Mistakes to Avoid When Writing Technical Documentation
Creating technical documentation is time and effort-consuming. But sometimes, readers are not eager to use it. Why? Probably because of the following mistakes that make documentation useless.
Outdated Content
Technical documentation is supposed to be updated regularly as products and services change with time. Readers get frustrated when they try to find a particular article or section, but they see the content that is different from what they expect to see. For example, some features might have changed, but the documentation doesn’t reflect that, or some features do not exist anymore, but you can still find their description. Documentation like that cannot be called trustworthy, and customers won’t take a company seriously. Outdated and incorrect content cannot be called a valuable source of information. Readers will spend time trying to complete a task or solve their problem.
Content should be reviewed and updated regularly. One can even use a schedule to keep it relevant.
No Information Architecture
Information architecture is the way the information is organized in your documentation portal. It is a logical structure. Ideally, it should help readers quickly find what they are looking for. But that doesn’t always work like that. One of the simplest ways to create a clear information structure is to classify information into categories and subcategories, paying attention to the interrelations between them. The biggest advantage of well-thought-out information architecture is easy navigation. That means a lot.
Not Analyzing Reader Feedback
Most help authoring tools offer technical writers to gather reader feedback. It may be just likes/dislikes or something more exhaustive, like suggestions, soft spots, etc. This is the best way to learn what works properly and what does not, and it is the biggest mistake if technical writers and content creators overlook this information.
Wrong Help Authoring Tool
Choosing the most suitable help authoring tool is a challenging task. Most of them offer a free trial or a demo, but that doesn’t mean that it is going to be easy to make the right choice. It is hard to say whether the features are going to be useful or not in the long run. You are to think carefully about the documentation strategy and how it is going to change in the future. Using the wrong tool might prevent you from creating efficient technical documentation as it doesn’t meet the unique needs of your company: it might not be intuitive enough, updating process might not be clear, the reader UI might not be quite user-friendly, etc. The best solution here is to analyze the needs of your company.
I hope this post will inspire you to pay attention to the mistakes you can make when creating technical documentation. When you know what can ruin the positive image of your documentation portal, you can prevent it from the very beginning. Careful planning is one of the things that will improve your docs.
