Would You Like Some XML With Your Coffee?
Most of us search, we find stuff, we move on. We write content, we post it, we move on. But what is the importance of the technology behind the content? Do we see the big picture? This morning I was served a dose of XML with my coffee at the Web Content Conference, forcing me to think about the backbone of everyday web applications and how that applies to marketing.
Joe Gollner of Stilo International spoke about the technologies behind the content and the relationship between the two. As business professionals and marketers we need to understand a little bit about the power behind the technology in order to consider the possibilities that lie ahead. Ann Rockley of The Rockley Group talked about how XML and other technologies allow us to provide a customized experience for customers like they’ve never had before by only delivering the right content at the right time.
There are certain things that we take for granted today, such as being able to easily move information from one application to another. I can quickly send an email with a link to my friend who can then view a video, digg it and post it on her Facebook page. We can thank XML for a large part of this. Back in the day, there were great applications, but they couldn’t talk to one another. You can think of XML as the mass transit system of the web; your content is the passenger. It doesn’t do us any good to have great content if it’s just sitting still. Once that content can easily “travel,” that’s when the magic happens.
So how does this affect us as marketers? The convergence of content and technology allows for better performance and allows us to have better interaction with our customers. We’ve moved beyond just giving people information to giving them the ability to take action. We’re not just arming them with knowledge, we’re equipping them with tools. And we can effectively do this if we start thinking of our customers as both consumers and publishers.
