Planning - Purposes, Personas, Conversations - Chapter 2

Aug 27, 2026

Uploaded by Quinn

Chapter 2 focuses on planning effective content by defining purposes, understanding personas, and shaping the conversations users need to have with a website. It emphasizes starting at every content level with three core questions: why, who, and what the conversation is. The chapter explains turning general goals into specific, action-oriented statements, aligning design and writing with user needs, and treating usability and plain language as ways to reduce interpretation gaps. It also outlines four steps to gather data, segment audiences, identify characteristics, and infer the conversations users want to initiate.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages20

Reading Time50 min

AccessFree to download

Planning: Purposes, Personas, Conversations

Why? Know what you want to achieve

Focus on what you want site visitors to do

Be specific

Think of SEO

Think of universal usability

Know your purposes for everything you write

Who? What’s the conversation?

Understanding users through data and personas

Planning: Purposes, Personas, Conversations 2 Successful writers don’t start by writing. They plan before they write (and they plan while they write and through all their revisions) . At every level and for every piece of content (entire site, web page, mobile app or site, social media message, blog article), start by asking yourself: • Why? • Who? • What’s the conversation? Your site = you = one side of the conversation. You have to know what you want that conversation to accomplish. Your site visitor = the other side of the conversation. To have successful conversations with your site visitors, you must understand them and what they need and want. Why? Know what you want to achieve You may want to make money, reduce phone calls, increase phone calls, have people be able to access the site wherever they are and whenever they want, or have people come to your site before any others for your topic. Planning is part of developing a content strategy. See Interlude 1 right after this chapter. You might call what I’m covering here your creative brief. Letting Go of the Words. DOI: 10.1016/B978-0-12-385930-3.00002-9 © 2012 Redish and Associates, Published by Elsevier, Inc. All rights reserved. 18 Chapter 2 • Planning: Purposes, Personas, Conversations As you state your goals, • focus on what you want your site visitors to do • be specific Focus on what you want your site visitors to do To meet your goals for the site, you must help site visitors have successful experiences . Put your goals in terms of what your site visitors should do . A few examples of what I mean: We want to sell a lot of shoes. We want people to buy shoes from us. We want to give out a lot of information on this topic. We want to answer people’s questions about this topic. We want to increase subscriptions. We want site visitors to feel so engaged with us that they subscribe. The differences here may seem subtle . But the shift of focus will help you change from only thinking about what you have to say to thinking about how to have successful conversations with your site visitors . Be specific When asked to explain why they are putting up a web site or specific web content, most people speak in generalities: to inform, to persuade, to educate. That’s fine as a start. But it’s not enough to help you select the right content or to organize and write that content so it engages and satisfies your site visitors. Be specific. Fill in this sentence: I’m writing this so that (who?) (can do what?) . Kenneth W. Davis gives us a good example in the blog post I’ve included as Figure 2-1. Who? What’s the conversation? 19 Figure 2-1 Being specific about your purpose helps you write well. [www.manageyourwriting.com](www.manageyourwriting.com) (Nov. 21, 2011) Think of SEO For most sites, coming up high in search engine results is very important. You probably want to have it on your list of purposes: We want people to find us easily in organic (not paid for) search results. Think of universal usability A~~A~~CACE~~A~~SS MaIt skhinogulyoud alr sitwayes worbe orofayllosuiepvuspiorsses:is goWebntusevi neessryon. eto be able to use our site easily. Know your purposes for everything you write You will have overall purposes for your site or app or blog. You will have even more specific purposes for each part of the site, for each piece of content, for each blog article, for each part of a mobile app, for each social media message. Always ask: What do I want to happen because I wrote this? Who? What’s the conversation? A web site needs visitors. If no one comes to your site, all the effort you took to design and write it is for naught. 20 Chapter 2 • Planning: Purposes, Personas, Conversations A web site is successful only if site visitors can • find what they need • understand what they find • act appropriately on that understanding • do all that in the time and effort that they are

FAQs

How do you start planning content for a website?

Start by asking why, who, and what the conversation is at every content level. Define what the site needs to accomplish and what visitors should be able to do.

Why should goals be written in terms of visitor actions?

Action-oriented, specific goals help shift thinking from only what you want to say to how to enable successful conversations. This improves content selection, organization, and engagement.

What is the four-step process to understand site visitors in the chapter?

Gather information, list groups, list major characteristics for each group, and understand the conversations they want to start. The steps are meant to be revisited as needed.

Aug 27, 2026

Uploaded by Quinn