The 5 R’s of Branding, by Jaci Russo
How do you get your brand viewed, and in the light you want to be seen?
“You can’t tell [your audience] how to feel!”
Genius Bar Unconference Introductions, led by Michelle Morris
We all have challenges in healthcare marketing we struggle with. Here are some of the key challenges people shared! Continue Reading
Creating Customer and Employee Engagement, by Gary Rhoads
“We are in the business of inspiration”
What do successful organizations do?
Some behavioral things have emotional connections – like being green. People feel strongly about it, even when they don’t do anything related to it. These things are “Goliaths.” Find a Goliath to slay, and it will connect people.
In the past few weeks, I’ve given talks on Behavior Change and on Mental Health. Take a look at the slides, below!
I worked on a recent project with very enthusiastic stakeholders. They were very hands on, and we had many long discussions to come to consensus and take in feedback. Plus, they loved the design recommendations, they were on board with the content strategy, and as a result they kept our team on as partners well into development. However, as development went on the implementation of our design didn’t quite match our expectations. Over time, larger and larger issues became apparent, and by the time the dev team was ready for launch, we designers and strategists were feeling disillusioned about the entire process.
What went wrong? Continue Reading
It’s been almost two years since Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Girls Write Now Awards Speech, and yet in the current political climate it’s getting some much-needed press. Today, I’m sharing it both because I think it’s a valuable lesson, and because I want to drive home an important point: the difference between a person and a brand.
Here’s a transcript of part of Adichie’s speech: Continue Reading
Tree testing and its related research activity, the card sort, are often the first research lines of defense for content strategists. We love seeing what people who might use a site or app think about terminology, hierarchy, and categorization. But sadly, I’ve been in many a research phase where we looked at the results and said “wait – was that a problem because we used the wrong words?” or “Did they put those together because of how we phrased them or what they associate with that term?” or even “You thought that card meant that? I always use that term for this… what were our participants using it to mean?”
This is the hidden danger in card sorting: confusing the search for terminology with the search for organization. Continue Reading
In the February 19th closing Broadway performance of Chicago, the female lead playing Roxie Hart broke character. Personally, I’ve seen actors break on occasion, due to a prop malfunction or an audience interruption. It’s not funny, the way it is when SNL cast members break – in fact, it upsets the context and fluidity of the show.
What made this moment unique is that it was pre-planned and purposeful. Mel B, the former Spice Girl playing Roxie Hart, stopped mid-scene to sing a line from the Spice Girl’s hit song Wannabe. The audience cheered, the show went on, and plenty of press and Broadway regulars weighed in. Most agreed that the break was unnecessary, unwarranted, and unprofessional.
There is no purpose to design. It’s a trick question, see, because design is a tool. It’s a process, an action. When we ask “what’s the purpose of design?” we might as well ask “what’s the purpose of creating?” The answer is tautological: the purpose of creating is to create.
But really, we’re not asking the right question. Continue Reading
“Triggered” might just be the word of the year. It’s showing up in political discussions, on college campuses, in relation to gender equality, rape culture, military history, suicidal fears, domestic abuse, racial slurs, sexual abuse, and the list goes on.
Generally speaking, we read it referred to for two reasons:
These responses seem to assume that triggers are static things that people are impacted by, or that they make up. But a trigger isn’t always a word or phrase that defies political correctness. It’s not always a joke in poor taste, or something said to shock. For content strategists working in healthcare, triggers are associations that impact patients’ ability to care for themselves. Continue Reading