Ready to overhaul your website, CMS, everything—or just tear out your hair about how your organization appears online? Treasure Coast Hospice, one of the largest nonprofit hospice and palliative care providers in the country, needed their website to better communicate services, reach donors, and engage volunteers. But they first needed to ask: What do we really need to communicate? What content is working well, and why? Sit in on a conversation between Michael Hallinan, Treasure Coast Hospice’s web strategist, and Margot Bloomstein, their content strategy consultant, as they recount how they developed a message architecture of the organization’s communication goals, conducted an all-hands-on-deck content audit to understand the value of their existing content, and then collaborated with a development team to build a “content first” website—all on a timeline and budget that can scale to the needs of any nonprofit organization. Presented together at Confab for Nonprofits, #confabnp, in Chicago on June 16, 2014

1. GETTING THE CONTENT RIGHT:
HOW CLIENTS & CONSULTANTS
SUCCEED TOGETHER
Margot Bloomstein
@mbloomstein
Michael Hallinan
@rmhallinan
Confab for Nonprofits
June 16, 2014
#ConfabNP

2. this could be you. Client, or
content strategist, at the
mercy of the waves!
The Gust, or A Ship in High Seas Caught by a Squall
Willem van de Velde, 1707

3. heaven!
And that’s where our story
begins

4. Suddenly,
there was a ray
of light, sent
from heaven…
The Storm on the Sea of Galilee,
Rembrandt, 1633

5. …an
cont
• inc
• con
bud
• “we
• dec
scoA French Ship and Barbary Pirates,
Aert Anthonisz, 1615

6. A French Ship and Barbary Pirates,
Aert Anthonisz, 1615
This isn’t sustainable for
anyone:
we abandon campaigns,
shift priorities,
blow out the timeline, and
cannibalize our budgets.

7. You know the story.

8. At the mercy
of the waves…

9. We needed a better way.

10. Our rudder:
the message
architecture gave
us a POV to help
us steer into
changing winds
We offer reliable patient care with empowering
guidance and support thanks to both efficient
internal systems and deep roots in the
community—strengths that enable us to shape
the industry.
TCH offers reliable, empowering clinical patient
care.
• Professional and focused
• Comprehensive and diverse in staff and
services
• Approachable and accessible
Internal delivery mechanisms allow TCH to scale
and operate like a well-oiled machine, offering
appropriate skills, staff, and services—but still
offer the sensitivity and relevance of a premium,
community-based healthcare partner.
• Large enough to be efficient but small enough
to be welcoming
• Detail oriented and tactically smart;
systematized but customer-oriented
TCH is an industry-driving thought leader.
• Visionary and pioneering in hospice services,
palliative care, and patient and caregiver
support
• Innovative and technically savvy

11. I hear what you’re saying.
These are the goals we’re all
working to accomplish.
Remember, we agreed on
this strategy and direction.

12. <image from cardsorting>

13. Content audit

14. Content audit
What do we need?

15. Content audit
What do we have?

16. Content audit
Is it current? relevant?

17. Content audit
Is it appropriate for our goals?

18. Content audit
Q: How do we pace for emotion?

19. Content audit
A: see our content model

20. Visual & verbal
emotional hook1
Service response2
What to expect3
Call to action3
Abstract anxiety
Concrete action

21. Content first,
to drive content
types and their
hierarchy

22. We righted the ship.
Our message is consistent,
content types are sustainable,
we didn’t waste budget or
effort chasing the wind, and
content and design anticipate
the future.

23. Why is this important?

24. Content is time travel:
Moves audience from one place,
belief, habit to another
Persuasion of professional
communicators
CONTENT IS TIME TRAVEL

25. © 2014 Treasure Coast Hospice and Appropriate, Inc.
THANK YOU
Margot Bloomstein
@mbloomstein
margot@appropriateinc.com
Michael Hallinan
@rmhallinan
mhallinan@tchospice.org
MORE:
slideshare.net/mbloomstein
amzn.to/CSatWork