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Separating the Users from the Brand: Editorial Brand Experience Without Strategy

Workshop scheduled at 8:30-11:30 in Room 1 (Johnson)

We strive to learn from organizations such as MailChimp and Slack, who seamlessly combine editorial brand personality with exceptional user experience. But we experience many more examples of popups and call-to-actions trying to be cheeky while alienating users with forced and offensive choices such as “No, I prefer to pay full price” or “No, I’ll just wing it.”

When what you want to be is in contrast with users, everyone suffers. Learn how to bridge the gap with a strong content strategy that begins with user experience to build an editorial brand that leaves all delighted.

In this workshop we’ll work to identify top user tasks. With this information, build a usable persona based on tasks and motivations and complete a user journey. Finally, exercises such as cardsorts will allow development of a rough message architecture.

Learning Outcomes:

You’ll walk away from this workshop with:

  • Identify user tasks and goals through user research.
  • Prioritize user journeys to highlight key editorial needs.
  • Find common ground between user needs and brand desires.
  • Develop a content strategy to lead editorial brand development.

Attendee skill level: Best for intermediate skill levels. Those who have been attempting to advocate for the user with stakeholders already. Beginners are welcome, but it is recommended that they have some basic familiarity with the terms used in the descriptions as the workshop will be move rather quickly.

Attendees do not need to have previously performed any of the tasks listed in the description.

Presented By

Amy Grace Wells

Amy Grace is a content strategist and user experience researcher with more than decade of experience “making rainbows and herding cats” in higher ed, publishing, and nonprofit. She is currently pursuing a Master’s degree in user experience design from Kent State University. Her experiences include at University of South Carolina, where she served as the first content strategist, and Texas A&M AgriLife, where she directed content strategy, information architecture, and social media for the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and five state agencies. She served as an expert reviewer for “Content Strategy for WordPress,” published in 2015. Bragging rights include holding a sensei rank in karate and singing happy birthday to Muhammad Ali.

Follow @amygracewells on Twitter