Lessons

  • Lesson 1: Communication and Persuasion. This lesson will familiarize you with general elements of persuasion from classical rhetoric and orient you to the concept of communicating about technology through persuasive messaging. It will also focus your learning on the difference between everyday communication and technological communication, in addition to the persuasive elements that are part of marketing communications in general.
  • Lesson 2: Planning and Needs Analysis. This lesson will introduce you to the processes involved with planning for technical communication marketing and for conducting a needs analysis. You will read textbook materials and use this lesson as a supplement to the information contained in your textbooks. Focus your learning on the differences between consumer and corporate audiences and on needs analyses. By the end of the lesson you should be able to apply principles of basic technological marketing communication to a fictional product of your own choosing and conduct a needs analysis for that product.
  • Lesson 3: Audience Analysis. This lesson will introduce you to the processes involved with analyzing an audience for technical communication marketing. Focus your learning in this lesson on what it takes to learn about an audience and apply what you find to specific products. You should be able to use that information at the end of the lesson to create a basic product analysis memo.
  • Lesson 4: Strategy Development. This lesson will help you begin to outline strategy and message development for communications that center on product development and marketing. Focus your learning on connecting audience analysis with strategic development. You should think about how information about audiences drives strategic decisions about marketing communications.
  • Lesson 5: Creating Written Marketing Materials. This lesson will introduce you to the writing process, especially as it relates to audience analysis. For example, you will consider how to use audience information and research to direct your writing process, and you will learn which elements of the writing process are critical regardless of the information you have.
  • Midterm Exam (covers Lessons 1–5)
  • Lesson 6: Designing Effective Documents. This lesson will introduce you to document planning and design. You will learn about different types of written products and how they can be used to direct a reader’s attention, and you will consider which design elements are most useful in hi-tech communications. In particular, this lesson focuses on product sheets and how text and graphics are used within product sheets.
  • Lesson 7: Content, Branding, and Product Sheets. This lesson will explain how to create meaningful content and will introduce you to the concept of branding. You will learn how content types fit within written documents and how they can be used to add persuasive elements through branding. In particular, the focus will be on content that will be applicable to product sheets.
  • Lesson 8: Tactics and White Papers. This lesson will introduce you to the guidelines for developing white papers after first discussing the processes involved with tactical planning. For example, you will learn the difference between tactics and strategies and consider how both are useful in persuasion and promoting knowledge.
  • Lesson 9: Ethics, Legal Issues, and Global Communication. This lesson will introduce you to ethics in technical communication and will discuss legal issues and global communication. You will consider how to manage ethical situations appropriately and how legal issues can impact your career in the future.
  • Lesson 10: Presentations. This lesson will discuss effective presentations in technical marketing communication.
  • Final Exam (comprehensive)