1. Closing the
Findability Gap
8 better practices from
information architecture
Lou Rosenfeld • Rosenfeld Media • rosenfeldmedia.com

2. Hello, my name is Lou
www.louisrosenfeld.com | www.rosenfeldmedia.com

4. The state of
contemporary
findability

5. Some questions that you
probably can’t answer
• Who are your content’s primary audiences?
• What are the five major tasks and needs
each has?
• Are you satisfying those tasks and needs?
• What data support your thinking?
• How do you measure success?

6. Why can’t we get
findability right?

7. Why can’t we get
findability right?

8. Why can’t we get
findability right?
• We don’t know how to diagnose

9. Why can’t we get
findability right?
• We don’t know how to diagnose
• We don’t know how to measure

10. Why can’t we get
findability right?
• We don’t know how to diagnose
• We don’t know how to measure
• Siloed organizations

11. Why can’t we get
findability right?
• We don’t know how to diagnose
• We don’t know how to measure
• Siloed organizations
• Ill-equipped decision-makers

12. Why can’t we get
findability right?
• We don’t know how to diagnose
• We don’t know how to measure
• Siloed organizations
• Ill-equipped decision-makers
• Short-term thinking

13. Why can’t we get
findability right?
• We don’t know how to diagnose
• We don’t know how to measure
• Siloed organizations
• Ill-equipped decision-makers
• Short-term thinking
• Semantic illiteracy

15. Data is binary
Information isn’t

16. Data is binary
Information isn’t

17. Information architecture:
8 better practices for findability
1. Diagnosing the important problems
2. Balancing our evidence
3. Advocating for the long term
4. Measuring engagement
5. Supporting contextual navigation
6. Improving search across silos
7. Combining design approaches effectively
8. Tuning our designs over time

18. #1
Diagnosing the
important problems

19. A handful of queries/tasks/ways to navigate/features/
A little goes a long way
documents meet the needs of your most important audiences

20. A handful of queries/tasks/ways to navigate/features/
A little goes a long way
documents meet the needs of your most important audiences
Not all queries
are distributed
equally

21. A handful of queries/tasks/ways to navigate/features/
A little goes a long way
documents meet the needs of your most important audiences

22. A handful of queries/tasks/ways to navigate/features/
A little goes a long way
documents meet the needs of your most important audiences
Nor do they
diminish gradually

23. A handful of queries/tasks/ways to navigate/features/
A little goes a long way
documents meet the needs of your most important audiences

24. A handful of queries/tasks/ways to navigate/features/
A little goes a long way
documents meet the needs of your most important audiences
80/20 rule isn’t
quite accurate

25. (and the tail is quite long)

26. (and the tail is quite long)

27. (and the tail is quite long)

28. (and the tail is quite long)

29. (and the tail is quite long)

30. The Long Tail is
(and the tail is quite long)
much longer than
you’d suspect

31. Zipf Distribution in text

32. It’s Zipf’s World;
we just live in it
A little...
• queries
• tasks
• ways to navigate
• features
• documents
...goes a long way

34. UNVERIFIED RUMOR:

35. UNVERIFIED RUMOR:
90% of

36. UNVERIFIED RUMOR:
90% of
Microsoft.com content

37. UNVERIFIED RUMOR:
90% of
Microsoft.com content
has never been accessed...

38. UNVERIFIED RUMOR:
90% of
Microsoft.com content
has never been accessed...
not even once

39. UNVERIFIED RUMOR:
90% of
Microsoft.com content
has never been accessed...
not even once
TAKEAWAY:

40. UNVERIFIED RUMOR:
90% of
Microsoft.com content
has never been accessed...
not even once
TAKEAWAY:
FOCUS ON

41. UNVERIFIED RUMOR:
90% of
Microsoft.com content
has never been accessed...
not even once
TAKEAWAY:
FOCUS ON
THE STUFF

42. UNVERIFIED RUMOR:
90% of
Microsoft.com content
has never been accessed...
not even once
TAKEAWAY:
FOCUS ON
THE STUFF
THAT MATTERS!

43. #2
Balancing our evidence

44. from Christian Rohrer: http://is.gd/95HSQ2

45. Balanced research
leads to true insight,
new opportunities
from Christian Rohrer: http://is.gd/95HSQ2

46. Lou’s TABLE OF
OVERGENERALIZED Web Analytics User Experience
DICHOTOMIES
Users' intentions and
What they Users' behaviors (what's
motives (why those things
analyze happening)
happen)
Qualitative methods for
What methods Quantitative methods to
explaining why things
they employ determine what's happening
happen
Helps users achieve goals
What they're Helps the organization meet
(expressed as tasks or
trying to achieve goals (expressed as KPI) topics of interest)
Uncover patterns and
How they use Measure performance (goal-
surprises (emergent
data driven analysis)
analysis)
Statistical data ("real" data Descriptive data (in small
What kind of data
in large volumes, full of volumes, generated in lab
they use errors) environment, full of errors)

47. #3
Advocating for the long-term

48. Steward Brand’s Pace Layering
model Typical design
focus
Stuff that gets ignored:
mission, vision, charter,
goals, KPI, objectives

49. #4
Measuring engagement

52. Measuring
conversions?
No problem...

55. ..measuring
anything else?
Good luck!

56. The missing metrics
of in-betweenness
• Orientation (“What can I do here?”)
• Engagement (“I like this; do you?”)
• Connection/cross-promotion (“What goes
with this?”)
• Authority (“I trust this”)
• and many more...

57. #5
Supporting
contextual navigation

58. Contextual navigation:
your site’s desire lines

59. Contextual navigation:
your site’s desire lines
Determine
through content
modeling, site
search analytics

60. Contextual navigation:
your site’s desire lines
Determine
through content
modeling, site
search analytics
Deep navigation requires
content modeling:
a better approach to
deep IA and content structuring

61. Important content objects emerge
concert calendar
from content modeling (example: BBC)
album pages artist descriptions
TV listings
album reviews discography artist bios

62. Important content objects emerge
concert calendar
from content modeling (example: BBC)
album pages artist descriptions
TV listings
Content that
matters most
album reviews discography artist bios

63. Important metadata attributes emerge
from content modeling

64. Important metadata attributes emerge
from content modeling
Metadata that
matters most

65. #6
Improving search across silos

66. Reconsidering the search UI...

67. ...by contextualizing “advanced”
features, focusing on revision

68. ...by contextualizing “advanced”
features, focusing on revision
search session patterns
1. solar energy
2. how solar energy works

69. ...by contextualizing “advanced”
features, focusing on revision
search session patterns
1. solar energy
2. how solar energy works
search session patterns
1. solar energy
2. energy

70. ...by contextualizing “advanced”
features, focusing on revisionsearch session patterns
search session patterns 1. solar energy
1. solar energy 2. solar energy charts
2. how solar energy works
search session patterns
1. solar energy
2. energy

71. ...by contextualizing “advanced”
features, focusing on revision search session patterns
search session patterns 1. solar energy
1. solar energy 2. solar energy charts
2. how solar energy works
search session patterns
search session patterns 1. solar energy
1. solar energy 2. explain solar energy
2. energy

72. ...by contextualizing “advanced”
features, focusing on revision search session patterns
search session patterns 1. solar energy
1. solar energy 2. solar energy charts
2. how solar energy works
search session patterns
search session patterns 1. solar energy
1. solar energy 2. explain solar energy
2. energy
search session patterns
1. solar energy
2. solar energy news

73. Recognizing
specialized queries
(e.g., proper nouns,
dates, unique ID#s)

74. ...and designing specialized search results

75. ...and designing specialized search results

76. ...and designing specialized search results

77. Content objects
from product
content model
...and designing specialized search results

78. Poor search
results returned
by search engine
Content objects
from product
content model
...and designing specialized search results

79. #7
Combining design approaches
effectively

80. Yes, manual effort is still as
important as tools

81. Yes, manual effort is still as
important as tools
Narrow, deep
content access

82. Vanguard’s Tax Center is a
simple, low-tech, editorial

83. Vanguard’s Tax Center is a
simple, low-tech, editorial
...to editorially
rich content

85. Manually
selected results

86. Manually
selected results
...complement
raw results

87. Treat your content
Each layer is
cumulative;
most important
like an onion content is at
the core
information
layer usability content strategy
architecture
indexed by search
0 engine
leave it alone leave it alone
squeaky wheel issues
1 tagged by users
addressed
refresh annually
tagged by experts (non- test with a service
2 topical tags) (e.g., UserTesting.com)
refresh monthly
tagged by experts “traditional” lab-based titled according to
3 (topical tags) user testing guidelines
content models for structured according
4 contextual navigation
A/B testing
to schema

88. #8
Tuning designs over time

89. Your site is a moving target
built on moving targets

90. Impact of change on design
(queries)

91. Impact of change on design
(queries)
Interest in the
football team:
going...

92. Impact of change on design
(queries)
Interest in the
football team:
going...
...going...

93. Impact of change on design
(queries)
Interest in the
football team:
going...
...going...
gone

94. Impact of change on design
(queries)
Time to
Interest in the
study!
football team:
going...
...going...
gone

95. IRS before Tax Day

96. Before
Tax Day
IRS before Tax Day

97. IRS after Tax Day

98. After
Tax Day
IRS after Tax Day

99. Summary:
8 IA better practices
1. Diagnosing the important problems
2. Balancing our evidence
3. Advocating for the long term
4. Measuring engagement
5. Supporting contextual navigation
6. Improving search across silos
7. Combining design approaches effectively
8. Tuning our designs over time

100. Summary:
8 IA better practices
1. Diagnosing the important problems
2. Balancing our evidence
3. Advocating for the long term
4. Measuring engagement
5. Supporting contextual navigation
6. Improving search across silos
7. Combining design approaches effectively
8. Tuning our designs over time
Let’s stop boiling the ocean

101. Say hello
Lou Rosenfeld
lou@louisrosenfeld.com
Rosenfeld Media
www.louisrosenfeld.com | @louisrosenfeld
www.rosenfeldmedia.com | @rosenfeldmedia