What did you read or watch that surprised, delighted or disappointed you? Why?
Module 3 was a milestone. Information from the previous modules fell into place. The acronym ROT was delightful. But the term “personas” was disappointing.
ROT
ROT is any redundant, outdated, or trivial content. It’s a satisfying, clever, and clear acronym. Interestingly, whenever I’ve read about ROT, including when my client referred to ROT, a caveat quickly follows: webpages with low hits aren’t necessarily ROT.
The caveat suggests we liken infrequent traffic to ROT, but a particular article’s topic could be niche, or the problem it addresses is rare. The caveat also suggests how difficult striving for clear, plain language can be because we often impose extraneous meanings onto words: We mistake “heavy traffic” pages as greater importance rather than greater commonality. Similarly, we equivocate “low traffic” with insignificance. ROT.
I tell my students, Synonyms don’t exist. Imagine you’re sitting on a park bench. Somebody sees you. No big deal, right? But if that somebody starts watching you? Observing you? Studying you? Gazing, or even staring at you?
You get the idea. Those words are synonymous with “seeing,” but each evokes different emotions and, as a result, elicits a different reaction.
ROT’s beauty is its simplicity. ROT’s challenge is our knee-jerk capacity to mistake adjacent meaning with actual meaning. Using plain language poses a threefold challenge:
- Plain language requires us to understand our clients straightforwardly. We cannot communicate clearly if we misunderstand our client.
- Once we understand our clients, plain language requires us to interpret their prompts straightforwardly.
- Plain language requires us to write straightforwardly. Writing simply is not synonymous with writing easily. Precision is eliminating unnecessary words or details. We must read our writing from another’s POV so that, to the best of our ability, we avoid using imprecise words that could mislead our readers.
Personas
The term “personas” seems trivial. I read Land’s chapter on personas after she referenced it in Chapter 8.
In ordinary language, a “persona” signifies a personality. You can have a public and a private persona. The two can be radically different. An extreme example would be David Bowie’s personas, such as Ziggy Stardust or Aladdin Sane.
Problematically, Land uses the term interchangeably with a familiar term: “target audience.”
I accept the need to write inclusive, accessible language, and imagining a particular reader helps achieve that goal. But “personas” requires significant explanation for proper use, and it does not seem to add value beyond “target audience.”
Ultimately, my aversion to “personas” is a strong opinion loosely held. I’m willing to be wrong, and I’m open to changing my mind, but I am curious if “personas” is unnecessary jargon.
What was most meaningful for your own career goals? Why?
For me, the most significant aspect of this module for my career goals was the five qualities of content performance.
As a content consumer, I may have a sense of findability, usability, accessibility, and brand voice, but I tend to notice these qualities only when they function inefficiently. Being frustrated by poor performance qualities has altered how I engage with particular content or a specific site. Sometimes, it has made me disengage with a site altogether.
Becoming aware of these elements as a consumer also assists me as a content strategist. As strategists, we investigate the efficacy of these four qualities, and key performance indicators (KPIs) support: whether the content is reaching the appropriate audience, whether that audience is engaging with it, and whether that engagement results in conversions.
Ultimately, the most meaningful element for my career goals was learning to categorize content performance qualities that I am going to investigate in my own content audits. Content with excellent performance qualities may or may not draw conscious attention from a user, but I am hopeful it will result in higher conversions and stronger brand loyalty.