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Background
The growth of personalization in Web commerce and syndicated content is
changing our conception of audience from a fuzzy mass to a series of
distinct individuals. Back when we were busy creating a book or a help
system, we often started with a rather vague description of a fairly
unified group of users, with one or two subsets. But now that a Web site
can interrogate each visitor and retain personal profiles using cookies
and database records, we are surrounded with one-to-one marketing,
individual wish lists, personally selected interfaces, and individual
content delivered by services with names such as, yes, Individual. The
mass audience, appropriate (even inevitable) for a book or a single help
system, is disintegrating into thousands of individuals, with a myriad of
roles, goals, tastes, tasks, and preferences [2,
14-16, 20, 21,
26-29, 31,
34].
Accustomed to personalization on the Web, our users want to locate only
the answers to particular questions. These consumers do not like to read.
They reject books, dislike help systems, and, in fact, refuse to use these
large document-like blocks of data. They insist that we tailor the
information to them, on the fly.
Using content management systems that rely on object-oriented databases,
we are transforming our old books into sets of discrete objects, some as
small as glossary terms or product numbers, some bite size (procedure
steps), others more filling (a whole procedure, the reference for a
command). Exploding our legacy documents into distinct objects makes them
easier to re-use in multiple circumstances (several different Web pages)
and display formats (Web pages, cell phones, PDAs), customizing content
for whatever device the recipient is using.
We also offer multiple menus leading to the same information objects,
because on the Web we do not have to follow the tradition of books and
help systems, which tend to provide a single main table of contents. On
the Web, convention and the ease of linking allow a company to offer not
just one, but half a dozen menus, so a user can find information in which
ever context he or she prefers. Looking up information on troubleshooting
a particular hard disk, for instance, one user might conceive of the
information as living under Computers, Peripherals, Hard Disks, Product
Lines, Product Number. But another user could find the same information
following the menu chain starting with What You Want to Do, through Store
my Files, to Electronic Storage, down to Hard Disks, Product Lines, and
Product Number. Through multiple menus, each offering a different
perspective on (more or less) the same set of objects, users can pick the
browse paths they feel most comfortable with, and therefore increase the
likelihood of success. They find the paths that mean most to them,
personally.
By tagging the objects with XML we also allow users to decide exactly
which parts of our documentation they want to look at, which parts they
want to leave in icon form for use as needed, and which parts they want to
hide. For instance, an engineer might ask to see the functional
definition, syntax diagram, parameters, and an example for each command
reference, iconizing more rarely used information with buttons that would
pop up information on prerequisites, processing algorithms, status, and
shortcuts, while refusing our offer of information on error messages and
menu locations, as unnecessary. Another user might want the error messages
displayed, while hiding the example, and iconizing the menu locations.
Because the XML tags identify each element in these terms, we can, through
software, allow users to pick and choose the elements they want
automatically displayed, turned into buttons, or kept out of sight.
Essentially, we can allow users to build their own documentation, defining
the layout and content they want, and we draw the pieces out of the
underlying database, as needed [12, 18,
19, 23-25].
Increasingly, users email us with questions. The writers who must answer
these messages look up the answers in the database, pick the most relevant
response, and drop it into the reply. Instead of writing books, the writer
is answering mail, but instead of having to draft a new e-mail message for
every correspondent, the writer draws on previously created objects, to
expand the replies.
Similarly, writers who are assigned to participate in user discussion
boards must often look up a few facts, copy the text, and post that as
part of the ongoing thread. Having access to previously written chunks,
not just entire chapters, increases the speed with which these writers can
get back to the user. In effect, the writers are acting like clerks in a
mail room, selecting this, that, and the other object to drop into the
envelope, and send off.
From the user's point of view, these messages, whether in regular email or
discussion boards, address the unique problem, without any other jabber.
Personalization, here, means getting the relevant answer fast, rather than
saying "Read the fine manual."
Furthermore, by defining attributes for these objects (subject, products
mentioned, natural language used, type of documentation, date) we afford
users the opportunity to make much more subtle and personal searches for
the information they seek. Advanced searches like those in Amazon allow
people to avoid the twin devils of too many hits, and too few. In a large
database, then, each user has a much better chance of getting search
results that correspond to his or her personal wishes.
As technical communicators, then, we are being driven to adopt an
object-oriented approach to our information, using vocabularies developed
in XML, so that our users can find just what they want, quickly, view it
in exactly the layout they want, or get the information directly from one
of our people, who picks the right info object and pops into the reply. We
are also beginning to investigate content management, customer relation
management, and syndication software, the tools that are most need by
technical communicators, in this new role as conversationalist. In all of
these ways we are edging toward a world in which we personalize the
communication, moving from a publishing model (we make books, you read
them) to a conversational model, in which we respond to questions from our
users, as quickly and adroitly as we can, tailoring our responses to their
personalities, concerns, and tasks.
Dangers for your user
Danger #1: Customizing means stereotyping, which can often lead to
mistakes.
Once we have identified a person as part of a niche market, we follow
business rules that tell us what content to emphasize, but we may
inadvertently leave out, de-emphasize, or hide content that this
particular person wants. In this way, customization may conflict with true
personalization, and with our desire to offer all our information to
everyone, even if it is not thrust in their faces upon arrival.
Solution: Remind people that you have lots of other content. Put icons on
their home page, suggesting they click and go to that content. Pop up
messages once a month pointing out some relevant content that is not
directly accessible from their home page.
If we ask a lot of questions on the personal profile, but do not make use
of the answers to pinpoint the content we should deliver, we frustrate the
person who spent ten or fifteen minutes filling out the form. They feel
insulted each time they come to their personal home page. "This isn't me."
Solution: Identify content types or topics that might be relevant, and
advertise all those on the person's home page. Build better business rules
to take advantage of the personal information you have been given.
If we do not ask enough questions, we may drop the person into the wrong
category, offering irrelevant content. "Why are they bothering me with
this stuff?"
Solution: Interview your users, as JoAnn Hackos and Ginny Redish suggest
in User and Task Analysis [13], then build much more subtle profiling
forms. Work out correspondences between a personal fact and the relevant
content. Build those into business rules, so you can deliver that content
automatically.
Danger #2: Allowing a person to pick and choose content may mean some
content gets lost, for that person.
People forget that they chose the content being offered to them. They
forget that there were other choices they could have made; they do not
know what else you have to offer them. Having chosen not to display
reference manuals, they may then come to believe you do not have any.
Solution: Periodic reminders of other content you think might be relevant,
and invitations to look at the full range of content, including stuff you
believe is irrelevant.
People grow and change. The content that someone chose six months ago no
longer may no longer apply to their job.
Solution: On every section of their portal, urge people to edit the
content. Put an Edit button in the title of each grouping. Make change
convenient.
Danger # 3: Your organization may violate the user's trust
You may be completely trustworthy, yourself, but your organization may
decide to sell the user's personal information to unscrupulous spammers,
or fail to protect it from hackers [1, 3-5,
8-11, 17, 22,
30, 32].
Solution: Campaign for real privacy. Offer to rewrite the privacy policy
in plain English, then insist that the company follows it. Speak up in
protest when marketing starts keying popup ads to the profiles. Become a
new kind of user advocate.
Dangers for you
Danger #4: Identifying several niche audiences means writing more.
You may not have to rewrite every information object for each audience,
but you do have to tailor some passages for individual audiences.
Solution: Rewrite text that is sensitive to audience goals and roles-
introductions, overviews, lists of features and benefits, concepts. Come
up with several different menu paths, one for each group. Identify the top
priority objects for each audience, and revise those to target the group,
with appropriate examples, references, goal statements, problem
statements, suggested content.
Danger #4: Updating the database, creating group
content, and answering customer e-mail means that you are getting
personal, and becoming a Subject Matter Expert (SME).
Your idea of your role as a writer must change. You have been a neutral
but helpful authority so far. Now you must become an individual, with
unique characteristics-yourself.
Solution: Build a collection of boilerplate answers to e-mail questions.
But start each e-mail with phrases borrowed from the user's message (not
whole paragraphs) to prove you have actually read it. Then drop in the
boilerplate message. End with something personal. This means coming up
with an e-mail persona, hobbies, interests, content you are willing to
reveal about yourself. Oh, and your actual name, e-mail address, and, if
you are really bold, a phone number. Wow, that changes your relationship,
doesn't it?
Even if you do not have to answer e-mail, you are becoming a subject
matter expert, rather than a creator of books, or a maker of Help systems.
You no longer turn out finite documents, tangible things. You simply
learn, and respond to questions, implied or real, derived from e-mail,
discussion lists, or your own chats in the hall. You enter the process,
but give up turning out products. You join a conversation.
Danger #6: Your idea of your audience must change.
You can no longer settle for vague generalities like "beginning user." The
pieties of audience analysis go out the window.
Solution: You must keep thinking: what content can I come up with for this
particular group? You may have to characterize niche audiences as
personas, in Alan Cooper's sense-with a real name, car, goal, work
environment, and photo [6, 7].
Danger #7: Your idea of your work must change.
You can no longer hope that a single large document will address the needs
of several different audiences, somewhere.
Solution: For each object you create, you must consider which
audiences it is a top priority, so that it is brought to their attention.
You'll identify those audiences in the object's attribute for something
like Priority Audiences.
As you write, adapt your tone to their ear, put in examples that make
sense to them, mention goals they identify with, solve their problems.
Now, of course, you are in danger of proliferating objects. Instead of
single sourcing, your group may be on the verge of proliferating, and, in
the process, becoming identified with one or two favorite audiences.
Danger #8: You must be evaluated on new criteria.
A manager can no longer evaluate a writer on document delivery and
deadlines. You can't be judged o whether you got out half a dozen manuals
on time in the last quarter, or met with the standards committee
regularly, or kept your nose clean, during the recent layoffs.
Solution: Managers must develop new criteria, based on your new role as IT
Subject Matter Experts ("It's me!"). How many objects of interest to each
group have you updated? How many new topics did you create, for each
group? What efforts have you made to learn more about your subject-and
your groups? Oddly, your value increases as you become more human-not just
a repository of wisdom, but a participant in the community of users. You
should get a raise when the discussion group asks you to become the
moderator.
Conclusion
Customization and personalization, together, challenge our traditional
notions of audience, structure, and process. Exciting in many ways, these
trends also threaten our equilibrium, and demand a new way of writing,
working, and relating to our users. We are being drawn into a more equal
exchange, making communication more like conversation than publishing.
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