Colleen Jones’s book, Clout: the ART and SCIENCE of INFLUENTIAL WEB CONTENT, faces this problem from the outset. Right there on the cover it straddles the fence of condescension. Its subtitle invokes the renaissance and dares to use the word “influential”: Influence being the characteristic sought by all who write content for the web but never mentioned explicitly for fear of being judged manipulative.

In that way, Jones’s title teaches us the first lesson the book has to offer: Sometimes it’s better to be explicit than pretend to be something you’re not.

Inside the book, the lessons continue and it’s quickly evident that these are lessons for the less informed content creators. The reader is eased into the concept of content strategy. For the uninformed it’s an introduction while the informed are given some ready-formed arguments to help sell the idea of content strategy to those who need to buy it.

Jones’s book is a primer for content strategy, focussing more on creating content with a taste for the planning and analytics that go along with other parts of the strategy. She describes in appropriate detail why creating the right sort of content is difficult and how it’s a job that is never really finished.

Important for any introductory book, and successfully achieved by Jones, is informing the reader that there is still so much to learn before becoming an expert. Throughout Clout, she refers to the other leaders in content strategy like Ann Rockley, Kristina Halvorson and Erin Kissane, and she prescribes further reading into areas of marketing, planning, heuristics and analytics.

In Australia we’re particularly bad at explicit instruction. The title garnered some judgement amongst colleagues and judgemental looks on public transport. Our attitude is often “what could a book tell me about what I do?” The answer is: “A lot. Now, shut up and read.”

Clout puts the concept of content strategy into perspective for those who do it on a daily basis and those who are new to the idea. For those of us who work in the field, it serves as a reminder of what it is we’re trying to achieve and who to talk about it to those who have no idea.

I’ve played with Google Wave (OBM) and toyed with PBWorks. I tried wikis and intranets, I implemented networks and created complicated Excel spreadsheets. I have used at least five different time trackers and even more wireframing tools.

None of those things ever helped get the work completed quicker, more efficiently or better in any way.

I have largely learnt my lesson from this and mostly stick to the processes I know.

So, when a client recently asked me to create a software solution to a clearly inefficient business process I panicked and told them the first idea that came to mind. That idea was a complicated online spreadsheet and I am yet to implement it because I fear it’s just another distraction.

I’ve never found anything in web technologies as efficient or simple for managing workflow as a well-planned whiteboard.

My favourite whiteboard is the one in Homicide: Life on the Streets. It sits up on the wall in the homicide office and features the names of the detectives and the cases they’re working on. An unsolved case is written in red marker and when it is solved it’s rewritten in black.

Red and black. That’s all. It’s easy to look at the board and instantly see where everything is up to.

There are, however, two problems with a whiteboard:
1) It is, to an extent, transient. There’s no permanent or historical record to refer to.
2) There is no way for people to refer to it remotely. People might need to access the information while “on-site”.

These problems/requirements complicate the issue. It’s quite easy to have an elegantly simple solution to a simple problem but this is not a simple problem.

It’s a problem that many businesses face. The person who started the business has a lot of information in her head. She has also tracked jobs and written notes in a series of notebooks. It made perfect sense to her when the business was just her and her business partner but then her business grew. Over time more and more people needed to access that information.

I’ve worked for people who would ponder on a problem for a frustratingly long time. They would sit and reject idea after idea until they ran out of time to act. I’m often the opposite and I’ll jump on a solution, try it and then discard it a while later. Neither is good for business.

What I keep forgetting, though, is that the excellent whiteboard in Homicide probably wasn’t the first system they tried in that office filled with detectives. There must have been a time when the Baltimore police department didn’t have an elegantly simple solution for keeping score of investigations.

The key is to ask at every step, “Is this leading to a simpler way?” My client’s problem started as a simple process and was complicated over time. My job is not to make it more complicated.

To test it out I obtained a free copy of The Hound of the Baskervilles from the online store and started reading. I was an instant convert. I loved the experience and I loved the concept.

Until, that is , I found my way into Chapter 2 and there were vital passages missing from the text. It soiled my experience with the Kindle.

There are a number of lessons here. Obviously, there’s the whole caveat emptor, you get what you pay for scenario. A little bit of research would have shown me this review that tells me up-front what to expect:

This edition is missing certain passages… Whenever there is a point in the story where a character reads out of a newspaper or other document, that passage is missing from this Kindle edition. Spend a dollar and get a different version.

But the other lesson is more a question for thought. Why would Amazon keep the book in their store if it’s not what people are expecting? There is no obvious avenue to inform Amazon of the problem with the book and no way to ask them to remove the book so other people don’t fall into the same trap.

When building the user interface of an online store, there are many things to take into account. Feedback is vital for any business. Amazon and Zappos have built empires with great customer service but customer service is about a lot more than just an attentive complaints department or a good returns policy.

Great customer service starts with the user interface. It’s the experience a customer has when they browse or purchase a product. A bad UI is like having a rude salesperson on the shop floor. A customer should be able to trust that the seller is looking out for them. There should be a way to bring issues of faulty products to the attention of the sellers.

Sometimes there are use-cases that just aren’t foreseen. But when they reveal themselves it’s important for an online store to be able to adapt.

So there are things that Amazon could have implemented to make my experience better. A roll-over information box that showed me the start of the most helpful review, for example, could have given me the information I needed to make my decision to purchase or not.

These are the small design things; the small usability things that we try to develop every day.

Recently I designed some wireframes for an online store. It’s hard. I had to balance the client’s budget with the limited information I had, the inclusion and prioritisation of use-cases, and a degree of future-proofing to allow for unforeseen developments.

There is a lot of information to include in an online store. There are lots of buttons and lots of icons to demand a customer’s attention. It’s important to remember, however, that customers want something very simple: They want to buy stuff and for it to behave as expected. Give them that and the rest will follow.

The nature of email, of course, is communication.

I’ve worked with people who might have scanned the subject lines for something interesting but I could never rely on them having read an email I sent. Their inboxes became a communication void.

If I wanted them to read an email I had to send them an instant message or SMS to tell them I sent an email I wanted them to read. Other times I’d send the email and then print it out and put it on their desk. It was not a very efficient way to communicate.

It might take anywhere between 30-60 seconds to reply to an email.

Sometimes the reply might only require “Thanks” and then it takes even less time.

As part of my work with Boxcutters I often have a need to email US-based television publicists. It’s becoming an increasingly futile exercise. They never reply. I may as well shout my requests across the Pacific Ocean.

If they can’t help me, then I’d at least like a simple:

I’m sorry but we don’t deal with [Australians / Podcasts / People we've never heard of].

Or even the generic:

We can’t assist you with your request at this time.

An email that requires a lot of attention could be acknowledged really quickly with something like:

Thanks, I’ve flagged this to read later and I’ll let you know my thoughts within a week.

That says a lot. It says: “I know you’re telling me something you think is important but please understand that I’m busy and I can’t give it my full attention right now. I will read it and let you know what I think in my own time.”

This is called managing expectations in email. Email doesn’t need an instant response. A lot of email only needs a response at some stage that day. Some needs a response at some stage that week. Some doesn’t need any response at all.

You need to work out your own criteria for prioritising email but be one hundred percent sure that if someone has taken the time to write to you personally, they are hoping for some kind of reply or acknowledgement that you are paying attention.

Similarly, if you’re sending an email, maybe include a line about how soon you need a reply. It will help the other person formulate their response. And please, if something is really urgent, use the telephone.

Replying to email doesn’t take very long, doesn’t cost much but works wonders to strengthen relationships.