Key Highlights from SDL Innovate 2011
SDL Innovate 2011 Santa Clara, CA—Having recently attended the SDL conference, one of the keynote speakers—Toby Bell, VP at Gartner Research— presented “Online Channel Optimization” which captivated the audience for two hours while he presented best practices and new research studies.
Bell pointed out the new rules of engagement, which have emerged as customers are exposed to using smart phones and tablet devices daily. Studies have shown that these new rules in fact do apply; if we are not listening to our users while developing web applications, we will lose our customers even with a dazzling newly designed website. We need to realize that holding the interest of our audience is changing.
New Rules to Retain Audiences
| Device | New Rules | Old Rules |
| Laptop | 10 second rule | 60 second rule |
| Mobile | 3 second rule | 30 second rule |
| Web Clicks | 3 clicks | |
| Time to Buy/ Check-Out | 3 minutes |
A couple of key points mentioned during his presentation were based on User Experience (UX) and building solid mobile strategy:
- Do UX before kicking off your projects. Spend at least 5% of the budget on asking the right questions. Who are the users? What do they do? What do they want? And don’t forget, trust the users to tell you what they want—then design something better that they will love and use.
- Ensure you have a mobile strategy that is customer-driven, not technology-driven. Don’t take your current website, publish it with mobile-friendly CSS files and call it mobile-ready. Mobile devices and apps should be designed differently so that they can present content and be interactive in a different way than the website.
After the presentation by Toby Bell, the day was filled with several other seminars—ranging from translation, localization, user groups and new WCMS products. I was able to spend time with Sophie Pibouin, General Manager NA of the SDL WCMS division. She is especially excited about the new product released earlier this year—Tridion 2011. She discussed her goals for 2011, which included her dedication to bringing successful implementation within her own team and working together with strategic partners to help enhance the needs of the new and existing clients.
Walking away from the conference as a longtime Tridion user, analyst, tester and project manager, the feeling was good. SDL is listening, and they are building products that we can implement in the real world.
For additional information on SDL Innovate, visit: http://www.sdl.com/en/sites/innovate2011/.
