Marketing communication (marcomm) and technical communication (techcomm) are two different worlds, generally with different tools and a different focus. Technical writers are sometimes asked to synchronize their content with that produced by the marketing department or to provide technical content lite for the marketing folks. Usually, it ends badly.
In Connecting the XML and web CMS mindsets, Sarah O'keefe from Scriptorium examines how to bring these two worlds closer together.
Good news: The technical problem of integrating marketing and technical content has been solved.
Bad news: The hard work is just starting.
The design-focused marcom perspective and the structure-focused techcomm perspective need to co-exist and co-create.
For online content, technical content and marketing content have typically used two different publishing stacks. Marketing content uses a web CMS of some sort. The emphasis is on creating the best possible experience for the site visitors, so that the visitor will buy the product or at least think kindly of the organization.
Technical content has a different publishing stack, which is normally built for efficiency. It emphasizes consistency, structure, scalability, and automated channel delivery.
But today, we have the ability to push technical content into the marketing delivery channels, such as the web CMS. Both Adobe and SDL let you integrate their web CMSs and their XML CMSs, and there are other possibilities. So now, the web CMS/marketing professionals are designing for technical content delivery. And there is friction at this interface.
Here’s some of what I’m seeing as a result.
I've known Sarah since very early in my technical writing career. She knows what she's talking about.
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