The DevRel Digest November 2024: If You Content It, They Will Come

Content for a dream DevRel content program

According to the 2024 State of DevRel report, “content marketing remains the most effective tactic for outreach to new developers.” From marketing to education, content development remains the top responsibility of DevRel practitioners from IC to C-level. In other words, you can’t have DevRel without content.

So what would my dream DevRel content program look like?

At a high level, when it comes to Developer Relations, content is any information provided by a company or brand that is intended for developers. So this includes blog posts, tutorials, documentation, webinars, and conference talks. Content accompanies a developer at every step of their journey from product awareness and evaluation, education and implementation, and product champion.

Whether it’s a blog post, a white paper, or a talk for a meetup, content for developers should follow the Triple A’s:

• Authenticity: Developer audiences are famously allergic to bullshit – which is why they are my favorite group of people to create content for.
• Accuracy: Outdated docs and broken tutorials are not only huge turn-offs for developers, they make the work of developers harder than it needs to be.
• “Aha!”: There is no experience more powerful than the moment a developer fully internalizes the value of something. The more hands-on the “Aha!” moment is, the better it is, generating a powerful neural connection between a solution or a concept and the triumphant dopamine hit of success – a connection that is especially important for developers. Content should always offer an opportunity for this.

One of the best ways to help determine if a piece of content is following the Triple A’s is to actually take the time to do your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) homework. The more thorough and researched your ICPs are, the more precise your content can be, ensuring that content is not being produced in vain. Check out this developer ICP framework from Tessa Kriesel to help you get the most out of the exercise.

My dream DevRel content program can be divided into three primary categories that sync up with the developer on their hero’s journey:

• Awareness and evaluation
• Education, onboarding, implementation
• Champion content

The call to adventure: Content for awareness and evaluation

This is the content that invites the developer to learn more by piquing their curiosity. This category of content should focus less on the product (henceforth referred to as the “solution”) and more on addressing specific use cases, problem spaces, and technologies – especially emergent ones. The point is to reach developers by empathizing with the particular obstacles they are facing and offering them assistance overcoming them.

Content in this category should be more general and SEO-forward, answering the questions commonly asked by developers. Content in this category could include the following:

• Written content
  • SEO-forward blog posts that answer general questions related to your solution. For instance, if your solution is an open source vector database, a blog post topic could be the differences between nearest neighbor search (NNS), approximate nearest neighbor search (ANNS), and semantic search.
  • Tutorials and recipes that focus on learning about a particular tech rather than the solution itself. For instance, “How to build a movie recommendation app without the complexities of vector databases.”
  • Introductory documentation that is not gated and emphasizes how easy it is to get started with the solution.
• Video content
  • SEO-forward “edutainment” that provides useful information in bite-sized videos that are fun to watch. The smart DevRel content producer will repurpose the aforementioned example blog post about search methods for vector databases into an edutainment script, breaking down each method into a 1-minute video.
  • SEO-forward webinars that focus on solution related but still more general topics. For instance, a webinar that walks through the creation of a vector database – and just so happens to use the solution to do so!
• Conference/in-person content
  • Talks – especially shorter talk slots like lightning talks. And while your solution should not be in the title of the talk, you should definitely offer swag to those who attend!
• Important metrics and outcomes of awareness and evaluation content
  • Views and engagement with an emphasis on engagement (especially saving and/or sharing) and follow through on calls to action. (What did they click next and is it where you wanted them to go?)
  • Lead generation segmented into first time users and established users (but don’t gate on work emails).
  • Trial sign-ups … and for the love of all that’s good in the world, please provide some sort of self-service free or limited trial and if that’s not possible, please really consider if your solution is ready for a DevRel content program.

Descent into the unknown: Content for education, onboarding, and implementation

Whether a solution is adopted by a company via developer recommendation or handed down by a CTO, education, onboarding, and implementation is where the hero’s journey into the unknown can become fraught. The content provided for developers at this stage should be supportive, accessible, applicable, and as frictionless as possible. While the decision to use the solution has already been made, the marketing isn’t over yet. This is an opportunity to win over lifelong solution champions.

Content in this category should be very specific, organized, and easily searchable, allowing developers to skip, review, or bookmark as needed. It should be streamlined, lightweight, and copy-pasteable. Content in this category could include the following:

• Written content
  • White papers that emphasize customer success stories, quantifiable outcomes, and implementation solutions that are as detailed as company intellectual property policies will allow.
  • Documentation for advanced use cases, concepts, features, and troubleshooting.
  • Onboarding guides and tutorials focusing on typical integration cases and specific tech components that provide architecture diagrams and sample code wherever possible – anything that makes it easier for developers to add the solution to their existing tech.
• Video content
  • Webinars that explain and demonstrate more advanced concepts and features and provide examples of where these concepts and features can be implemented.
  • Longer, more detailed education on-demand videos that cover solution topics in-depth. The developers who gravitate toward this kind of content are good candidates for future champions.
• Conference/in-person content
  • Workshops are an especially good format for more advanced use cases and features because attendees can troubleshoot directly with solution advocates.
  • Co-located and/or unofficial meetups and office hours provide a venue for users of your solution to get facetime with you and each other. This can also be an extremely valuable opportunity to get honest solution feedback as well as identify potential champions.
• Important metrics and outcomes of awareness and evaluation content
  • Views and engagement with even more emphasis on what is being shared and by whom.
  • Documentary discovery flow to evaluate whether or not you have your information organized in a way that is intuitive and frictionless.
  • Changes in frequently asked questions and issues can help determine if you need to address something better in your content or if your content is alleviating points of friction or if you need to reconsider something in the solution all together.
  • Leads – with an emphasis on identifying who has shown up more than once.
  • Community activity that indicates investment in the solution such as users responding to other users.

Returning with the boon: Content created by champions

The best possible outcome of a DevRel content program is content created by users. By this time, the developer has heeded the call to adventure, descended into the unknown, and returned as a champion with a boon to share with other developers. A good DevRel content program inspires, enables, and empowers users to create their own content and share it – which is the most powerful testament to the power of your solution that you could ever ask for.

A champions content program is a topic more suitable for another blog post, but I mention it here to close the loop for now. The point is that a successful DevRel content program becomes self-perpetuating and all content up to this point should help generate momentum in that direction.

From awareness to advocacy: The power of a dream DevRel content program

A dream DevRel content program doesn’t just inform – it transforms. By aligning content with the developer’s journey, adhering to the Triple A’s of authenticity, accuracy, and "Aha!" moments, and maintaining an unwavering focus on the needs of your ICPs, you create more than just engagement. You foster trust, empowerment, and advocacy. Every piece of content should serve as a bridge connecting developers to solutions, demystifying complexity, and igniting inspiration. When done right, a DevRel content program transcends marketing – it becomes a catalyst for community, collaboration, and shared success, turning developers into champions who carry your story forward.

(And you should hire me to run it! )

Events and resources and other notable things

• The Developer Marketing Alliance Developer Relations Summit is tomorrow, December 3rd, 2024. With speakers such as Wesley Faulkner and Katie Wasilenko Miller among its speakers, I’m looking forward to the insights, inspiration, and community. Register here.
• I’m excited because the DevRel Foundations working groups are getting underway and yes, I am volunteering to manage the group on metrics, reporting, and best practices cause you know I love some process and data!
• From the CNCF to career transitions, here’s an open source list of tech professionals who are down to grab a virtual coffee with you and chat – I should add my name to that list!
• What they never tell you about leaving an abusive relationship is that it’s expensive. If you can, please consider donating to help my friend Emily start a brand new life.