Scott Abel presented a short review of the past 20 years — and provided a brief overview of the Fourth Industrial Revolution — with an eye toward explaining the need for content strategists to find ways to leverage their skills to help the organizations they serve become information-enabled.

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Strategic interventionist coach, Andrew Lawless, explored how forward-thinking leaders are leveraging a scientifically-proven team performance framework that produces results and unity. Discover how to build a frictionless, high-performing collaborative team.

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Rahel Anne Bailie introduced the audience to the emerging practice known as content operations (ContentOps). In this opening keynote presentation, she covered some of the high-level principles that make this an exciting development for content professionals across the board.

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Robert Mills explored lessons learned from several different organizations that have invested in ContentOps. Attendees learned what improvements these organizations are making, why, and how.

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Catherine Lyman discussed how the team at MapR Data Technologies expanded a simple feedback system into an automated process, saving the writers and the manager time. By adding integration tools to a ‘human’ process, the MapR team radically reduced the effort required to manage feedback that they get from their users and got an easy way to generate customer analytics in the process. 

Download the slides.

Pushpinder Lubana explored how PayPal measures the quality and effectiveness of content globally in a standardized, consistent, and repeatable way. She lays out how the company developed content metrics — based on customer feedback — and how these quantitative measures of content quality have helped PayPal determine whether their content is meeting their declared goals. 

Download the slides.

Experience designer Colin Eagan discussed content personalization — asking is it realistic (or even desirable)? In this highly practical talk, Eagan focused on the ever-expanding role of content strategy in ethical personalization design, including technology selection, user data models, editorial considerations, and the "infinite content problem."

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Val Swisher challenged the audience to understand what it means to transform content and she shared concrete steps you can take to begin preparing content for digital transformation.

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Blaine Kyllo shared how a regional government utility company transformed an aging, cluttered information repository into a sleek, modern knowledge center, and how shaving seconds from phone calls is saving the government hundreds of thousands of dollars each year.

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Ben Colborn shares how Nutanix applied terminology and taxonomy guidelines to help the company better deliver consistent customer content experiences. 

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To drive success, today’s content strategists and content marketers must work together to design a superlative “content experience” with assets that are integrated and orchestrated, supporting and enhancing the customer journey at each step. Karla Spormann works to demystify this exciting new arena of content experience.

Download the slides.

Sarah A. Rice examined ethics (in the context of content strategy). She posed questions of the audience and suggested ways attendees can discuss a code of ethics to be applied widely among content teams, including contexts and formats that may not have been considered before.

Download the slides.

Screen readers are assistive devices that convert text content displayed on a computer screen into a form that visually-impaired consumers can process.. Vince Abbate and Carrie Farber examine screen reader content — the good, the bad, and the ugly — and share several good practices you can put into place to ensure your content is accessible.

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Charles Cooper helped the audience spot natural departmental allies and provided tips on how to convince them to work together with you to make your content strategy projects successful. Cooper also offers advice on how to spot naysayers (and other problematic players) and provided a few tricks to help you convert those who oppose the project and turn them into allies.

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Rob Hanna explored the need to develop information-enabled organizations that are capable, by design, of deploying intelligent microcontent in a manner that enables consumption and reintegration across different business functions in the enterprise. 

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Most business content is more forgettable than it is memorable. Attend this session with Dr. Carmen Simon to learn the science behind what it takes to keep your audiences’ brains engaged and likely to recall your message.

Mindfulness coach Janet Fouts discussed the need for a kinder, more compassionate approach to content creation that focuses on the needs of the customer. Fouts shared how adopting a thoughtful approach to content strategy can help you turn prospects into loyal customers and brand evangelists.

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Alexa K. Apallas shared why writing clear, concise microcontent is so important. In this case study, Apallas showed how PayPal learned to use limited space to communicate clearly and enhance customer experience.

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Lisa Gettings taught attendees how to put customer journeys, personas, user scenarios, empathy exercises, and content mapping to work.

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In this case study presentation, Glenn Lafollette and DJ Francis discussed why commercial real estate giant Jones Lang LaSalle determined that they needed content governance, the steps they took to establish it, and the role that content governance plays in the organization today. 

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In this presentation, product content and design strategist, Tracy Ulin, examined the challenges of executing content strategies and without becoming part of the problem. Because when a content strategist deeply understands the organizations they serve, they get better at the business of executing on content strategy.

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Michael Haggerty-Villa led a discussion with a panel of content design strategists on how to turn style guides into useful tools for design team collaboration. The panel explored better practices for sharing style guides, discussed ways to integrate them into design systems with visual and interaction guidelines and helped the audience think through how their efforts will be impacted by chatbots, artificial intelligence, and machine learning.

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Workday's Simone Ehrlich shared a new approach, a riff on content first, in which designers and product teams consider the user’s information needs throughout the design process. Ehrl;ich shared how designing with words can help you shape or improve your product or project.

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Robin Boldt shares ideas you can borrow from the content teams at Rockwell Automation and apply them to your organization in an effort to overcome content challenges, improve content quality and usability, and develop a successful content strategy.

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Rich Schwerin led a discussion with a panel of three SEO experts on how organic search is evolving and what every content strategist should know to stay current. The panel explored the past, present, and future of search, debunking some long-held myths, with an eye on where search is heading next. Panelists included Benu Aggarwal of Milestone, Michelle Robbins of Aimclear, LLC, and Towa Ghosh of VMWare.

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Danielle Kirkwood shared how she discovered how her approach to content strategy killed her career as a content strategist. She shared lessons learned and suggestions for moving content strategy forward in your organization.

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Mark Walsh, founder of Motional AI, a platform for transforming chatbots and voice assistants into warm, charming, and visual animated characters, shared essential tricks to defining a persona for your bot, voice, or visual assistant. Walsh shared insights into writing for conversation, and how to design a voice and a visual that makes consumers feel understanding, respect, and even love for, your brand.

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Featured presenter, Colleen Jones, will help you understand what these insights mean for content roles ranging from writer to strategist to engineer to manager. (Hint: You might need shades. The future is bright.)

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Val Swisher took a look at the role that words play in our ability to understand others, and how we can better understand each other by being open to, acknowledging, and using different vocabularies.

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Michelle Savage explored how the PayPal Content Team rethought their hiring strategy, experimented with hiring and training approaches that helped them find a slew of new writers, and brought magical new energy and ideas to their entire team in the bargain. 

Download the slides.

Given that content jobs lack standards around naming conventions and skills sets, it's a wonder that we manage to match people to jobs at all. As the content landscape evolves, content strategy maven Rahel Anne Bailie argued that we need to keep in mind that our roles keep changing within it. 

Download the slides.

Shibi Sudhakaran and Paul Pardi examined the content infrastructure in place at PayPal, from content creation to delivery. Discover how PayPal is developing the capability to deliver Content-as-a-Service (CaaS)  to distribute personalized content to users across a variety of channels.

Download the slides.

In this aspirational closing keynote presentation, content leadership coach, Andrea Ames shared best practices for getting the most out of any situation, including practical advice designed to help you clearly demonstrate the value of content to business leaders and customers alike.

Download the slides.

Strategic interventionist coach, Andrew Lawless, explored how forward-thinking leaders are leveraging a scientifically-proven team performance framework that produces results and unity. Discover how to build a frictionless, high-performing collaborative team.

Download the slides.

Catherine Lyman discussed how the team at MapR Data Technologies expanded a simple feedback system into an automated process, saving the writers and the manager time. By adding integration tools to a ‘human’ process, the MapR team radically reduced the effort required to manage feedback that they get from their users and got an easy way to generate customer analytics in the process. 

Download the slides.

Pushpinder Lubana explored how PayPal measures the quality and effectiveness of content globally in a standardized, consistent, and repeatable way. She lays out how the company developed content metrics — based on customer feedback — and how these quantitative measures of content quality have helped PayPal determine whether their content is meeting their declared goals. 

Download the slides.

Blaine Kyllo shared how a regional government utility company transformed an aging, cluttered information repository into a sleek, modern knowledge center, and how shaving seconds from phone calls is saving the government hundreds of thousands of dollars each year.

Download the slides.

To drive success, today’s content strategists and content marketers must work together to design a superlative “content experience” with assets that are integrated and orchestrated, supporting and enhancing the customer journey at each step. Karla Spormann works to demystify this exciting new arena of content experience.

Download the slides.

Sarah A. Rice examined ethics (in the context of content strategy). She posed questions of the audience and suggested ways attendees can discuss a code of ethics to be applied widely among content teams, including contexts and formats that may not have been considered before.

Download the slides.

Rob Hanna explored the need to develop information-enabled organizations that are capable, by design, of deploying intelligent microcontent in a manner that enables consumption and reintegration across different business functions in the enterprise. 

Download the slides.

Alexa K. Apallas shared why writing clear, concise microcontent is so important. In this case study, Apallas showed how PayPal learned to use limited space to communicate clearly and enhance customer experience.

Download the slides.

In this case study presentation, Glenn Lafollette and DJ Francis discussed why commercial real estate giant Jones Lang LaSalle determined that they needed content governance, the steps they took to establish it, and the role that content governance plays in the organization today. 

Download the slides.

In this presentation, product content and design strategist, Tracy Ulin, examined the challenges of executing content strategies and without becoming part of the problem. Because when a content strategist deeply understands the organizations they serve, they get better at the business of executing on content strategy.

Download the slides.

Rich Schwerin led a discussion with a panel of three SEO experts on how organic search is evolving and what every content strategist should know to stay current. The panel explored the past, present, and future of search, debunking some long-held myths, with an eye on where search is heading next. Panelists included Benu Aggarwal of Milestone, Michelle Robbins of Aimclear, LLC, and Towa Ghosh of VMWare.

Download the slides.

Mark Walsh, founder of Motional AI, a platform for transforming chatbots and voice assistants into warm, charming, and visual animated characters, shared essential tricks to defining a persona for your bot, voice, or visual assistant. Walsh shared insights into writing for conversation, and how to design a voice and a visual that makes consumers feel understanding, respect, and even love for, your brand.

Download the slides.

Val Swisher took a look at the role that words play in our ability to understand others, and how we can better understand each other by being open to, acknowledging, and using different vocabularies.

Download the slides.

Michelle Savage explored how the PayPal Content Team rethought their hiring strategy, experimented with hiring and training approaches that helped them find a slew of new writers, and brought magical new energy and ideas to their entire team in the bargain. 

Download the slides.

Given that content jobs lack standards around naming conventions and skills sets, it's a wonder that we manage to match people to jobs at all. As the content landscape evolves, content strategy maven Rahel Anne Bailie argued that we need to keep in mind that our roles keep changing within it. 

Download the slides.

Shibi Sudhakaran and Paul Pardi examined the content infrastructure in place at PayPal, from content creation to delivery. Discover how PayPal is developing the capability to deliver Content-as-a-Service (CaaS)  to distribute personalized content to users across a variety of channels.

Download the slides.

In this aspirational closing keynote presentation, content leadership coach, Andrea Ames shared best practices for getting the most out of any situation, including practical advice designed to help you clearly demonstrate the value of content to business leaders and customers alike.

Download the slides.