Abstract:

This tutorial, an expansion of a highly-rated “Invited Speaker” session from the UPA 2001 Conference, will teach attendees how to martial their ideas and resources into a sustainable and effective marketing program that will make it easy for them to promote usability within their organizations.

Audience

Experienced usability professionals, user interface designers, developers, and managers who are working within an organization and trying to make their work more visible and/or promote their department within the company to find internal projects.

Learning objectives:

Participants will learn to talk about what they do in terms understood by different audiences, to identify barriers and opportunities which can hinder or support efforts to promote usability and to use available resources to promote usability. They will leave the session with ideas galore and a marketing plan ready to implement.

How tutorial will be conducted:

The tutorial will be highly interactive, with brief Powerpoint presentations by the leader, hands-on exercises (with handouts provided), participants giving and getting feedback from each other in small groups, and large group discussion, facilitated by the leader, following each exercise.

Detailed Description of Material Covered by Tutorial and a Schedule of Events

Introductions: The goal of this tutorial is to create a 1-2 page marketing plan (the format for which will be provided as a handout, and completed formats to serve as examples). The real end result of each of 5 lessons will lead to the composite plan in Lesson 6.

The session will begin with introductions by the tutorial leader and participants. Group discussion will address the main challenges to promoting usability (including the issue of how to justify the costs). Slide presentation of main themes about self promotion, obstacles to it and general ideas for promoting usability within an organization.

Lesson 1: Goal-setting. In this first lesson, attendees will set goals for what they can reasonably accomplish each month and each quarter to promote usability within their organizations. (Handouts and small group discussion followed by large group discussion)

Lesson 2: Targeting the market. Promoting usability within an organization involves convincing a range of stakeholders from upper management to end-users, each with different agendas and different perspectives, who need to be addressed and approached based on their priorities. This lesson revolves around identifying who the stakeholders are and creating messages for each of them. This list is then integrated into the marketing plan. (Large and small group discussions)

Lesson 3: Blurb Writing. Talking about what you actually do so that people understand and become engaged in a conversation is a challenge for most usability professionals. This lesson will focus on writing “elevator pitches” of varying lengths and for use with the various stakeholders identified in Lesson 2. Attendees will then practice these blurbs with each other, giving and getting feedback. They will also learn how to demonstrate that they know what they are talking about and should be heeded -- even if what they have to say isn't easy to hear. (Handouts and small group discussion followed by large group discussion)

Lesson 4: Choosing the marketing tools. Usability professionals rarely think of using corporate communications channels at their disposal (such as newsletters, "meet the department" sessions, etc.) to spread the good word about usability. In this lesson, we will brainstorm ideas about the marketing tools available to each participant and what resources would be required to take advantage of them. This list is then integrated into the marketing plan. (Large group discussion)

Lesson 5: Playing the corporate game. Open discussion about how “the corporate game” works in the companies where attendees are employed, followed by brainstorming on how each can play the game to their advantage. This includes UPA’s Friends of Usability effort to create visibility for usability. (Large group discussion)

Lesson 6: Evaluating and Implementing the Marketing Plan. Attendees will exchange the marketing plan they have created over the course of the day with a partner and do an evaluation, then make any changes necessary. The session will end with a Q&A to address any miscellaneous ideas and topics. (Handouts and small group discussion followed by large group discussion)

Instructor Biography

Ilise Benun is a nationally recognized expert on self promotion and marketing, and heads the public relations committee for the NY chapter of UPA. She is the author of Self Promotion Online (HOW Design Books, 2001) and Designing Web Sites for Every Audience (HOW Design Books, 2003), as well as two guidebooks, 133 Tips to Promote Yourself and Your Business and Making Marketing Manageable. Since 1995, Benun has been conducting seminars and workshops on self promotion and online marketing for industry and trade associations groups of 30-300 participants including UPA, Graphic Artists Guild, Women in Communications, NYU Entrepreneurship Summit, American Marketing Association, and City University of New York, among others. Benun also works privately with clients to promote their services.