I’m a content designer, and I do more than words.

As a content designer (who recently rebranded from being a “UX Writer”), I spend a lot of time telling those I work with exactly what I do.

As a content designer, I also have cool eyewear and a collection of fancy jumpers, but I’m not here to stereotype.

I tell PMs that I focus on making sure we’re communicating what needs to be communicated in the user experience in the right way at the right time.

I tell analysts that I spend time thinking about the architecture of key screens to ensure that the new feature we included a button for isn’t hidden or appearing in the wrong place.

I tell other stakeholders that we need to constantly be thinking about how we work with accessibility and localisation and presenting strategies to simply address these topics in existing workflows.

And before today, I’d never needed to explain to a product designer what I do, because they’re the ones I communicate most with. We’re a tag team. Where they go, ideally I go. Until I realised that this one product designer really just thought that all I needed to do was write the words at the end. And then I realised that this is common and I’ve been in a bit of a bubble working with designers who are familiar with content design.

So that’s why I want to share some of the things that I do as a content designer, and I’m hoping other content designers will add more too.

I write.

Yes, I write. Of course, I’m responsible for the content. But there’s a lot that goes into the writing process.

I research and define the tone and voice of the product in line with branding. I explore options for communicating what needs to be communicated and discuss with designers exactly where in the interface this sits. I craft copy so that we’re communicating everything the user needs to know here without overloading them with information or clouding the meaning.

Notice though that a lot of UX Writing teams are starting to pivot towards “Content Design” (coined by Sarah Richards)? That’s because writing in a UX context is a different beast from standard copywriting (as explained here). This brings me to my next point…

I design.

This more accurately encapsulates the writing process in my opinion. Writing is the last stage of what is hopefully…