Parlez-vous Content Strategy?
Rachel Lovinger December 1, 2009
Riding the Content Strategy Wave: not nearly as dangerous as you might think. (Image via fishfoot)
Mesdames et messieurs, allons à Paris !
Earlier this year, the Content Strategy community put a stake in the ground at the IA Summit’s Content Strategy Consortium, which – as far as I know – was the first ever official meeting of a sizable group of content strategy professionals from a wide range of companies and organizations. This coming April, CS has will have its large-scale International debut.
Content Strategy Forum 2010 is a 2-day conference that’s been organized by STC France and STC TransAlpine. The schedule is packed with professionals who are practicing Content Strategy in France, Ireland, England, Canada & the United States. Workshops will take place on the first day – including one on Content Analysis that I’m co-leading with Karen McGrane of Bond Art + Science. The main conference day includes keynotes by Rahel Anne Bailie (Intentional Design, Inc.) and Kristina Halvorson (Brain Traffic; author of Content Strategy for the Web) and enough enticing talks that attendees are bound to have trouble choosing (check out the whole program for details).
The hosts are European chapters of the Society for Technical Communication, a professional organization for people who are involved with communicating information about technical processes. It’s a fairly broad discipline that incorporates many research, analysis and communication practices, and has a lot in common with Content Strategy. The intended audience for the conference is “anyone who develops, manages, or delivers content within their own organization or for their clients: user experience designers, information architects, business analysts, technical writers, web project managers, documentation managers, translators, web marketers, practicing content strategists, and those looking to break into the field.”
2009 has been a breakout year for Content Strategy, and this conference heralds some major steps forward in 2010: sharing methodologies and perspectives with another content-oriented discipline; expanding the CS community beyond the US/English-speaking Web; and introducing more delicious, delicious pastries. I hope to see you there!
I’ve been agonising over this for weeks now, but you’ve twisted my arm. I have no idea where I’m going to find the money (converting South African Rands to Euros is just plain scary), but your post pushed me to finally enter my credit card details and click the big BOOK NOW button. I’ll make it happen somehow, even if I have to sell my cats into slavery.
Content strategy is almost unheard of here in SA, which is incredibly exciting and slightly daunting at the same time. I’m so looking forward to meeting and learning from people who’ve already been down this road. See you in Paris. :)
Kerry-Anne, Thanks for your comments. And I’m so glad I helped convince you. This means there will be Content Strategy practitioners from at least three continents there!
I would love, love, love to make this conference. It looks to have the perfect content for me in my current and emerging roles at my org.
Convincing my dept. to send me is another matter, though. Fingers crossed that I’ll be there in April, attending CS sessions and mangling spoken French once again. :)