Slides for workshop on "Create Effective Content Quickly With Pair Writing"

1. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11th July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
Create effective content quickly with pair
writing
Lauren Tormey
University Website Programme
University of Edinburgh

2. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11 July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
Welcome to pairadise

3. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11 July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
Overview
• Introduction to pair writing
• What is it?
• The process
• The benefits
• Case studies
• Pair writing exercise

4. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11 July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
What is it?
• Pair writing is when two people, a subject matter expert and
content professional, sit together to write content
• Inspired by pair programming

5. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11 July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
The roles
• Subject Matter Expert (SME): provides the specifics and
background information on the subject they are writing about
• Content professional: someone who’s an expert in how to
create effective web content

6. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11 July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
The process
• Alternate between the roles of driver and observer
• Driver leads the writing; observer asks reflective questions,
such as:
• Is this the best angle?
• Is the most important content at the top?
• What do you mean by this?
• Aim to have a complete or nearly complete piece of content
ready by end of session

7. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11 July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
Share your experiences
• What’s challenging about writing on your own?

8. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11 July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
Why pair writing?
• get immediate feedback on your work
• saves time that would have been spent checking over drafts
• turns your SMEs into better web writers through sharing best
practice
• helps your department develop a mutual understanding of your
content
• creates more effective, user-focused content (and thus cuts
down on customer enquiries)

9. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11 July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
How we’ve put it into practice

10. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11 July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
How we’ve put it into practice

11. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11 July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
How we’ve put it into practice

12. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11 July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
How we’ve put it into practice
• Pair editing workshops with University departments
• Read the title and summary sentence of a priority page
• Who is the target audience of the page?
• Think of 3-4 questions the target audience wants answered on the
page
• Highlight where those questions are answered
• Does the content meet the need?
Adapted from content microtest technique developed by Laura Arlov (slide 6: http://bit.ly/2ubpSQq)

13. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11 July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
Pair writing exercise
• Write a blog post on one of the following:
• Your journey over to IWMW
• Your IMWM experience so far and/or what you’ll be doing while you’re
here

14. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11 July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
Share your experiences
• How did you find the process?

15. THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
11 July 2017 Create effective content quickly with pair writing
Thanks for attending!
• Pair writing blog post: http://edin.ac/pair-writing
• University Website Programme blog: http://website-programme-
blog.is.ed.ac.uk/
• lauren.tormey@ed.ac.uk