Best Practices for
Information Architecture
and Enterprise Search
Agnes Molnar
Founder, Managing Consultant,
Search Explained

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Introduction – Agnes Molnar
7 years SharePoint Server MVP
Enterprise Search, Information Architecture
Founder & Managing Consultant
Worldwide Consultancy, Guidance, Trainings,
Workshops
Web: http://SearchExplained.com
Yammer: http://yammer.com/SearchExplained
Twitter: @molnaragnes
E-mail: agnes.molnar@SearchExplained.com

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Agenda
Information Architecture:
Organize and Classify the Content
Enterprise Search:
Find the Proper and Relevant Content

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Information Architecture
The art and science of organizing and labeling
the CONTENT
(documents, web sites, blog posts, database entries, etc.)
to support findability and usability

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Enterprise Search
Connects people
to the information
they need to get their jobs done

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Enterprise Search
Search Technology
that your organization
owns and controls

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ENTERPRISE CONTENT
MANAGEMENT

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Content Management in SharePoint

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Content Management in SharePoint

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Organize and Classify Content
in SharePoint
Document Libraries & Folders
Content Types
Document Sets
Managed Metadata
Document ID
Workflows
Content Organizer Rules
…

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Folders or Not Folders?
Linear Structure
• Requires drilling down to sub-folders
• Difficulty in finding content
• Inefficient during upload
Every File HAS to belong to ONE folder
Moving document = URL change
Deep folder structure = long URL
• Max URL length: 256 characters
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Folders or Not Folders?
Lack of flexibility in views
No Synonyms
Folder names cannot contain special characters
Folder structure can be modified by any team
member (Contributor)
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Folders or Not Folders?
Lack of Standards
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Folders or Not Folders? - Alternatives
Tagging
Document ID
Content Type
Document Set
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Why Keep Using Folders?
Risk of low user adoption
Metadata is a huge mind shift
Permission model (folder-level)
Bulk upload – No metadata enforcing/support
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How to use Folders?
Combine Folders + Metadata + Content Types
+ Document Sets + …
Create “Without Folders” View
• Hides folder structure
• Eliminates hierarchy
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Location: Folders vs. Document Sets
Document Sets:
Components, similar to folders, that enable users to
collaborate on related documents without having to
create a new document library or site.

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Document Sets in SP2010
Document Library
Document_1
Document_2
Folder_1
Document_F1_1
Document_F1_2
Folder_F1_1 Folder_F1_1_1 Document_F1_1_1_1
DocumentSet_F1_1 Document_DS_F1_1_1
Folder_2
Folder_3
DocumentSet_1
Document_DS1_1
Document_DS1_2

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Document Sets in SP2013
Document Library
Document_1
Document_2
Folder_1
Document_F1_1
Document_F1_2
Folder_F1_1 Folder_F1_1_1 Document_F1_1_1_1
DocumentSet_F1_1 Document_DS_F1_1_1
Folder_2
Folder_3
DocumentSet_1
Document_DS1_1
Document_DS1_2
Folder_F1_1 Folder_F1_1_1 Document_F1_1_1_1

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Content Types
Document
Document_Root
Contract Technical Document
Requirements
System
Requirements
Functional
Requirements
Case Study User Manual
Marketing
Presentation
For Business
Decision Makers
For Developers
For Admins

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Content Types
Storing the Templates in local folders

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Content Types
Organize the Templates into Template Library

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Content Organizer Rules
Property based rules
Users don’t need to know where to save
anymore
Well organized content
Searchability and Findability

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Content Organizer Rules
•Use if you have clear organizing requirements
•Deploy a good Search Architecture  Search
Based Navigation
•Don’t forget to turn on the Content Organizer
Feature – on the Target Site too!
•Don’t forget to implement Content Types in the
Target Libraries
•Teach the users!

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ENTERPRISE SEARCH

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Organize and Refine Results
in SharePoint Search
Refinement Panel
 Managed Properties
Result Sources / Query Rules
 Properties (Metadata)
 Content Source
 Content Type
 …
Core Results Web Part
 Managed Properties
 Customization
Hover Panel
 Managed Properties
 Customization

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Search Metadata –
Crawled/Managed Properties
Crawled property: metadata extracted from the
documents/items during the crawl.
Managed property: created from crawled
properties, controlled by the Search Admins,
helping users perform more efficient and
successful queries:
 Refiners
 Properties displayed in Search Results
 Sorting Properties (FAST)

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Identifying and Planning Managed Properties
Crawled
Property
Managed
Property
Author
CreatedBy
From
Author
Usage
Refiner
Display on
Result Set
Display on
Hover Panel
Sorting by

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Search Metadata
Refinement
Result Type &
Display Template
On Hover
Panel
Query &
Query Rules

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Search Metadata

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Managed Navigation
+ Search

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Managed Navigation

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Conclusions

Thank you for your attention!
This presentation will be available on the Toronto
SharePoint Summit web site a few days after the event.

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