{"id":25722,"date":"2015-05-22T08:30:00","date_gmt":"2015-05-22T15:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/content26.com\/?p=25722"},"modified":"2017-02-21T13:51:10","modified_gmt":"2017-02-21T21:51:10","slug":"4-takeaways-from-the-answers-summit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/987654321.space\/c26_dev\/blog\/4-takeaways-from-the-answers-summit\/","title":{"rendered":"4 Takeaways from the Answers Summit"},"content":{"rendered":"

This past week I presented at the Answers Summit<\/a>, an industry event hosted by one of our strategic partners, Answers.com.<\/p>\n

In addition to being one of the most visited websites in the world, Answers is building out a comprehensive suite of cloud-based tools that that can help brands sell their products and services across their channels and better engage with their customers while doing so.<\/p>\n

Included in the Answers suite are Webcollage, a product-content\u00a0syndication platform that has over 750 million impressions a year; ForeSee, a multichannel analytics tool that aggregates data from more than 130 million customer surveys; and Reseller Ratings, a retail ratings and reviews platform that hosts over 4.1 million customer reviews.<\/p>\n

While much of the conference was devoted to the particulars of the Answers suite, the Summit attracted a wide array of industry leaders, companies, and organizations that shared insights into their content strategies. Below are my four takeaways from the conference.<\/p>\n

1: “True but Useless” Should Be in Everyone\u2019s Toolbelt<\/h2>\n

Chip Heath, who has authored several popular business books<\/a> with his brother Dan, opened the event with a keynote titled \u201cHow to Lead a Switch.\u201d Based on his latest book Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard<\/a><\/em>, Heath\u2019s basic premise was that by learning a few insights into the nature of individual and organizational transformation, we can all become the masters of our own change.<\/p>\n

One tool that I\u2019ll definitely add to my belt is Heath\u2019s concept of TBU, or “True but Useless”. It goes something like this: Because humans are generally hard-wired to focus on the negatives, we tend to look for data that highlights poor performance, inefficiencies, and so on. But while negative data may be true, it is often too overwhelming to take action on and is therefore useless to us as an agent of change.<\/p>\n

A far more effective way to effect change is to seek out the data that points to what Heath calls bright spots expand on them. A powerful illustration of TBU can be found in Heath\u2019s story of Jerry Sternin, an American who found great success in reducing malnutrition<\/a> in millions of Vietnamese children by finding bright spots at the village level.<\/p>\n

2: Good Content = Happier Customers<\/h2>\n

No matter how the presenters dressed it up, most of the data shared throughout the conference can be summed up in this basic equation: the better your content, the more engaged and happier your customers will be.<\/p>\n

3M, Adobe, Microsoft, and Mattel were just a few of the dozens of organizations that shared metrics pointing to the value of good content. In his introductory remarks, Don Morrison, Executive Vice President and General Manager of Answers Cloud Services, shared analytics from Webcollage showing that in addition to increased conversion rates, enhanced content (video and text) increased customer satisfaction by double digits.<\/p>\n

None of this was new to me, of course, but it was refreshing to be surrounded by a few hundred folks for a few days who understood the value of good content and who had the data to prove it.<\/p>\n

3: Our\u00a0Challenges to Selling Product Content Are Universal<\/h2>\n

In my presentation in the Content Publishing breakout session, I shared our company\u2019s challenges in selling our content services<\/a> to brands:<\/p>\n