Web 2.0 is an emotional world and users rely on each other rather than technical documentation for help with products and applications. The reason for this is another user is more likely to share empathy and to mirror or at least understand any emotions the user might have. Sites like Facebook, Trip Advisor and Amazon's product rating feature allow users to vent and to swap stories. Users are more likely to ask their friends how to use something rather than bother looking for the online help files published by the manufacturer.
Therefore, in order to bring traditional online help back from the brink, technical writers need to enable an emotional component.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Winter Puts on Her Lipstick
Early Fall in Nebraska is a fleeting friendship
Is it going to be nice out one more time, no more times?
I'm not going out there, it's just a trick.
There might be wind or rain or humidity
It could be hot or bitterly cold (in the same day)
There's probably something up in the air right now
It's deceptive - the changing leaves, the sunny skies, there's a quiet in the trees.
A quiet that is restless, that wants out, to open up and hurl its innards upon us.
It sits out there waiting, for a fall picnic, a football game, putting on its lipstick.
I don't trust it, this fleeting friendship - I know it's just a mask, a costume, a cover up.
Oh how I want to plan one more day of yardwork, a trip downtown, an outdoor shopping mall cornucopia.
But I don't dare because it is waiting
It wants to ruin our plans
A Nebraskan
Is it going to be nice out one more time, no more times?
I'm not going out there, it's just a trick.
There might be wind or rain or humidity
It could be hot or bitterly cold (in the same day)
There's probably something up in the air right now
It's deceptive - the changing leaves, the sunny skies, there's a quiet in the trees.
A quiet that is restless, that wants out, to open up and hurl its innards upon us.
It sits out there waiting, for a fall picnic, a football game, putting on its lipstick.
I don't trust it, this fleeting friendship - I know it's just a mask, a costume, a cover up.
Oh how I want to plan one more day of yardwork, a trip downtown, an outdoor shopping mall cornucopia.
But I don't dare because it is waiting
It wants to ruin our plans
A Nebraskan
Sunday, October 10, 2010
more questions keep coming up - when a user posts something about a product...
When a user posts something about a product, are they really making an indirect inquiry with that company? And do they expect a response?
Communicating lean WITH CUSTOMERS
This article "presents the variety of options available for the mode of communication to customers, including oral communications as the popular mode, written communication, and physical communication."
Reason why this article is valuable to my research: Even though this article is about selling process improvement, it brings up several key points:
- "you cannot overlook the responsibility of accurate and timely communication with customers"
- customers believe the worst when they haven't heard anything back
- (so maybe when they don't hear anything back, they go to other users and complain, maybe the entire user community is made up of consumer emotion, maybe technical writers are really psychologists)
- communication "provides direction" including instruction and training
- "the inquiry aspect of communication includes determing the extent of customer knowledge, customer attitudes, customer beliefs and importance to the customer" "It also includes questions offered by your customer to you."
(Does this mean questions posted in blogs, forums, and social media outlets including Twitter? If so, we can refer to user-authored content as the inquiry aspect of communication?)
(When a user posts something about a product are they really making an indirect inquiry?)
Revelle, Jack B. 2010. "Communicating lean WITH CUSTOMERS." Industrial Engineer: IE 42, no. 8: 40-44. Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed October 10, 2010).
Subject Terms:
*LEAN manufacturing
*PRODUCTION control
*COMMUNICATION in management
*MANUFACTURING processes
*CONSUMERS
*CONSUMER satisfaction
*ORAL communication
*CUSTOMER services
*MANAGEMENT
*AWARENESS
SERVICES for
SOCIAL aspects
Reason why this article is valuable to my research: Even though this article is about selling process improvement, it brings up several key points:
- "you cannot overlook the responsibility of accurate and timely communication with customers"
- customers believe the worst when they haven't heard anything back
- (so maybe when they don't hear anything back, they go to other users and complain, maybe the entire user community is made up of consumer emotion, maybe technical writers are really psychologists)
- communication "provides direction" including instruction and training
- "the inquiry aspect of communication includes determing the extent of customer knowledge, customer attitudes, customer beliefs and importance to the customer" "It also includes questions offered by your customer to you."
(Does this mean questions posted in blogs, forums, and social media outlets including Twitter? If so, we can refer to user-authored content as the inquiry aspect of communication?)
(When a user posts something about a product are they really making an indirect inquiry?)
Revelle, Jack B. 2010. "Communicating lean WITH CUSTOMERS." Industrial Engineer: IE 42, no. 8: 40-44. Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed October 10, 2010).
*LEAN manufacturing
*PRODUCTION control
*COMMUNICATION in management
*MANUFACTURING processes
*CONSUMERS
*CONSUMER satisfaction
*ORAL communication
*CUSTOMER services
*MANAGEMENT
*AWARENESS
SERVICES for
SOCIAL aspects
Using User-Authored Content to make Better Products
In researching "Trends in Online Help" I found "Trends in Technical Communication" (Brandon, Magnuson, Hoeppner, Melsted, a 2000 STC Conference Proceeding presentation)
The authors claim that "the best products are created and developed when the user is involved in the project."
Perhaps technical writers should compile information from user-authored content to help engineers make products better. This sounds like an entirely different research project than the one I am after. I am researching how technical writers could manage user-authored content. But now I am thinking that user-authored content could be used to make products better.
The authors claim that "the best products are created and developed when the user is involved in the project."
Perhaps technical writers should compile information from user-authored content to help engineers make products better. This sounds like an entirely different research project than the one I am after. I am researching how technical writers could manage user-authored content. But now I am thinking that user-authored content could be used to make products better.
"online help" Twitter Search
On October 10, 2010, I searched twitter for "online help". Here are some of the results relevant to my research on user-authored online help:
Note: Since tweets are public, I am posting the entire twitter message including the user's name:
DylanReeve: Evaluating @GoogleApps at work, but unusual email setup makes it difficult - online help useless, and impossible to actually talk to anyone!
mpmselenic: Great new feature from the #Mercurial sprint: online help in hg serve (http://www.selenic.com/hg/help) (this tweet was re-tweeted several times)
cruzDINERO: This is #twitter , nawt yhur online help center
delicious50: Using default views in your module | Views online help http://bit.ly/a7McEV
IndiansInParis: If you are in doubt about your written French, get reference and online help from French lexicon and grammar site. http://bit.ly/orthonet
Note: Since tweets are public, I am posting the entire twitter message including the user's name:
DylanReeve: Evaluating @GoogleApps at work, but unusual email setup makes it difficult - online help useless, and impossible to actually talk to anyone!
mpmselenic: Great new feature from the #Mercurial sprint: online help in hg serve (http://www.selenic.com/hg/help) (this tweet was re-tweeted several times)
cruzDINERO: This is #twitter , nawt yhur online help center
delicious50: Using default views in your module | Views online help http://bit.ly/a7McEV
IndiansInParis: If you are in doubt about your written French, get reference and online help from French lexicon and grammar site. http://bit.ly/orthonet
Saturday, October 9, 2010
The acceptance of blogs: using a customer experiential value perspective
Ching-Jui, Keng, and Ting Hui-Ying. 2009. "The acceptance of blogs: using a customer experiential value perspective." Internet Research 19, no. 5: 479-495. Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed October 9, 2010).
Uses interesting search terms:
Subject Terms:
*BLOGS
*ELECTRONIC documents
*INTERPERSONAL communication
*SOCIAL ethics
*ONLINE information services
*INTERNET users
*MATHEMATICAL models
*EMPIRICAL research
*CONSUMERS
Why do I want to research this article?
Because "this paper aims to examine emotional experiences that internet users gain while reading blogs..."
If internet users are gaining emotional experiences while reading blogs then perhaps that is a motivator for seeking online help from a blog as opposed to the corporate documentation or company product manual.
If this is true and users are seeking out an emotional experience online, then there must be something unemotional about corporate and company product documentation. There must be something lacking in the way of personal experiences and emotional experiences.
How do we as technical writers incorporate emotional experiences into online help to draw in readers?
This paper's findings includes "empirical results demonstrates that: interpersonal interaction enhances browsers, aesthetic experiences as well as playfulness; machine interaction generates high aesthetics value which comprises visual and entertainment effects, service excellence, and CROI; perceived similarity by readers positively influences the four components of customer experiential value:..."
Uses interesting search terms:
*ELECTRONIC documents
*INTERPERSONAL communication
*SOCIAL ethics
*ONLINE information services
*INTERNET users
*MATHEMATICAL models
*EMPIRICAL research
*CONSUMERS
Why do I want to research this article?
Because "this paper aims to examine emotional experiences that internet users gain while reading blogs..."
If internet users are gaining emotional experiences while reading blogs then perhaps that is a motivator for seeking online help from a blog as opposed to the corporate documentation or company product manual.
If this is true and users are seeking out an emotional experience online, then there must be something unemotional about corporate and company product documentation. There must be something lacking in the way of personal experiences and emotional experiences.
How do we as technical writers incorporate emotional experiences into online help to draw in readers?
This paper's findings includes "empirical results demonstrates that: interpersonal interaction enhances browsers, aesthetic experiences as well as playfulness; machine interaction generates high aesthetics value which comprises visual and entertainment effects, service excellence, and CROI; perceived similarity by readers positively influences the four components of customer experiential value:..."
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