How to Use Technical Content to Improve the Customer Experience

Technical content is often the most valuable content we have at our disposal, and the most underutilized. It gets relegated to FAQ sections of our websites and off-site help documentation wikis. In this session, I share how to leverage your existing technical content and turn it into a robust content funnel that can help you attract, land, and retain consumers who are hungry for this type of information.

Consumers are doing research on products and services more than ever before. The larger and more technical the purchase, the more research they’re going to do. When they go to search engines, social media, their email contacts, and other channels, your organization’s content needs to stand out. Your content needs to be front and center, not lost in a sea of content from competitors. When consumers start to engage with your organization, they need relevant, accurate content to make an informed buying decision. And finally, after purchasing from your organization, they need follow-up content that keeps your organization top-of-mind the next time they make a purchase.

They need support throughout the entire customer journey, in other words. And your organization’s technical content is one of the most valuable assets to them in their journey. Your technical content can tell them:

• During information gathering: the nitty-gritty specifications of your products and services so they know exactly what they’re getting
• During buying decisions: what differentiates your products and services from those of competitors
• During purchase: how you will take care of them as a customer—customer support is one of the #1 reasons people make a purchase, even over price
• After purchase: the types of decisions they need to make after purchase, such as how to get support packages, how to submit a support ticket, and how to get troubleshooting assistance

If your organization is not mining your technical content to fuel the customer journey, then you are losing a key opportunity to attract, retain, and support your customers. This session will introduce you to the ins and outs of leveraging your technical content through goal setting, inter-departmental collaboration, content auditing, content development, content delivery, and content management. You will be introduced to the core tasks essential to any content strategy that puts technical content at its center. You will leave the session with a variety of tools and best practices for assessing, managing, and delivering all the different types of technical content you are responsible for.