Find breakthrough content solutions
that work for stakeholders, users and you!

1-day course: 4 June 2018,
Sadler’s Wells Theatre, London
Learn to find common goals with your stakeholders and create content solutions that everyone buys into

Save £200! Register by 3 Apr.

When stakeholders push back on your content recommendations, you don’t need to cringe. When they share opinions and anecdotes, insist on using jargon, or appear to ignore the data, resist the temptation to argue your case. Objections are opportunities: they show that stakeholders care about content and want to be involved in making it effective. All it takes to move from conflict to productive dialogue is to change how you hear feedback. What if your stakeholders aren’t trying to undermine you, but instead want to work with you to find content solutions that meet user needs?

In this 1-day course Jonathan Kahn will show you how to reframe objections as opportunities to collaborate with your stakeholders. Learn how to:

  • use contextual research techniques to discover user needs with your stakeholders
  • use pair writing to create content that meets the needs you discovered
  • integrate your stakeholders’ perspectives by agreeing shared content principles and creating content that satisfies them

Save £200! Register by 3 Apr.

Find inspiration, practise techniques, network with peers

Practise techniques like pair writing and user research

Customise your learning for your specific context and challenges

Meet fellow content professionals over lunch and coffee

Testimonials from past events

“An invaluable way to learn more about collaboration within content strategy. We learned how to overcome barriers to change and how to share the same perspective with our stakeholders.”Stephanie Hubbard, Brilliant Noise (read Stephanie’s writeup)

“The agenda was set up to meet my concerns over stakeholder relationships and how to create convincing content. I have already raved to my colleagues and hopefully some of them can attend next year.”Alison Jacobs, Tesco

“A well paced, interactive and informative day. I now have simple tools and techniques I can use to collaborate with stakeholders which I believe will genuinely help.” Janey Crichton, NHS Health Scotland

“It was grounded in the day-to-day experiences of people who work with web content. The friendly and lighthearted tone of the day made it easy to try things out, learn and meet new people.”Liz Whyte, Citizens Advice

“Very relevant for a multiple stakeholder large organisation.” Simon Peters, Transport for London

“It was brilliant to get time off the day job and really think about our content needs and how to fulfil them.” Sarah Hunter, Financial Conduct Authority

“I would definitely recommend this event to other content editors and writers. It was informative, fun and challenging. I was surrounded by like-minded people and felt comfortable speaking to new people.” Louise Skinner, Christian Aid

“Engaging and enjoyable. I came away with a lot of new techniques that I wish to implement in my current role.”Joshua Evans, The Stroke Association

Save £200! Register by 3 Apr.

1–day course (4 June)

Standard cost: £500 + VAT.
Special offer: £300 + VAT if you register by 3 Apr.

Note: these prices are for online payment by credit/debit card.

The course runs 9am–5pm and includes refreshments and lunch.

Register now

Refunds and transfers

We accept cancellations up to 60 days before the event: we’ll refund your registration minus a 20% cancellation fee. Fewer than 60 days before the event we won’t refund your registration.

Note: we don’t allow transfers. Please make sure that you can attend before you register.

Training for your organisation

For groups of 10 or more, we can lead training inside your organisation. Sessions can either follow our 1-day course syllabus or focus on techniques like pair writing or finding shared content principles. We can also run sessions at conferences or team retreats.

If you’d like to arrange training for your organisation, get in touch.

Videos from the 2018 conference

Find breakthrough content solutions that everyone buys into

Jonathan Kahn, Together London

Do you encounter objections about content from stakeholders or subject matter experts? Would you like to learn collaboration techniques that can resolve differences of perspective about content? In this session you’ll learn:

  • why stakeholders resist evidence-based arguments and appeal to emotion, opinion, or politics
  • how to reframe objections as requirements and create a shared understanding of all the constraints around a content problem
  • how to create content solutions that satisfy stakeholders and work for users without giving up your values

Designing a content operating model for government

Trisha Doyle, Government Digital Service

GOV.UK, the single website for the UK government, has changed the way people interact with government online. This success has brought new content challenges, including a dispersed network of publishers with different approaches to digital. How can we build collaborative relationships after disruptive digital change? In this session you’ll learn:

  • strategies for creating a unified model for content across a complex organisation
  • how to create a “digital content culture” in a traditional organisation
  • tactics to encourage collaboration

How to launch editorial experiments to connect with new audiences online

Steve Wilson-Beales, Global

For many organisations, digital-first publishing doesn’t sit well with existing processes. So instead of trying to revolutionise your approach to content, why not run experiments instead? In this session you’ll learn:

  • how to take risks with content in order to learn from both success and failure
  • strategies to get stakeholders to buy into pilot projects that test new content formats
  • tips to speed up your learning process using social media

Using data to collaborate with experts on user-centred content

Claudia Knowles, Breast Cancer Care

BECCA is a mobile app that supports women after breast cancer treatment. To develop content for the app, the digital team collaborates with clinical specialists, front-line staff, internal stakeholders, and the users themselves. In this session you’ll learn:

  • how to use data analytics to show stakeholders which content is most useful to users
  • strategies to encourage experts to collaborate on content that meets user needs
  • tips for sourcing content ideas from users

Supporting non-writers to write effective content

Beth Aitman, Improbable

How can you make a large amount of content work for users when you don’t have the resources to write and maintain it yourself? One solution is to support writers to create user-focused content themselves. In this session you’ll learn how to:

  • explain the principles of user-focused content in way that resonates with authors
  • find common goals with authors so that they hear your suggestions and feedback in a constructive way
  • make decisions together about what content to write (and what not to write) based on a shared understanding of user needs

Improving content standards through communities of practice

Lynne Roberts, Home Office Digital

We can’t make authors follow content standards, but we can encourage them to choose to. One strategy is to build a content community, which creates cooperation across silos, a sense of shared mission, and more effective content. In this session you’ll learn how to:

  • build a community of practice for content creators, whether you work in a large or small organisation
  • make content more effective for users by engaging with your content community instead of enforcing standards
  • influence content standards when you have no formal authority over the people who create the content

Thanks to our sponsor
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