Hello Reader, "I think what we need is more human-first content." I had someone say that to me in a conversation a while back, and it honestly had me scratching my head. I had to ask, "What do you mean by human first?" I was thinking about it from a content strategy perspective. Content written for humans instead of AI and SEO. Audience-centered content. To me, that makes perfect sense, and I thought that's where they would go with their response. Nope. They said, "You know. Content you know...
9 days ago • 6 min read
Hello Reader, "I wanted to let you know we're ending our contract at the end of this month. Our CEO wants us to use AI to write the content instead." Way too many of us have heard those words in the last couple of years, and they never get easier. They hurt, and if you're like me there's more than a little anger too. How can a client expect a machine to put the same care and attention into the work that we do?! It's a case of good enough in their eyes, unfortunately. AI can imitate a writer...
15 days ago • 7 min read
Hello Reader, I'm looking out the window of my hotel room and all I can see are the buildings within half a block of where I am. Everything else is wrapped in fog, and it's hard to imagine what's behind that thick white barrier. Every so often I get to tag along to one of my husband's work conferences. Right now we're in Devonport, Tasmania, a place I've never been before. I used to go to plenty of conferences of my own when I was a Chief Information Officer, and they were often exhausting....
29 days ago • 3 min read
Hello Reader, A few days ago, I drove past a young girl standing by the side of the road waving a sign that said, "Cookies and pay ID." Since I like to support kids who are being entrepreneurial, I pulled over, walked back and found out a little bit more about these cookies. Turns out that the girl and her brother make them with the help of her mom, and they sell them from home every Wednesday, as well as at markets around the territory. And since this week's batch of cookies were my...
about 1 month ago • 3 min read
Hello Reader, I was standing next to a motley selection of air fresheners in the grocery store aisle, desperately trying to figure out which one to choose. We had friends coming to visit and I wanted the guest bathroom to smell nicer than it currently did. The problem was, all those air fresheners were in closed boxes and I could only guess at the scents hidden inside. I finally chose one that sounded faintly exotic, got it home, unwrapped it … And reeled. It wasn't an unpleasant fragrance,...
about 1 month ago • 3 min read
Hello Reader, This was not how I was expecting to spend my lunch break. I'd boiled a couple of eggs the day before and put them in the fridge for later. I don't really like cold eggs, so I grabbed one of them and put it in the microwave to warm up a bit (yeah, you know where this is going, don't you). I set the microwave on for 20 seconds and made the mistake of walking away. At 18 seconds I heard an ominous "pop." I swung around and raced back to the microwave as fast as I could. But I was...
about 2 months ago • 3 min read
Hello Reader, After I started my business, I didn't take a true vacation for 5 years. I fell into that hustle mindset (which is its own problem), but that wasn't why I hadn't taken a real vacation. I didn't know how to walk away from my business for a week. I'd tried to take time away a couple of times before that. Every time, I spent part of the day on my computer dealing with client issues or answering project inquiries. I know that sounds like a good problem to have, but it's actually a...
about 2 months ago • 6 min read
Hello Reader, I have a confession. My business newsletter once went 4 months without a single issue going out. Judge me. I deserved it. It wasn't that I forgot about it. I thought about it (and stressed about it) almost every day. The same way you think about that text you owe a friend and keep not answering. I always had an excuse for not writing and sending it. There was a client I needed to follow up with, an invoice to send, or a project I had to get done by Thursday. I fell into the trap...
2 months ago • 7 min read
Hello Reader, Have you ever seen a certain client's name in your inbox and your stomach drops before you've even opened the email? You already know it's a "small change" that isn't small, or a deadline that moved, or a question you answered two weeks ago. You might have a client management problem. I sometimes get the feeling that client management is more of a fable than a practice. It’s a bit of a fairy tale where some people are "good with clients" the way some people are good with plants,...
2 months ago • 5 min read