Lean simply means creating more value for customers with fewer
resources.
It was originated and developed by the Toyota executive, TAIICHI OHNO
(1912-1990) for Lean manufacturing of automobiles. I am sure terms like Lean
Manufacturing, Lean Organisation, Lean Production, Lean Process does ring a
bell. You may be a pro and already using this in your organisation.
How about take a leap further and follow Lean in your day
to day content?
Using Lean methodology, we let our content and documentation talk a lot with very few
resources or in this case here text.
Can you imagine how much data are we creating
on daily basis? 2.5 quintillion bytes.
This would fill 10 million blue-ray discs, the
height of which stacked would measure the height of 4 Eiffel Towers on top of
one another.
How much of it actually creates value for the
customer or the target audience? Hmm tricky question!!
Life is busy, time is less. Customers don’t have
time to read several pages of your terms, reports or what you did last summer (pun
intended)!
This is the time for Lean transformation of your
content!
Think how you can provide the same information
with limited resources and limited text and minimising waste.
Here are some tips to streamline your content
and make it lean.
Focus
on audience: The audience of your content can be your customer or your stakeholders. Don’t
lose the focus on them. What they need to see should be mentioned first and clearly.
Clarity: Be clear of your
content and the information you wish to pass.
Prioritize: Identify the key
areas of your content that are the major takeaways for your customer and make
sure they are prioritized.
Curate: Don’t always try
to write your own content. Reuse what is available. Curate wherever possible.
It saves time also.
Story always win. Keep
storytelling in your mind while you create your content. Write your content as
if you are narrating a story. It is very important and will always help you to
engage your audience.
Fit: Your content
should be viewable on the single screen. If it is an email, there are higher
chances that most of the stakeholders will read it on their phone. People lose
interest if they have to scroll. Pass the most important message first.
Use appendix
or detail page for all kind of information that is not relevant to the
customer but important for further references or documentation purposes
In
Time, On Budget: Content writing should not eat away lot of your
resource time or your organisations budget.
Simple, clear and concise content. Don’t overcomplicate your content and make it
difficult to understand.
Stick to Basics:
Use short sentences, coma and full stops. Try to use bullet points and change
paragraphs when the context changes.
Make it pictorial
where ever possible and as much possible.
Your content must Intrigue your audience. Strive to write your content pretending you
are writing for clicks and make sure that your message is so compelling that
will force your customer click on it to know more and read more.
Put aside
your technical or Experiential ego
and dive in to writing lean content
Good Luck and have a great start towards your
Lean Content.
