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Information Architecture as Storytelling

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  • + acloskey acloskey 7 months ago
    Yes, you understand.

    So how far 'outside' of the marketing vehicle can you go? Can you bury pages in the site, excluded from the primary navigation? Do you test secondary users for how they utilize, say, menus in the page footer? Do you find secondary users respond well to redirection to sites more specific to their needs?
  • + texburgher texburgher 7 months ago
    Also, my other name is guest613aee0. Probably, everyone already knows that. But just in case...
  • + guest613aee0 guest613aee0 7 months ago
    @dsbruno Thanks! I’m glad that connected!

    @acloskey That’s an outstanding question, and the honest answer is, 'sometimes.' In the example of the higher education, the only audience I’d be inclined to think of as secondary is 'influencers' of the prospective students. The obvious protagonist is the prospect.

    You may be asking about faculty, current students, alumni, etc though. In this example, I’d think maybe they need their own destinations outside of the enrollment marketing vehicle. Did I understand your question?
  • + acloskey acloskey 7 months ago
    @texburgher - Loved the presentation. Thank you for sharing with us.

    Do your tests reflect secondary users? What are your typical findings? How much weight do these findings carry, relative to primary users, for making changes to the story and architecture?
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Notes on slide 1


WHAT IS INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE?
There’s a lot of to-do lately about what people like me ought to be called, and Whitney Hess is going to give you a knock-em-dead presentation on exactly this topic.
For me, “User Experience” is the very broadest, most generic description of what we’re trying to protect when we make websites.

This is true whether you’re on a team or you’re freelancing, whether you have multiple responsibilities or work in a silo.

My responsibilities range from business strategy to interaction design, and I am called an IA.

WHAT IS INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE?
There’s a lot of to-do lately about what people like me ought to be called, and Whitney Hess is going to give you a knock-em-dead presentation on exactly this topic.
For me, “User Experience” is the very broadest, most generic description of what we’re trying to protect when we make websites.

This is true whether you’re on a team or you’re freelancing, whether you have multiple responsibilities or work in a silo.

My responsibilities range from business strategy to interaction design, and I am called an IA.



I do marketing websites. We don't get asked to make a lot of cool gizmos for users to play with or build software. Our clients are selling goods and services, and they want our websites to effect conversions.

Marketing website is different from app or game. Different from tool in and of itself.
There are marketing goals. Conversion. Concepts of alphas, betas, and gammas. Who is the site for? How does alpha arrive? Beta? Gamma?

I do marketing websites. We don't get asked to make a lot of cool gizmos for users to play with or build software. Our clients are selling goods and services, and they want our websites to effect conversions.

Marketing website is different from app or game. Different from tool in and of itself.
There are marketing goals. Conversion. Concepts of alphas, betas, and gammas. Who is the site for? How does alpha arrive? Beta? Gamma?





Clients have one set of needs & users may or may not care about what client wants them to care about.
Who are they selling to? Their board or their customers?

Listening to stakeholders will tell you one thing.
User observation will tell you another.
DO BOTH

Who is the site for? How does alpha arrive? Beta? Gamma?


Clients have one set of needs.
Users may or may not care about what client wants them to care about.
Board/stakeholders will tell you one thing. User observation will tell you another.

Who are they selling to? Their board or their customers?

Who is the site for? How does alpha arrive? Beta? Gamma?

Website is not an auditorium. At best, it’s a date. But it’s okay for it to be a campfire.

Isolate the primary group and speak to them.

Get inside the mind of that protagonist
Understand who they are

If you want a girl to fall for you, don't talk all about you you you. You ask about her.
Find our her interests. Do things she likes to do.
Show her you are her type of guy - don't tell her about it.

You don't seduce a lot of women by being an obvious narcissist (you have to hide it).

Get inside the mind of that protagonist
Understand who they are

If you want a girl to fall for you, don't talk all about you you you. You ask about her.
Find our her interests. Do things she likes to do.
Show her you are her type of guy - don't tell her about it.

You don't seduce a lot of women by being an obvious narcissist (you have to hide it).


Website is a story into which the protagonist can project himself and of which he is the center and by which his needs and the client’s objectives are merged.


FORGET THE 1.0, 2.0 NONSENSE.

Our job is to know preserve the timeless even when the trendy threatens its apparent validity, to combine it with the popular, in short to use all the best means at our disposal to make a story. And timeless does exist. People trust it and enjoy it.

Consider this: Each of us has come here today, more or less by horse and buggy, to sit in some really comfortable chairs and look at pictures and words while people talk to you. Is that worthwhile? Is it connecting? Enriching? Motivating? Do you think of it as outmoded? You obviously don't resist \"using\" that paradigm. Here you are.

This is the 1.0 vs. 2.0 nonsense we need to erase from our egos and consciousness.

Show, don’t tell?

Show AND Tell.



In other words, the story is about the protagonist. The website is about the user.

First generation brochureware site: Reader is onlooker.
Second generation brochureware site: Reader can project himself into story (voice change)
Evolution: Reader becomes contributor.

-projection into story is one aspect (1.0)
-involvement in the story is a second (2.0)



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Information Architecture as Storytelling - Presentation Transcript

  1. Storytelling Information Architecture
  2. Wait up a sec!
  3. Wait up a sec! Don’t you mean User Experience Design?
  4. Who? On what unfortunate subjects do you practice this dark art you call “Information Architecture?”
  5. Marketing Websites Extranets Other 4% 13% 83% Types of websites from which the presenter’s primary and most recent experience comes.
  6. Marketing Websites
  7. Marketing Websites So, like, brochureware? That’s so passé!
  8. Trend chaser. That’s so passé!
  9. Trend chaser. Sore loser.
  10. :( Sore loser.
  11. :( :(
  12. Matchmaking Storytelling and Seduction
  13. The Protagonist
  14. The Protagonist You cannot seduce everyone at once.
  15. User Target Groups By Importance (example) Motivated Prospects (alphas) Skeptical Prospects (betas) Uninterested Losers (gammas) 0 37.5 75 112.5 150 Who do you need to seduce for your client?
  16. Primary Audience / User Group Skeptical Prospects (betas) 0 37.5 75 112.5 150 Who do you need to seduce for your client?
  17. Who is the protagonist? • read and do market research • listen to client input • study analytics • ask around • think deeply • use your intuition • make personas
  18. Who is the protagonist? • what is he like? • what motivates her? • how does he play? • what does she have no patience for? • what are his values? • why won’t she return my calls?
  19. You may have to guess. It’s better to take a position that’s imperfect than to fail to take a position.
  20. The Story
  21. The Story What happens to the protagonist in pursuit of an objective?
  22. Story is not a deprecated feature.
  23. Story
  24. Story Is the most enduring form of communication in human history.
  25. Story is not its narration. Whether by an authoritative voice or the collective voice.
  26. Story
  27. Story Embodies claims in addition to overtly making them.
  28. Story Is trend & technology agnostic.
  29. Story Is trend & technology agnostic. Not 1.0
  30. Story Is trend & technology agnostic. Not 1.0 Not 2.0 either
  31. The story of the website is the seduction, and the story of the seduction, of the protagonist, by the story of the website.
  32. Build the story’s unfolding.
  33. Build the story’s unfolding. WTF? And how?
  34. Use Information Architecture!
  35. Use Information Architecture! • Navigation indices & labels
  36. Use Information Architecture! • Navigation indices & labels • Organization principles
  37. Use Information Architecture! • Navigation indices & labels • Organization principles • Language and tone
  38. Use Information Architecture! • Navigation indices & labels • Organization principles • Language and tone • Interaction patterns
  39. Use Information Architecture! • Navigation indices & labels • Organization principles • Language and tone • Interaction patterns • Tell + show + engage
  40. Use Information Architecture! • Navigation indices & labels • Organization principles • Language and tone • Interaction patterns • Tell + show + engage • Titles, headings, guide text
  41. Use Information Architecture! • Navigation indices & labels • Organization principles • Language and tone • Interaction patterns • Tell + show + engage • Titles, headings, guide text • Become Chuck Woolery
  42. The litmus test: Does this - this hierarchy, this section, this page, this language, this device, etc. - support the protagonist as he pursues his goal in the story.
  43. Unless the answer is an honest “yes,”
  44. Unless the answer is an honest “yes,” It has to go.
  45. Get it right.
  46. Get it right. Don’t we always?
  47. Test your hypotheses.
  48. Test your hypotheses. • Conduct formal testing
  49. Test your hypotheses. • Conduct formal testing • Testers
  50. Test your hypotheses. • Conduct formal testing • Testers • Actual Users
  51. Test your hypotheses. • Conduct formal testing • Testers • Actual Users • Conduct informal testing
  52. Test your hypotheses. • Conduct formal testing • Testers • Actual Users • Conduct informal testing • Friends, lovers, Twitter pals
  53. Test your hypotheses. • Conduct formal testing • Testers • Actual Users • Conduct informal testing • Friends, lovers, Twitter pals • Coworkers & stakeholders
  54. Test your hypotheses. • Conduct formal testing • Testers • Actual Users • Conduct informal testing • Friends, lovers, Twitter pals • Coworkers & stakeholders • Measure results
  55. Test your hypotheses. • Conduct formal testing • Testers • Actual Users • Conduct informal testing • Friends, lovers, Twitter pals • Coworkers & stakeholders • Measure results • Analytics
  56. Test your hypotheses. • Conduct formal testing • Testers • Actual Users • Conduct informal testing • Friends, lovers, Twitter pals • Coworkers & stakeholders • Measure results • Analytics • Anecdotes
  57. Keep reaching.
  58. The End.
  59. The End. Thank you!

+ texburghertexburgher, 7 months ago

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Slides from my April 4th presentation at Web Design more

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