UX Writing and the systematization of content
Making content demands having a goal. It is easy to see how the text assumes different functions depending on where it is applied and what effects it produces on the reader according to the path it is taking.
I have always seen text construction in a logical way. When I understood its intern dynamics, it got easier for me to play with its shapes. I really think that it was my connection with the technical aspect of content what inspired me to write for user experience.
Even before knowing what the term UX writing meant, I realized that when you work with digital products, paying attention to the text logic is very important. It needs to be aligned with the objective of the product, to follow its evolution, and mediate the relationship with the user.
UX writers have to be careful when building and maintaining this relationship. Our job has never been limited just to writing in a concise and clear way, it’s also understanding how to create a humanized interaction with our users, and how we’re going to do it depends on their needs.
Creating experiences requires not only empathy, but mainly study and tests, which will guide your work and provide insights to make it more systematic. Yes, systematic.
Just like in the Design System, it’s also possible to structure and group the content in a methodical way. It makes the communication more consistent, brings to the product a unique voice, an identity, makes your work faster and gives autonomy to other people to write and apply the content without negatively impacting the quality.
Ok, and how can we systematize the product content?
I’ll summarize what I usually do and what you can also apply to create a content strategy at your company in a few steps.
1. Looking at the macro scenario
If the product already exists, it’s nice to start analyzing what has already been done in a macro way. This is going to give you a dimension of the work you’ll have forward and an idea of which are the inconsistencies in your product. At this step, it is nice to observe:
- How/if the voice and tone are been used.
- If the product has different ways to approach the same things and if it feels like you are navigating between different products.
- Which are the critical points when it comes to content.
- If there is a variation of formality in the speech.
Among many other things that will appear at this stage and will be very important to give you ideas and lead you to what will come next.
2. Establishing best practices
There are some practices that sometimes are left out. Some of them are related to accessibility, consistency in speech, information hierarchy etc., and others will depend exclusively on the product’s proposal.
The important thing is that, when you know your product and its users, you can establish some standards to guide the content. Here are some aspects which you can observe at this point:
- Maintain textual parallelism when the topics have the same purpose. Example: if there are two similar cards with related goals at the landing page, why do you start one title with a verb and the other with a noun? Why are you using different verb tenses? Standardize the speech.
- Create information hierarchy
Put the most important piece of information first and the complementary ones after. - Give the users a direction
It’s important to give your user the right instructions so they know what they need to do. Avoid speaking too vaguely if something goes wrong or leaving users with no alternatives.
3. Grouping concepts
Your product may have a brand with a concept, a voice tone, and proper strategies. When you understand which concepts are these , you can turn them into important strategic elements.
Example: If the brand voice and tone is positive and fun, how can you adapt your text to look like this? Ok, and how it fits into your product? In which moments it can or must be reinforced to make your product’s purpose even more clear?
By mapping these moments, it is easier to define the next steps and organize the content.
4. Mapping problems
This is an essential step: mapping the main problems and checking the metrics to understand which have been the pain points of the product to then figure out how the content can solve some of these cases.
As digital products are usually divided into distinct parts, it’s also possible to categorize some of these problems using the same logic. Doing that you can create specific solutions for each case:
Find the problem, make the analysis, create a hypothesis based on metrics, and categorize it.
Example:
- Problem: Buttons without standards.
- Analysis: The texts aren’t clear, some of them start with verbs and others with nouns. Some of them don’t give the users a clear and objective instruction, others are too big etc.
- Hypothesis: Buttons which start with verbs have a better performance in the cases of conversion and sales.
- Main category: Buttons
- Subcategory: Conversion and sales
After this, you’re ready to test your hypothesis.
5. Separate components and other items.
Just like in Design System, we can also systematize content in categories. At this phase, we select banners, buttons, links, lists, modals, input-text, alerts, etc. They enable us to understand what we can standardize and then structure the content.
You can organize a document with all these categories to have a clear visualization and find inconsistencies. In practice, it is difficult to standardize everything to the point that the content became “copy and paste”, but, in some situations that follow the same logic, yes, it can be done to craft more consistent experiences.
6. Structure options
Once everything is organized, it’s time to plan your content. You’ll be based on the analyzed metrics to see what went right in the product in the past few months to make your first content decisions. It's obvious that it’s always better to think out of the box, but these results will help you to understand the probabilities and innovate with conscience.
7. Implementing, analyzing impact and confirming hypotheses.
When the writings are structured systematically, it’s possible to prioritize implementation and conduct tests to validate how they impact the users and the product. You can implement and test while you are choosing new content, streamlining the process, and, in case you have to reconsider something (and you probably will have to), you didn’t lose time waiting until everything to be finished.
8. Finally, creating standards
After all these studies and organization, you’ll finally find relevant standards to craft a consistent and improved communication, with a better performance. From there, you can start to create a communication guide and let it disposable to other designers to apply the texts in a quicker and simpler way, making the processes of your company faster than it was.
Gabriel Soares has graduated in Fine Arts from the Universidade Federal Rural do Rio de Janeiro. He currently works as a Graphic Designer and Illustrator. You can check his work on Instagram:@gabit.h.
