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Being more attentive to inclusion is helping Julie Copley and her colleagues at Pop improve their clients’ websites.
Julia Copley is a connections strategist at POP, a Seattle-based digital agency. She helps clients prepare for the future and incorporate emerging technology to their existing portfolios. Previous clients include Microsoft, Adobe, eBay, The Home Depot, and BMW’s ReachNow.
Video
Here’s the video version of our conversation:
Transcript
This current version is not a word-for-word transcript, just my raw notes from my first listen-through of our conversation.
0:48 “connections strategist” – evolution to this title was natural growth over 18 months at Pop – began as content strategist working on a project for Adobe – started as straightforward content strategy – quickly clear that she brought a broader perspective
2:15 Adobe product line launch – agency “quick hit” success – competitive analysis of market – how to improve
3:15 context of project in bigger Adobe site – how new product diverged from existing Adobe content
4:20 UX background – and product designer – “connections” as defined at Pop is another layer on top of those – she’s a liberal arts major and generalist – has always been a generalist
6:10 reference to Jared Spool’s “unicorn” talk in Seattle several years ago – importance of being a generalist but also specializing in a content strategy/UX role
7:20 understanding in aggregate who your personas are – where to find them – where client’s target audience fits in client’s goals – way she works as connections strategist: do the research, build out a channel connections plan, put it in market, test it
9:00 inclusion in product design, how to improve inclusivity in persona development and product design: 0. have the mindset that you are not the baseline; your customer is 1. ongoing challenge of building more inclusive personas – industry as whole figuring it out – how to make life easier/products better – often building for C-suite/Director level folks – how to leverage that learning to reach more people – we’re tech savvy early adopters, able to navigate better with this tech – Di Dang and she trying to raise idea that early adopters are just one part of the market [here’s a slide [[[ demographics slide Julia Copley SIC ]]] from her SIC talk deck that shows some of this data]
Boomers, e.g., big market but can’t reach them as you would early adopters
14:30 client work iterating on targeted demo – validate assumptions: are personas based on validated data? – e.g., recent project on luxury brand used Audience View tool [link – account required to use tool] to show to client new customer opportunities that they might want to go after – e.g. folks who not normally luxury targets but have one-time luxury event
17:45 building institutional capability of broadened awareness – “demographics are destiny” – indeed much of life set by your generation – Millennials – Gen Z – et al
19:45 demographic axes – awareness of different dimensions – slow change in racial diversity generationally – one or two percentage points per generation – but more of a mentality of expecting diversity in younger generations – social media influence on this dynamic – feels weird when you don’t see diversity represented
22:50 personas in web product development – aim for fewer than 5 – can be aware of more but gotta prioritize – 3 is pretty standard in her experience – different message for each demo and in each channel – Facebook, etc.
24:20 tailoring messages for different media channel – and these messages as a content type – don’t write too early – brand look, feel, and voice first and then write the tailored messages – ID who folks are, where they hang out, what are their assumptions, and then align with brand position – ALL of this in place before you write the user-facing content
26:15 campaign work vs branding work – they do both at Pop – bread and butter is in building websites – Hulu sites – how to take experience they’ve created and connect with audience
27:40 content management for clients – work with clients – sometimes make recommendations and hand off, other times do whole thing: strategy, planning, messaging matrix (for each channel) – and then track metrics
29:00 metrics & reporting – campaign tracking – varies by client – no proprietary tools at Pop – use tools that client prefers – Google campaign builder tool – track with Google analytics, ID trends across tracking mechanisms
31:00 how do you measure branding – she’s working on a piece about “Are We Measuring the Right Things” – everything now is about measuring attention – most current KPIs are around this – she’s not convinced that’s best serving her customers – we’re all fighting for that finite amount of attention that everyone has now – her personal reading stack is ten books deep!
32:45 wonders if “in aggregate that by putting out all of this great content if we are not collectively doing harm to our audience. We are sapping their attention, and they only have so much of it, and we want to give them good stuff, but all of us bombarding them with attention and beeping and notifications and metrics – I think that we are under-serving them and actually doing not-good things for them. I don’t know what we should be tracking instead, but I’m concerned that we are driving against something that is not good for them.”
34:15 – wrap-up: think about having awareness that there are groups that are historically underserved that would love to be on the receiving end of your talent and your skill and your marketing – and business case – since they’ve been underserved, those groups have more attention – benefits both biz and users
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