Organizing Help Content: Breaking Out of Topic-Based

HierarchiesSTC Webinar. Dec 1, 2011

Tom Johnson • idratherbewriting.com • @tomjohnson

THE PROBLEM

Where would you find this in a grocery store?

Image from TradeKorea

Next to the coconuts?

Next to the cream?

In canned goods?

In the dessert section?

In the ethnic food aisle?

Topics frequently overlap.

lays eggs • venomous • beaver’s tail • otter feet • duck’s bill

Image from Wikipedia

There isn’t an absolute order to find

Radiolab excerpt

Image from Wikipedia

Each contributes toward the solution

Findability

Search MetadataUser Research Indexes and

GlossariesQuick Reference Guides

Personalization

Interface Text Tags and CategoriesAlternative Modes Level-based Learning

SEARCH

Google works. Why not imitate it?

immediate trust • intuitive to use • users prefer this method

SEO Factors to Rank High on Google

• The number of links pointing to your site

• The authority of the sites linking to you• The text used in the links linking to you• The frequency of the keywords,

especially in the title, first paragraph, and h1, h2, h3 tags

• Your own site’s Pagerank

Problem: Google has armies of authors.

Search Algorithms Differ

• WordPress: Sorts based on date.

• SharePoint: Defined by search scope settings.

• Mediawiki: Results segmented by namespaces.

• Author-it: Change and changing are not the same.

• Flare: Exact matches rank extremely high.

Search fails when users don't know exact terms.

From Donna Spencer’s Practical Guide to Information Architecture

Search fails to help you discover unknown unknowns.

“There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we now know we don’t know. But there are also unknown unknowns. These are things we do not know we don’t know.” -- Donald Rumsfeld, qtd. by Peter Morville

Youtube video link

METADATA

Digital spaces allow near infinite rearrangements

See David Weinberger’s Everything Is Miscellaneous

You can create navigation filters based on your content’s facets.

Image from gwilmore on Flickr

You can push and pull topics in various arrangements through

metadata.

•“Faceted navigation is arguably the most significant search innovation of the past decade.”

–- Peter Morville, Search Patterns

Two Types of Entry Points

Dynamic Navigation Static Navigation

Example from Sarah Maddox/Matthew Ellison

You can choose different entry points into the content.

Different entry points into the content.

To facilitate multiple arrangements, you have to chunk

your content.

The Alarm Clock Metaphor

Metaphor from Mark Baker’s blog, Every Page Is Page One

First break content into small chunks…

But only if they have meaning alone.

I chunked up my content.

I added metadata.

I inserted metadata into each topic.

I ran the queries based on metadata.

I gave users navigation options.

New problem: Everything is a list

Our tools aren’t capable of the task

Skyscrapers by freevector

INTERFACE TEXT

Principles for Interface Text

•Clarity: Focus efforts on fuzzy words. Is it the right word for the context?

•Position: Group the text close to the action the user will perform.

•Convention: Follow standards for names and locations.

•Error Messages. Make messages informative.

•Brevity: “Too much text discourages reading” (MSDN).

Context-Sensitive Help

No need to leave task at hand • immediate findability • jquery

Problem: Forest vs. Tree View

Forest overview image from Flickr

Tree from alantankengoe Flickr

Problem: UI Text Annoys Advancd Users

Interface text addresses first-time needs, then gets in the way for experienced users.

INDEXES

Indexes

Image from ACJI on Flickr

familiarity • leverages synonyms • effective

Alternative Indexes

Problems with Indexes

•Studies show people prefer to search.

• Indexes are tedious and hard to create.

•You need a HAT to keep it synchronized.

QUICK REFERENCE GUIDES

Quick Reference Guides

minimalist• just enough to get started • users not overwhelmed • simple • 80/20

Problems with Quick Reference Guides

•Solves first-time need only

•Content irrelevant until user gets into interface

•Potentially creates another version of the source

•Layout intensive

PERSONALIZATION

Personalization

Reduces scope of content • speaks directly to user• all relevant content

Problem: Authentication

•System must have a way to identify the user’s role.

•Tough to authenticate users seamlessly.

•Overlapping roles make it difficult to select the correct role for users.

TAGGING

Tags and Categories

Group content in more than one place • web standard • flexible

Problem: A Flat File Structure

ALTERNATIVE LEARNING MODES

Video

Visual learners • interactivity necessary for learning • makes sense

Beginning to End Scenarios

Problems with Videos

•Not easy to search and skim for information.

•Almost impossible to translate.

•Video narration doesn’t appear in searches unless you include a transcript below the video.

•Expensive to create and maintain.

•Requires skills that go beyond the training of most technical writers.

LEVEL-BASED LEARNING

Learn to crawl before you walk

acknowledges cognitive sequence • follows natural learning models

From Kathy Sierra, Creating Passionate Users

Problems with Level-based Organization

•Requires sophisticated planning to leverage content re-use.

• Information isn’t all in one source.

•Assumes your audience has patience to be in a learning mode.

USER RESEARCH

Card Sorting

Photo from Rosenfeld Media on Flickr

Affinity Diagrams

See LDSTech for more details. Photos from LDSTech.

Surface the overall messages

See LDSTech for more details. Photos from LDSTech.

Treejack Method: Where would you go to find information for this

task?

Image from Optimal Workshop

Is Findability “Solvable”?

“Different people see the world too differently for us ever to solve findability. Finding the information you need will always be work. It will always be a skill that people have to learn. We can help, but we cannot solve. Our efforts in the field of findability ought to be focused not on achieving perfect effortless findability (which is unattainable) but at easing the work of finding that the user has to do for themselves.”

-- Mark Baker, Every Page Is Page One

The Problem May Be the Mindset

Pythagoras image from Wikipedia. Stellar image from NASA Jet Labs Database.

Contact Information

Tom JohnsonBlog: Idratherbewriting.com

Email: tom@idratherbewriting.com

Twitter: @tomjohnson