By Christopher Rollyson  The coronavirus “pandemic” feels like some kind of turning point for humankind in terms of individual autonomy. I perceive that the response to the emergence of the virus is asymmetrical to its actual health threat, and this is leading people around the world to relinquish their individual rights on a scale I have never seen before.
This post discusses this event (a sign in semiotics) within the context of privacy and autonomy in the digital age. My discussion is not a conspiracy theory as I find those pointless and disempowering. I link various technology and social happenings and place their significance within the context of human nature. I also reference some neuroscience to help you understand the situation at a new level. I conclude with suggestions for action. Continue reading Police State Scenario: Covid-19
By Christopher Rollyson How Poor Technical Communication Hurts Business reveals that firms regularly increase their customer service and marketing costs by sending inept letters, emails, technical instructions, and other communications to their customers and employees. It shows how they can increase profit by making these communications more user-centric.
 Banks, physicians, retailers, and many others routinely send poor instructional technical communications to their customers, resulting in high customer service costs, high return costs, high customer churn, and many related costs. These letters, emails, web pages, and other communications are produced by writers who show little insight into customers’ journeys that include the product or service.
The same problem occurs when firms communicate to their employees, and this results in employees’ anxiety and lost productivity (think about choosing your “benefits”) as well as HR staff time, IT staff time, management time, and employee dissatisfaction. It hurts the relationship that most employers try to develop with their employees. Continue reading How Poor Technical Communication Hurts Business
By Christopher Rollyson As Marc Andreessen once quipped, software is “eating the world,” embedding itself in all material and digital products. The basis of his remark was that digital interaction was an order of magnitude faster and more efficient than analog.
Design will eat user documentation explains that now a much more profound change is afoot because design is permeating everything that humans make. People are more likely to use things that have been explicitly designed for them because products’ ease of use and relevance are greater. Continue reading Why Design Will Eat User Documentation
By Christopher Rollyson Improving business impact of technical writing and UX writing outlines how to increase the business value of two writing disciplines that directly affect customer experience.
Before diving into that, the backstory shares how I developed an unusual point of view while practicing service design and experiential social media—and how this led me to technical writing and UX writing.
Then the main event: I offer five ways organizations can substantially improve the business impact of technical writing and UX writing. Continue reading Improving Business Impact Technical Writing UX Writing
By Christopher Rollyson  Africa [credit: Mapswire.com] If you’ve been interested in international development for long, you have seen many prognostications about “Africa rising” over the years only to see them fade into oblivion. Predicting profound economic shifts is like predicting earthquakes; you study the driving forces and your algorithms crunch the data.
That isn’t stopping Helga Stegmann. She has led “user experience” agency Mantaray since 2006, and she gave a riveting talk last week in Chicago hosted by partner agency BoldInsight. In my experience, user experience folks rarely have their hands on the pulse of disruptive economic change, but the reason she is an exception reflects that Africa’s economic transformation is happening at the grassroots level (as with most revolutions), and her key orientation is user experience design, so researching users across rapidly evolving interfaces in devices. Follow along with my notes of her remarks and my additional reflections to reframe your ideas about Africa as bastion of innovation and economic growth. Continue reading Why Africa Is a Nascent Innovation Powerhouse
By Christopher Rollyson  Agile Digital Ethnography uses an ethnographic research approach to analyze people’s online interactions. It creates a dynamic new market research capability that’s useful by itself and even more when used with surveys, focus groups, field work, and other primary research.
I have learned that Agile Digital Ethnography provides a unique combination of research results. I have used it on client engagements since 2006. Like primary research, it reveals people’s behavior, thoughts, emotions, and motivations in rich detail; however, because it’s secondary research, it’s faster and less costly than most other methods. It’s very useful when it’s conducted before primary research since its results can inform the design of primary research instruments. Continue reading Agile Digital Ethnography Secondary Market Research Quantitative Qualitative
By Christopher Rollyson  How to Boost the Power of Customer Journey Maps shows how firms can increase the accuracy and power of their journey maps by using digital social data in practical new ways that almost all customer experience pros overlook.
Would you willingly base multimillion dollar brand and product decisions on a hodgepodge of 20th century research methods?
That’s exactly what 99% of brands and agencies do, based on my just-completed review of customer experience, design, marketing, market research, and software firm posts. The good news is, you can improve the accuracy and power of your journey maps by using digital social data in a way that’s hidden in plain view. Continue reading Customer Experience: How to Boost the Accuracy and Power of your Journey Maps
By Christopher Rollyson Introducing the Free Chicago Seminars Experiential Social Media Nonprofits
 The Free Chicago Seminars of Experiential Social Media for Nonprofits and social impact firms aims to help nonprofits and social impact firms to unlock the power of experiential to transform their commitments from their donors, volunteers and other supporters. The series will be offered by CSRA in Chicago starting Summer 2018. Experiential is “the nonprofit way” to do social media because its main goal is serving people, not marketing to them. And it usually produces much better business outcomes than social media and marketing.
I designed this three-part public seminar series for nonprofits and social impact companies, and I’m making it available for free to qualified groups. I’ve pioneered the development of experiential social media since 2006, and I want to share a new way to build trust and commitment from donors, volunteers, partners, clients and other stakeholders to nonprofits and social impact firms. Continue reading Free Chicago Seminars Experiential Social Media Nonprofits
By Christopher Rollyson Trust and the Triune Ethics Theory reviews Darcia Narvaez’s breakthrough Triune Ethics Theory paper and draws new insights into how trust and relationship building work, based on the human brain’s evolutionary development, structure, and functions. And it sheds light on how experiential social media increases intimacy.
Triune Ethics Theory, Darcia Narvaez, Ph.D.
 Triune Ethics is an enthralling, exceedingly useful approach to understanding human behavior because it explains the context of trust and relationship building at a profound level that is actionable for anyone who wants deeper, richer, more flexible connections and collaboration with people. Triune Ethics Theory will help me to educate my clients and teams at a deep level, and it can give you a rare understanding of your own behavior—and that of people around you.
As with all my reviews, I will attempt to summarize this paper’s salient points before adding some reflections and conclusions about how I’m using its assertions in my work. As I have no formal training in neuroscience, I am drawing on lay study as well as psychology and my work in ethnographic research of social media. I highly recommend reading the paper, Triune Ethics: The Neurobiological Roots of Our Multiple Moralities, and delving into its sources. I have also included references for further reading at the end. Continue reading Trust and the Triune Ethics Theory
By Christopher Rollyson  How to Boost Employee Support for Nonprofit Fundraising reveals that, although employees can be tremendous supporters of nonprofit fundraisers, managers have to navigate some subtle waters to engage employees.
The key to “engagement” is making it voluntary and meaningful to employees as people. I say this because many organizations expect support, but expectation diminishes the voluntary requirement. When management harbors the attitude that employees owe them to promote the fundraiser, this will backfire. Here’s my response to a situation in the Nonprofit Technology Network forums.
A web/social media specialist for family services nonprofit sought advice for increasing employee participation in their annual fundraiser. Most of the responses explained how to use email signatures (someone even suggested appending promotional text to employees’ email signatures globally!). Someone else suggested gift certificates. I took a different tack. Continue reading Employee Support for Nonprofit Fundraising
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