We discuss background issues, how three sets of numbers (cost cutting, efficiency, and growth) were identified as a business target, and how they made their CCMS decision based on specific KPI they tracked. We’ll discuss how they got to where they stand now (2 years later) and what comes next.

1. Case Study: Diversify
Your Content Ecosystem

2. About your speaker
07:45@aschwanden4stc
2
 Bernard Aschwanden
 Past President of
www.stc.org
 Founded Publishing
Smarter
 Helps teams make the
case that content is the
key business asset with a
focus on how content
makes or breaks a
relationship

3. Official outline says:
07:45@aschwanden4stc
3
 Sales. Marketing. Training. Technical
Communications.
 They all generate content to drive revenue, so why
do they work in different silos?
 There is just one customer at the end of the day
 If you build business value through shared content it
reduces costs, time to market, and internal
bottlenecks.
 Manage what you say, how you say it, and when it’s
said to increase both the top line and the bottom line
in business.

4. But what does it all mean?
07:45@aschwanden4stc
4
 Thinking about how you create, manage, and
distribute content within and across your
organization
 This case study explores how one company came to
the realization that their staff could work more
efficiently together, serve the customer better, and
do so with a solid return on their investment
 Done by diversification of content across silos,
sharing between the traditional “tech docs” and the
“marketing” side of the business (and growing this to
sales, support, etc.)

5. This case study session explores:
07:45@aschwanden4stc
5
 Costs a business faced
 How they justified their migration to a CCMS through
expanded content generation and distribution
 Some results they have seen
(reduced costs, increased revenue)
 WARNING: There is a LOT of content, so track slide
numbers, then watch the recording later and skip to
the key areas. Don’t try to record all the details and
numbers!

6. Considerations on Diversification
07:45@aschwanden4stc
6
 Content must be clarified, simplified, reused
 Equally important is tracking/sharing costs
 Done through planning, content strategy, migration, and
training,
 Costs are cut by sharing content, but it’s just one
part
 Docs can reduce costs, generate revenue, and
improve the business top AND bottom lines!

7. Diversified content helps a business
modernize
07:45@aschwanden4stc
7
 Control and manage content sources
 Optimize teams
 Get to know who owns the content
 It’s not sales
 It’s not marketing
 It’s not legal
 It’s also not tech comm
 Content is a core business asset, owned by the
corporation and should be used as such

8. @aschwanden4stc 07:45
8
Let’s Talk Content

9. Content is cross-departmental and cross-
functional
07:45@aschwanden4stc
9
 Content spans
departments and
shouldn’t live in silos
 Content serves a broad
range of functions,
internally and externally.
 It is interacted with by
many different users with
different needs

10. Departments and comments on safety info
07:45@aschwanden4stc
10
Product
Management
Product safety information must be documented correctly everywhere it’s used.
Writers If we clarify this in one place where else is there an impact?
Regulatory Let’s ensure we show how our safety information shows regulatory compliance.
Training Let’s add safety information to the tutorials we use in the classroom.
Support Our step-by-step details are now on video; let’s share it!
Marketing We need self-directed steps and procedures clients can follow to ensure safe
operations.
Legal We have to be compliant with all safety laws.
Translation Let us know when safety content is updated so we can deliver in Japanese,
Spanish, Mandarin, Arabic, Russian, French, German, Portuguese…
Social Our safety info saved a customer’s eyesight. Let’s share her story with the world!
Clients I only care about getting what I need, right now, and in the format that I want…
Oh, and all safety related information better be current, accurate, and in the
right place.

11. Can your business answer these content
questions?
07:45@aschwanden4stc
11
 Where is the most current version
 Who has permission to change it?
 How many languages is it in?
 How are all the translations managed?
 How do you inform staff or clients when it changes?
 How is it integrated in your training (both internal and
external)?
 What is the financial impact if someone is injured due to
outdated or incorrect information?
 How often is it replicated (and now outdated) to your
print or online platforms?
Try to answers these questions about all your content.
Tough at best, right?

12. Content reuse beyond copy and paste
07:45@aschwanden4stc
12
Setup
Guide
Parts
list
Product Setup
Optionalsetup
Product Safety
Information
• Standards and Regulations
• Chemical Safety
• Personal Protective
Equipment (PPE)
Training
Manual
Welcome
Product
Setup
Configuration
Product Safety
Information
• Recalls and Alerts
• Standards and Regulations
• Chemical Safety
• Personal Protective
Equipment (PPE)
Owners
Manual
Schedule
Product
Setup
Standards and
Regulations
Tutorials Contact us Maintenance
records
Product Safety
Information
• Chemical Safety
• Personal Protective
Equipment (PPE)
Website
Standards
and
Regulation
s
Recalls and
Alerts
Personal
Protective
Equipment
(PPE)
Chemical
Safety
About
us
Sign
in
Sign
up
Our
people

13. Think about components, not docs
07:45@aschwanden4stc
13
 Components Can be used in almost any workflow for
almost any purpose. Unlike documents, components
manage content on a granular level.
 Content is information created, stored, retrieved,
modified, published and used in both a digital and print
environment including, but not limited to, text, images,
tables, links, video or sound.
 Management means handling and controlling, guiding or
directing any type of content.
 Systems include tools (hardware, software) and
procedures that support managed content to consistent
published to various mediums to specific audiences in a
consistent and organized fashion.

14. Reusable components across business
verticals
07:45@aschwanden4stc
14
Reusable
Component
Product Safety Information
• Recalls and Alerts
• Standards and Regulations
• ChemicalSafety
• Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
Marketing (HTML5/web)
Product Safety Information
• Recalls and Alerts
• Standards and Regulations
• ChemicalSafety
• Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
Training (app)
Product Safety Information
• Recalls and Alerts
• Standards and Regulations
• ChemicalSafety
• Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
Lega
lProduct Safety Information
• Recalls and Alerts
• Standards and Regulations
• ChemicalSafety
• Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
Training (HTML5)
Product Safety Information
• Recalls and Alerts
• Standards and Regulations
• ChemicalSafety
• Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
Health and
SafetyProduct Safety Information
• Recalls and Alerts
• Standards and Regulations
• ChemicalSafety
• Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
Training (PDF)
Product Safety Information
• Recalls and Alerts
• Standards and Regulations
• ChemicalSafety
• Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
Support (for
Engineers)Product Safety Information
• Recalls and Alerts
• Standards and Regulations
• ChemicalSafety
• Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
Support (for
Hospitals)Product Safety Information
• Recalls and Alerts
• Standards and Regulations
• ChemicalSafety
• Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
Support (for
chemists)Product Safety Information
• Recalls and Alerts
• Standards and Regulations
• ChemicalSafety
• Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)

15. What to do before you consider diversified
content
07:45@aschwanden4stc
15
1. Fact finding
2. Figure out Content Strategy and Information
Architecture
3. Separate 'Must-Haves' From 'Nice-to-Haves‘ in
tools/process
4. ID the right tools to help
5. Think about your technology requirements
6. Look for Important Vendor Services
7. Do a 'POC' or a 'pilot project‘

16. When thinking about
the ROI of content diversification
@aschwanden4stc 07:45
16
How and what to measure

17. Add efficiencies in process
07:45@aschwanden4stc
17
 Change up your:
 review cycles
 content publishing
 multi-channel delivery
 content management
 translation, and more.
 Add new revenue channels, improve relationships with
existing customers, and build new business leads
 Content becomes a connection tool
 Keep long-term benefits and vision in mind
 Don’t just ask “what can our content do for me now”, but
consider the 1, 2, or even 5+ year ROI.

18. Where to look for ROI
07:45@aschwanden4stc
18
1. Cost reduction and efficiencies: Traditional
approach suggests savings in cutting time and
effort and improvement in efficiencies together
to calculate the ROI. Efficiencies are great but not
the #1 way to make money.
2. Revenue growth: Suggests looking at the
benefits of improvements in customer
experience and other revenue related metrics. The
focus is on growth in revenue to calculate the
payback period. Only through growth will they get
the full rewards and compound the return.

19. Or added efficiencies
{getting more technical here}
@aschwanden4stc 07:45
19
Cost reduction

20. We had to know the full costs, so we asked:
07:45@aschwanden4stc
20
 Will things cost less? Traditional approach suggests
looking at time, cost, effort and efficiencies together to
calculate the ROI. Will diversification change corporate
processes and lower total costs? Where are costs cut?
Are things more efficient? Can they decrease content
related work and improve time to market? Efficiencies
are great but not the #1 way to make money.
 Will they be able to do things faster or better? If so,
what are the cost savings and how do they calculate
them? We defined categories and identified the true
costs their business had. Once determined, we worked
to find savings in time or a change in staff, outsourcing,
or other overhead and assigned values to the amount
saved.

21. Actual costs to create content
07:45@aschwanden4stc
21
Annual Costs Budget item
$750,000 Payroll (direct). 10 content creators @$75K/annually
per resource (includes people who edit, illustrate,
support, train, develop, manage, or perform functions
that contribute to the overall content lifecycle)
$300,000 Payroll (indirect). Time on review of docs by legal,
SME, engineers, managers, etc. Calculated at 4 hours
per week for 40 reviewers
$100,000 Translation. Includes management of about 800,000
words

22. Costs to deploy a system
07:45@aschwanden4stc
22
Onetime
costs
Budget item
$170,000 CCMS initial purchase and proof-of-concept
$100,000 Consulting and content strategy, conversion,
implementation, and support
$200,000 Downtime (lost time) when staff was working on CCMS
related work rather than active content development
$50,000 Training and development of training materials
$60,000 IT and support related costs
$50,000 Migration of publishing process automated in the CCMS
$630,000

23. Savings
07:45@aschwanden4stc
23
Annual
Savings
Reason
$50,000 Faster creation of content due to standard content models
$150,000 Savings in time spent formatting, reformatting, reviewing
efficiencies, and publishing
$25,000 25% reduction in translation costs due to better source
content management and reuse
$225,000 Content reuse within and across teams
(30% initial reuse, expected to climb over time)
$450,000

24. Calculated savings
07:45@aschwanden4stc
24
Year
1
Year
2
Year 3 Year 4 Year 5
Annual cost (Y1 includes upfront costs) 630K 100K 100K 100K 100K
Cumulative costs and services 630K 730K 830K 930K 1.03M
Yearly cumulative savings (450K per
year)
450K 900K 1.35M 1.8M 2.25M
Net cash from savings and
efficiencies*
-180K 170K 520K 870K 1.22M
*. This data will be reused later.

25. Improve top and bottom lines by
growth
{getting more technical here,
but it’s what your audience will love}
@aschwanden4stc 07:45
25
Profit

26. Overview
07:45@aschwanden4stc
26
 Sales and marketing saw business sales growth largely
through improved customer interactions.
 They wanted to have more time to interact with clients.
 Need tools to facilitate and simplify the work of many people
and free up staff and let them focus on their core jobs.
 We were told the website generated about $15,000,000 in
direct annual sales. (it was actually more when a more
indepth review was done!)
 We conservatively estimated adding 3% to the top line
through better content and free up staff AND help clients find
what they need faster.
 Our 3% projection is very low compared to ranges of up to
10% by McKinsey Global Institute (MGI).
 https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/high-tech/our-insights/the-social-
economy

27. Our projections and hopes
07:45@aschwanden4stc
27
 Year One: Targets met. Revenue numbers are good.
An investment is made.
 Year Two: Deliver expected growth and add $450K
to the bottom line.
 Year Five: Compound growth to new markets and
products generate an additional $1.9 million in
revenue (with no added costs beyond a CCMS)
Projections with 3% growth due to
CCMS
Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4 Year 5
Total Revenue (millions) 15M 15.45M 15.91M 16.39M 16.88M
Total New Growth Attributed To
CCMS
0 450K 910K 1.39M 1.88M

28. How can we build 3% revenue growth
07:45@aschwanden4stc
28
Business Objectives Priority KPI Impacted
Convert New/Returning Customers
Resolve technical queries by prospects
easily by making technical content
quickly findable by sales staff
1 Average Prospect
to Lead Conversion
Rate on Digital
Properties (%)Deliver a personalized, contextual and
highly relevant content experiences to
end users to move them further along
the conversion funnel
2

29. Continued
07:45@aschwanden4stc
29
Improve customer satisfaction by delivering a
consistent content experience pre- and post-
purchase
Number of Visits by
Returning Customers
per Month from All
ChannelsProvide quickly findable help content and
technical information to customers, so that
their queries get resolved in the least time
3
Acquire New/Returning Customers
Acquire more customers by increasing the
reach of your website by making the technical
content easily searchable and accessible to a
wider audience
4 Number of Unique
visitors per month
from All Channels

30. Continued
07:45@aschwanden4stc
30
Reduce Marketing Effort
Easily reuse technical content in
various marketing collateral and
websites
5 Total Annual Cost for Salaries and Other
Benefits as % of Total Annual Digital
Marketing Budget (%)
Reduce technology infrastructure/services cost
Reduce localization time and
cost
6 All Other Spend Applied to Digital
Marketing Activities (including In-house,
Third Party, Ad Spend, Software etc.) as
% of Total Annual Digital Marketing
Budget (%)
Enable support staff to publish
help content on their own
instead of relying on IT
7
Reduce Call Center Costs
Reduce customer support calls
due to improved search
experience of technical content
on websites
8 Total Annual Call Center Customer Sales
Transaction Costs as % of Total Annual
Revenue Attributed to Digital Marketing
(%)

31. Set growth targets based on improvements
07:45@aschwanden4stc
31
Current #’s Company Defined Information Expected
Change
271,101 Average number of visitors to website in a
month
+ 3–5%
18,977 Average number of leads generated on website
in a month
+ 3–5%
5,940 Average number of opportunities generated on
the website in a month
+ 6–8%
7% Average rate of opportunities converting to
sales
3.5% Percentage of customers that have performed
a lead generation action on website
+ 1–2%
$1,875.0 Average value of each deal + 4–8%

32. Continued
07:45@aschwanden4stc
32
$19.9M Total annual revenue as a result of deals
through qualified website leads (initial number
was $15M, not all sales are via ‘clicks’, giving a
higher number!)
+ 3–5%
$2.3M Total annual budget for marketing
28% Total annual cost for salaries and other benefits
as a percentage of total annual marketing
budget
- 5–10%
28% Spend on technology infrastructure, services
as a percentage of total annual marketing
budget
- 5–10%
8.0% Total annual call center costs for managing
sales transactions as a percentage of total
annual revenue
- 2.5–5%
5.2% Total annual cost for salaries and other benefits
for all IT as a percentage of total annual
- 5–10%

33. Charted and explained
@aschwanden4stc 07:45
33
The Results

34. Total ROI Calculated
07:45@aschwanden4stc
34
Y1 Y2 Y3 Y4 Y5
Net cash from savings and
efficiencies
-
180K
170K 520K 870K 1.22
M
Net new revenue generated
207K 216K 226K 235K 246K
Total financial benefit after all
expenses
27K 386K 746K 1.1M 1.47
M
Cumulative benefit
(adding each previous year)
27K 413K 1.16M 2.26
M
3.73
M

35. Combined savings & efficiencies, plus
revenue
07:45@aschwanden4stc
35
 Cash in the bank in a very short time frame
 The moving average over 5 years is expected to be
over $700,000
 Looking back over 2 years we can already see
that
we’ve exceeded expectations on the ROI
 Q2 of 2018 we start into year 3
 Met expected savings
 Exceeded the first two years estimates for revenue growth
 Steady growth, value from shared content

36. What is next?
07:45@aschwanden4stc
36
 Roll out features to others in the business beyond
support, documentation, sales, and marketing teams
 Training is next to get on board and already eager to
reuse content from the other teams
 Results show that the return has been quick,
definitive, and higher than initially expected
 Costs are down, people and teams are collaborating,
revenues are up, and the quality of content
continues to improve

37. @aschwanden4stc 07:45
37
Conclusion

38. NOT OUR CLIENT, but an important quote
07:45@aschwanden4stc
38
 Mark Raskino, VP and Gartner Fellow on how CEOs
are taking a "digital-first" approach to business
change
 “CEO understanding of the benefits of a digital
business strategy is improving. More of them
align it to advanced business ideas, such as digital
product and service innovation, the Internet of
Things, or digital platforms and ecosystems. 22%
are taking digital to the core of their enterprise
models. That's where the product, service and
business model are being changed and the new
digital capabilities that support those are
becoming core competencies."
 https://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/3689017

39. Next steps
07:45@aschwanden4stc
39
 Two things stand between you and a successful
digital business strategy that helps you understand
your customers, engage them, and drive new
revenue.
 An effective content strategy. Publishing Smarter
(www.publishingsmarter.com) can help get you started.
 A modern CCMS.
 Consider a connected CCMS that allows content teams,
marketing, sales, legal, and all others to interact with each other to
drive savings and revenue.
 Over half of all CEOs say that their digital improvements
have already improved profits. Every point of contact helps
their business retain clients, create growth, add value, and
deliver a customer experience that keeps people talking,
coming back, and signing up.
 https://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/3689017

40. Download the complete whitepaper
07:45@aschwanden4stc
40
 https://offers.adobe.com/en/na/marketing/landings/
xml_documentation_for_adobe_experience_manage
r
_7_steps_to_choosing_a_ccms.html
 https://adobe.ly/2vIlY0p

41. www.publishingsmarter.com
07:45@aschwanden4stc
41