Content Organization

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Content Organization

• What do people hate the most about the web?
• I can't find what I'm looking for.
• Users cannot find the information wanted despite
  it being available!!
• Information architecture concerns the structure
  of the content of a site so that it meets user
  expectations.
• Organizational systems schemes, structures

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Content Organization

• Organizational schemes classification systems
  for organizing content into groups
• Organizational structures defining the
  relationships among the groups
• Research and interview techniques How to
  discover a way to organize things so users can
  find what they want
• Controlled vocabularies and thesauri

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Graphic overview scheme and structure

• You have a mass of content that you want your
  users to be able to find

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How to Organize so Users Can Find Things?

• First, group related things, forming the groups
  in terms of the way users think. (How? We will
  see.)

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This is an organizational scheme

• Now have the users give names to the groups

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How do the groups relate to each other, continued

• Perhaps with hyperlinks

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Organizational structures schemes

• Remember
• A scheme groups similar things together
• A structure shows how those groups are related
• How to discover how users think
• How do they see the groupings

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Organizational Schemes

• Familiar in everyday life
• Phone book
• Appointment book
• Shopping mall diagram with store locations

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Exact organizational schemes

• Alphabetical phone book, for example
• Chronological appointment book, for example
• Geographical shopping mall diagram, for example
• Effective when you know what you want
• Also called know-item search
• Looking for a book on a library catalog
• Author index exact scheme
• Subject index not an exact scheme

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Not always possible

• Where can I find sardines packed in water, with
  no salt added?
• In the canned fish section?
• In the dietetic foods section?

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Ambiguous Organizational Scheme

• Ambiguous describes organizational situations
  where there is more than one reasonable way to
  group things,
• as with the low-sodium tomato soup.
• Four valuable types of ambiguous organizational
  schemes
• Topical
• Task-oriented
• Audience-specific
• Metaphor-driven

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Topical organizational scheme

• Organizes content by subject
• Examples
• Library subject index
• Encyclopedia
• Chapter titles in textbooks
• Website home pages (usually combined with other
  schemes as well)

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Task-Oriented Organizational Scheme

• Organizes content by what user wants to do.
• Scheme of choice for menus in software packages
• Usable when only a limited number of user actions
  are expected

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Task-oriented Organizational scheme

• Example Autobytel.com

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Audience-specific Organizational scheme

• Useful when there are two or more distinct user
  groups
• User may navigate to appropriate page and
  bookmark it

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Audience-specific organizational scheme

• Example Bank of Montreal

Specific audiences
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Metaphor-driven Organizational scheme

• Shows group by a visual metaphor.
• Help users to relate to something they already
  know
• Not many examples because
• It is difficult to find metaphors that will work
  with all users.
• Possible example pet supply store

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See the problem?

• This is a hamster,
• but what if your user thinks its a rat,
• and hates rats?

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Hybrid Organizational scheme

• Combines multiple organizational schemes
• Quite common,
• but must be done with care to avoid confusion
• Example Nordstrom
• Topical list is horizontal across the top
• Left-column is task-oriented

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Hybrid Organizational scheme
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Organizational Structures

• Organizational schemes create groups
• Organizational structures define the relations
  between groups

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Organizational structures

• Forms the basis for how a user will navigate a
  site
• Consider with extra care which structure to use
• Most common types of structures
• Hierarchy
• Hypertext
• Database
• Some times one of them, or a combination

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Hierarchical Organizational Structure

• Structuring by rank or level
• A tree, in computer science terms
• People are familiar with them
• Provides top-down view of the site

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Definitions

• Breadth of a hierarchy the number of links
  available at each level
• Depth of a hierarchy the number of levels
• Broad-shallow hierarchies offer many choices at
  each level
• Narrow-deep hierarchies require many clicks to
  get to the bottom level
• Users prefer broad-shallow hierarchies

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Hierarchy

• Some drawbacks
• User wants to go from some lower-level page to
  another
• Often subject matter will not support a
  completely hierarchical structure
• A book has an index as well as a chapter
  hierarchy
• Fell free to accommodate context by adding some
  cross-references when needed
• Identify need for cross-references user and task
  analysis and during testing

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Hypertext Organizational Structures

• Structure consist of items of information and the
  links connecting them
• Has great flexibility,
• But can be confusing to users
• It is easy to get lost among the links
• Almost always combined with other structures
• Consists of adding links to a page
• Hard to find a commercial website that does not
  use hypertext

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Database Organizational Structures

• Database organizational structure provides a
  bottom-up view, whereas a hierarchy provides a
  top-down
• In a database structure the user fills in data,
  and is then taken directly to the right page.
• One click, when it works ideally.
• Works well for content that can be organized in a
  tabular format

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Database example selecting a car model
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Database Structure

• Multiple values in multiple fields can be
  specified
• Facilities for using Boolean terms AND, OR, NOT
• Not knowing how to use them can be frustrating
• Look at portal.acm.org
• It does not provide for Booleans as a first
  choice
• Results of database search should indicate
  relevance
• Affords opportunity to search more pages than if
  each page had to be examined
• Database queries require precision in search
  terms controlled vocabulary and thesaurus

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Controlled vocabulary

• Predetermined set of terms that describe a
  specific domain
• There are no synonyms
• Only one term describes a concept
• Can help combat the ambiguity of English
• Determining the terms and using them consistently
  in the site will be very helpful in helping users
  find what they want

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Thesaurus

• Contains
• Synonyms
• Broader terms
• Narrower terms
• Variants (including misspellings)
• Used in conjunction with a controlled vocabulary,
  makes searching more effective
• Incorporating a thesaurus is a major undertaking
• Software support
• Multiple interactions of user interviews and
  testing

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Research and Interview Techniques

• Problem how do you know what your users
  categories are?
• Will they look for a sweater under Winter Wear or
  under Mens Clothing?
• What do they expect to find under About Us?
• What can you put on the home page for a college
  that will lead most directly to the tuition?
• You dont know!
• Not until you ask your users . . .
• . . . who, of course, have no idea what you mean
  by What are your categories?

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Analyze Documents forObjects and Actions

• Redesigning a site
• examine site for objects (nouns) and actions
  (verbs)
• New site
• Examine any related paper documents
• Commercial website examine the business case with
  great detail
• Shopping center --gt look at their catalog
• Refer to user and task analysis
• These and others to help identify content

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Card sorting to help select Site's information
architecture

• Devise a list of about 40 questions that a user
  might have
• Write each question on a card number cards on
  back
• Ask each user to sort the cards into piles, where
  the cards in each pile seem related to each other
• Ask the user to give a name to each pile
• Do this with ten or more users
• Do statistical analysis of the clustering in the
  groups

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Card Sorting

• Devise a list of questions with care
• Avoid using terms that can be mistaken as a
  category
• Avoid phasing that would tend to imply group
• Apply for, Request
• Apply for graduation check Graduation check
• Apply for tuition remission Tuition remision
• Apply for incomplete Incomplete
• Request game tickets Game tickets
• Request payment deferment Payment deferment
• request cap and gown rental Cap and gown rental

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Card sorting

• Ask each user to sort the cards into piles, where
  the cards in each pile seem related to each other
• Empower the user,
• you are the expert
• Avoid leading the user, but be supportive,
• you are doing fine
• How many groups?
• more than one
• As many as make sense
• Ask the user to give a name to each pile

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Card sorting

• Look for commonalities in how users grouped the
  cards
• Do statistical analysis of the clustering in the
  groups using Similarity rating
• cards in the same pile get 1 point
• Add up all times two cards appear together and
  divide by the number of groups ---gt similarity
  rating
• Will tell you how strongly items are related
• Helps organize information at page level
• Helps organize website to reflect users view of
  content

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Alternative Cluster Analysis

• Can be done be eyeball, just looking at the
  piles for patterns
• Examine data looking for pairs of numbers that
  appear together
• Much better use cluster analysis software
• Obtain CardZort, by Jorge Toro of DePaul
  University
• http//condor.depaul.edu/jtoro/cardzort/index.htm

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Summary

• Organizational schemes classification systems
  for organizing content into groups
• Exact Alphabetical, Chronological, Geographical
• Ambiguous Topical, Task-oriented,
  Audience-specific, metaphor-driven
• Organizational structures defining the
  relationships among the groups
• Hierarchy, Hypertext, Database
• Controlled vocabularies and thesauri
• Card sorting