IA Summit 08: Taxonomy is User Experience
Taxonomy is User Experience
Dave Cooksey
GSI Commerce
Dave talked about how the establishment of a taxonomy is directly tied to how users experience a site... His examples revolved around a redesign of the Dicks Sporting Goods & Ace Hardware websites.
Some notes...
Taxonomy is a framework
- Taxonomy is classification & labeling
- Metadata is data about terms in the taxonomy both structured & unstructured (attributes for facets)
- Logic, systems that represent understanding i.e. mapping - did you mean this?
5 Good ideas for Taxonomy objects
1. Leave your cubicle
- engage everyone from client to designers & developers
- limit engagement with timelines & hard stops
- work collaboratively
- create conversations
- keep interactions in mind
- help plan implementation
2. Focus on Interactions
- taxonomy enables finding & decision
- facets & filters need good data
- crucial in highly interactive experiences
- make the connection, clearly demonstrate how data drives experience
3. Speak their language
- use shared references (the long tail)
- talk about results (analytics, quantitative UX indicators)
- celebrate success
4. Test using *real* users
- taxonomies must be user-centric
- involve users (implicitly / explicitly)
- keep it simple
5. Plan the future
- taxonomy guidelines
- plan maintenance
Taxonomy is strategy
Slides coming soon
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