standard for podcasting, RSS feeds with enclosure tags (the enclosure tag actually details the media file and makes it available for download).
Major software and internet services providers such as Google and Yahoo are also providing free online services to allow users to subscribe to and consume podcast content. Many content providers are now ensuring they have implemented single click subscribe capabilities to further simplify consumption. One click and iTunes can be downloading the podcast series of your choice ready to synchronise with your player.
Content providers are embracing the technology as well. Many specialist providers have been around for a number of years now. Providers such as EscapePod, and PodCastle have been providing free short story content for some considerable time, in fact EscapePod had it's 4th birthday in May this year. More recently major international providers have been embracing this arena. The BBC have lead the way in internet content provision to the mass market with the BBC iPlayer. Now they are providing a wide range of content as podcasts. Currently, they have over 200 podcast series available on their website ranging from the Reith Lectures, through The World Service Global News to local radio programs and sports roundups. All available with single click subscription for the major MP3 players and podcatchers, single episode download and "play on page" capabilities.
Podcasting isn't difficult but in an market where consumer expectations and technology competence are growing daily it is essential that it is done properly. To succeed you must have high production values for your content, something of value to say, and you must provide it in the formats and with the capabilities the consumers have come to accept. A few links to files on a web page really doesn't cut it anymore.
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This may seem like a bit of an odd question from a content management based consultancy but two significant things have come to light over the past month that have made me wonder what is happening with content from the traditional content providers, organisations that have historically been slow to embrace the internet and its delivery methodologies.
Firstly, the Guardian has announced ‘The Guardian Open Platform’. This platform provides a methodology and API to allow partner organisations to access and consume The Guardian’s content. The Guardian describes the platform as follows:
‘The Open Platform is the suite of services that make it possible for our partners to build applications with the Guardian. We've opened up our platform so that everyone can benefit from our journalism, our brand, and the technologies that power guardian.co.uk.’
The platform is formed of a content API and a content data store. Interestingly the platform is free and is the start of a new approach to the internet for The Guardian.
‘Our aim is to make the Guardian Open Platform a useful environment for anyone who creates for the internet. We will offer more services in the future such as an ad network and an application platform.
This initial release is a beta trial that will help us identify the ways our partners want to work with us. Access will be granted on a limited basis.’
So where is the money in this? Well as you would expect they are offering the beta free but state in their terms that it is currently restricted to 5000 API calls per key per day, and that in the future they will require partners to join their advertising network. Still this is an interesting and thought provoking approach. Will The Guardian be the big winner in this content provision approach? Will other broadsheet and tabloid papers follow suit? Time will tell.
Secondly, Google are rumored to be having talks with the major traditional print and content providers about providing preferential search ranking. These talks have been closed door and related to an article report in Advertising Age. To quote Daniel Sung who reported this in an opinion piece on TechDigest;
‘there was a report in Advertising Age this morning on the ranking of Google search results and how certain members of the old school, established and, essentially, print centred publishers are complaining because the fact that their pages don't come at the top is unfair. "You should not have a system," one content executive told AdAge, "where those who are essentially parasites off the true producers of content benefit disproportionately."’
Daniel’s full opinion piece can be found at TechDigest.tv and is linked here.
So the next few months may well see some significant changes in the way content is provided to us all as internet users. Will Google alter their approach and provide a premium content layer? If they do this could be one of the most significant changes in the way content is provided in the history of Google. Or will we see silos of high quality content and data made available for anyone’s site to consume along The Guardian model? I know which one I would prefer.
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Now ‘abuse’ may seem like a strong term to use but there are many recorded cases where malicious comments have been posted to web sites and blogs, often in breach of national laws. These offensive comments are normally addressed in a very fast and effective manner by site owners and administrators but without moderation the offensive comment has already been presented to the audience. The cases of these types of comment are thankfully rare, but the erroneous information error is far more prevalent.
As a simple example from earlier this year during President Obama's inauguration lunch, US Senators Ted Kennedy and Robert Byrd, presumably attending the lunch, were both taken ill. Shortly after the event Wikipedia entries reported that they were both dead. Since both have recovered and are still with us I think we can assume the information was incorrect. The changes were removed from Wikipedia within a few minutes of being posted. (Source www.techdigest.tv, 26-01-2009)
Another well publicised miss-reported health issue was Steve Job’s heart attack at the beginning of October 2008. The story was reported by a ‘citizen journalist’ on CNN’s un-moderated news site iReport (www.ireport.com). Within minutes of the story being posted significant speculation was on sites such as Twitter (www.twitter.com). Within an hour Apple were referring to the story as a fake.
These may seem like minor issues but as Adrian Kingsley-Hughes reported in his ZDNET blog, the Apple news saw a significant drop in Apple’s stock price and also lead to an investigation by the US Securities and Exchange Commission as to whether this was a deliberate attempt to force Apple’s stock down.
Now having read the example detailed above you may believe that we are strongly in favour of moderation of posts and comments in a Web 2.0 environment. Well we aren’t. Every case should be examined on its own merit but we must also look at the legal situations within the UK. A major global law firm with offices throughout the UK (Pinsent Masons) advises on their own website www.out-law.com about user generated content. To summarise their article:
The examples we have distilled above are from a much larger article available on Pinsent Masons’ Out-law website and we would strongly advise anyone looking to move into the area of user generated content to both read the full article, its associated articles and seek appropriate advise from their legal advisors.
Finally, do not expect all of the comments and feedback you receive via Web 2.0 to be positive. If people feel they have an issue with regard to a product or service they will seek out a forum to voice their concern. This should be seen as an opportunity to both respond to any genuine complaints or issues, and also to gain valuable feedback. Most people using the internet today have learnt to sift through the comments and feedback available to them, filtering the extreme ‘reviews’, both good and bad, to draw a balanced opinion. Any site where the only product or service comments are unqualified praise is easily seen through. And remember, allowing users to comment on a blog or participate in a forum is optional. You don’t have to do it.
What technologies could you utilise?
There are 3 primary technologies that companies initially consider when looking at their first involvement in WEB 2.0. Each provides a different and unique service and each has its own considerations.
Blogs
A blog is simply a reverse chronological list of items of interest, be these comment, details of events, product information or video and diary style entries. This article is a blog entry. A blog is typically maintained by an individual or a single organisation and often allows other to comment on the individual articles and items. Many blogs can also be consumed as Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feeds.
Discussion Forums
A discussion forum, or forum, is a series of threaded ‘conversations’ normally arranged into categories that keep common subjects together. Forums, by their very nature, have contributions from multiple users and are often used to discuss or support products and services. A contributing user will typically be required to register with an email address and some form of user name or screen name. Most forums go to some lengths to disassociate themselves with the submissions of their members to ensure that any legally questionable postings cannot be associated with the hosting body.
Wiki
A Wiki is a collection of interlinked web pages that allow a collaborative group to contribute and edit the content. A wiki provide a simplified mark-up language that means contributing users do not have to have a technical knowledge of HTML or web development. Possibly the most well known example of a wiki is Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org), however many organisations use wiki’s on intranets and extranets as support or knowledge management systems. The essential concepts of a wiki, as explained by its creator Ward Cunningham, are:
Many wiki sites do not require validation of the entries made by contributors but rely on peer review and 'self policing' to validate the accuracy its content.
Social Networking Service
A social networking service, or social network, is typically a service that focuses on building online communities with common interests and who wish to share and exchange experiences with likeminded individuals. Popular and well know social networking services include Facebook (http://www.facebook.com), MySpace (http://www.myspace.com) and Bebo (http://www.bebo.com), however many businesses have chosen to create specialised communities utilising social networking technologies. These communities may cover specific interests or groups and may be global or limited to a smaller geographic area. An example would be the American site MomSpace (http://www.momspace.com). These business sites are often funded by click based advertising specific to the interest group they represent.
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3 years ago we published a discussion document explaining the importance of content together with a suggested approach to take if creating your own - "Content - King of the Web" which we've re-published for download here. Three years on and the importance of content is even more relevant – the number of sites has increased as has user expectation.
One of the key improvements that well written content brings is a considerable increase in usability. In a study carried out by John Morkes and Jakob Nielsen and published on useit.com, it was found that by writing content in a concise, easy to scan and objective style, overall usability was improved by 124%.
One element we didn't discuss specifically then was that of forms. With 'self service' becoming even more important today, the formatting (in it's broadest sense) of forms has never been more critical and could (and probably should) be the subject of a discussion document of its own. In a nutshell these are:
I feel no shame in repeating key messages from that original document as it is even more important today: “If your site does not make it easy for visitors to find the up to date information, product or service that they are looking for, then you risk them simply not bothering and going elsewhere, remember your competitors are only a mouse click away!”
Despite considering ourselves to be experts in the field of web solution development, we continue to have mixed feelings about the issues involved in web site accessibility, and hence its delivery.
I should add that we do not agree with or condone discrimination, of either the negative or positive kind. In our mind an employer being legislatively forced to employ certain percentages of particular groups is as wrong as them not employing them because of their sex, religion, creed or any disability.
So what does the Disability Discrimination Act specifically say about website accessibility? The answer is nothing! In effect the Act only lays out the high level legislative elements.
Despite all the noise about website accessibility and how it is a “legal requirement” (primarily made by companies and organisations with a vested interest in it), Eurisko, in common with the RNIB are not aware of any cases that have been brought against service providers in the UK regarding inaccessible websites. This is despite the core legislation being in place since 1995 – normally more than long enough time for legislation to be tested in the courts!
A very interesting question surrounds that of community sites (Facebook, youtube, bebo etc) that rely heavily upon user generated content. Here the use of both age and regional related slang is widespread, as is the inclusion of images without ‘alt’ tags and videos without a text equivalent. Each of these breeches one or more of the accessibility ‘rules’ (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines: 14.1 Use the clearest and simplest language appropriate for a site's content; Checkpoint 1.1 Provide a text equivalent for every non-text element).
As most businesses would not (and should not) discriminate against clients or potential clients, we all need to consider web site accessibility. How and what you do to address it will be dependent upon a number of things including:
At the time of writing, there is no definitive answer as to how web site accessibility has to be addressed. This is in part to do with the fact that different companies, in different sectors and of different size, apparently, have different obligations to the law, based in part on whose interpretation you decide (or are advised) to listen to.
Basic accessibility measures, such as resizable text, good link identification, image ‘alt tags’ and good copy writing should have little or no budgetary impact if specified as a requirement at the time of designing and building a site. ‘Adding’ accessibility to an existing site or after the build phase has started will potentially be significantly more expensive.
The last words on this we think comes from Bert Massie CBE, the Chairman of the Disability Rights Commission. In his forward to the Code of Practice, Rights of Access document he says “. . . there is undoubtedly some ambiguity and there are some areas which will require testing in the courts. . .”.