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A Book Apart #29
Everyday Information Architecture
The design of information on the web changes the way people find, understand, and use that information—for better or for worse. Lisa Maria Martin shows you how to leverage the principles and practices of information architecture in order to craft more thoughtful and effective digital spaces. Learn how to analyze your site’s content and structure, build clear and consistent taxonomies, and develop more strategic sitemaps. Because when we’re intentional about how we organize web content, we create better experiences for everyone.
126 pages, Paperback
First published April 16, 2019
28 people are currently reading
970 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews
May 3, 2019
I'm a three-time failure at reading the Polar Bear Book.
I'm also a Principal Information Architect with 10 years' experience.
I'm not telling you not to read the Polar Bear Book. I am telling you that if you want a short, direct, and well-structured book on what Information Architecture is, how to get started practicing it, and real-world examples of prior work, this is the book to start with.
It is the IA cohort to The Elements of Content Strategy.
I started this book while sitting in a hospital room watching my husband sleep. It's readable even under extreme stress. The book starts with the LATCH system of organization, which I had learned... but when I'd learned it through the quasi-apprenticeship of a mutual fund company's design department, it didn't have a name. So here I was, middle of the afternoon, snoring and beeping filling the room, and ten-year veteran of information architecture, learning things I didn't know on page 5.
Your milage may vary (YMMV), especially if you're one of those younger folks for whom information architecture degrees were available. (We had library science but I was too short-sighted to major in it.)
The book is vibrant and well-structured enough that I could put it down for a week at a time if I needed to and pick it up again and keep reading and understand where I'd left off. (Also, YMMV.)
Plus, this book isn't afraid to use Star Trek, Ravelry, cooking, self-deprecating spreadsheet jokes, and colorful, useful examples.
To sum up, this book is going on the list of books anyone who asks me how to start a career in UX, along with Don't Make Me Think, Revisited: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability, How to Make Sense of Any Mess: Information Architecture for Everybody and Universal Principles of Design: 100 Ways to Enhance Usability, Influence Perception, Increase Appeal, Make Better Design Decisions, and Teach Through Design.
I'm also a Principal Information Architect with 10 years' experience.
I'm not telling you not to read the Polar Bear Book. I am telling you that if you want a short, direct, and well-structured book on what Information Architecture is, how to get started practicing it, and real-world examples of prior work, this is the book to start with.
It is the IA cohort to The Elements of Content Strategy.
I started this book while sitting in a hospital room watching my husband sleep. It's readable even under extreme stress. The book starts with the LATCH system of organization, which I had learned... but when I'd learned it through the quasi-apprenticeship of a mutual fund company's design department, it didn't have a name. So here I was, middle of the afternoon, snoring and beeping filling the room, and ten-year veteran of information architecture, learning things I didn't know on page 5.
Your milage may vary (YMMV), especially if you're one of those younger folks for whom information architecture degrees were available. (We had library science but I was too short-sighted to major in it.)
The book is vibrant and well-structured enough that I could put it down for a week at a time if I needed to and pick it up again and keep reading and understand where I'd left off. (Also, YMMV.)
Plus, this book isn't afraid to use Star Trek, Ravelry, cooking, self-deprecating spreadsheet jokes, and colorful, useful examples.
To sum up, this book is going on the list of books anyone who asks me how to start a career in UX, along with Don't Make Me Think, Revisited: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability, How to Make Sense of Any Mess: Information Architecture for Everybody and Universal Principles of Design: 100 Ways to Enhance Usability, Influence Perception, Increase Appeal, Make Better Design Decisions, and Teach Through Design.
May 16, 2020
A lot of designers I speak with want to work on teams where they can ask questions and learn from teammates. That's what this books is like. A kind, gentle, breezy read that's like popping your head over a cubicle wall and asking your neighbor how to do the taxonomy. Or how to audit content, organize sites, or design navigation.
The books is organized around activities, like figuring our site structure, and each chapter includes a good way to document the outcome of the activity. Each chapter presents no-nonsense and clear how-tos, whys, and even better, responses to the kinds of common push back you run into from stakeholders and teammates.
I recommend this book for product managers, UX designers, content strategists, and information architects.
The books is organized around activities, like figuring our site structure, and each chapter includes a good way to document the outcome of the activity. Each chapter presents no-nonsense and clear how-tos, whys, and even better, responses to the kinds of common push back you run into from stakeholders and teammates.
I recommend this book for product managers, UX designers, content strategists, and information architects.
August 5, 2024
"Information literary is low, stress is high, distractions are abundant, and capitalism is a grind."
This is a good book for beginners, with easy-to-grasp concepts about IA. I wouldn't say that I learned a lot about the topic and became a master of IA after reading it, but one thing is for sure: Lisa Maria Martin and her writing have had some effect on my sense of humor. This book is surprisingly fun to read, just as I'd expect from someone who does web design for a living. The web itself is a funny business everyone.
May 24, 2019
“Information isn’t neutral; neither are the choices we make about how to present it, structure it, write it, juxtapose it, or classify it. Every design decision makes an impact; it’s just a question of whether we can stand up and own that impact.”
This is a fantastic book that should be required reading for anyone designing, writing, or managing any bit of digital space.
This is a fantastic book that should be required reading for anyone designing, writing, or managing any bit of digital space.
May 30, 2023
Made a ton of notes and got ideas. Funny and an explanation of Ravelry's taxonomy? A work book made in heaven.
November 15, 2021
See full review here.
~ Lisa Maria Martin
Everyday Information Architecture follows Richard Saul Wurman's assertion that information is infinite, but the ways of structuring information is not. According to Wurman, information can be ordered by Location, Alphabetically, Time (chronologically), Categorically, or Hierarchically (aka LATCH). Lisa Maria Martin thoroughly explores these methods and adds two more based on the work of Katherine Bertolucci.
I'll use my own blog, Beyond the Frame, as a way to concretely explore the book’s methodology. My blog offers an analysis of our information age: from the social impact of technology to the meaning of computational aesthetics found in art and nature. The potential breadth can be overwhelming; principled organization is required.
Exploring LATCH
Location
Each post on my blog contains location metadata. Ordering all posts by location reveals the following:
Turin, Italy: 25 posts
Berlin, Germany: 7 posts
Udine, Italy: 1 post
Bardonecchia, Italy: 1 post
Peoria, IL, United States: 1 post
This information says something about the author but I suspect it's not the most pertinent way of ordering writing about the information age.
Alphabet
Lisa Maria Martin opines that alphabetizing is for research, not discovery. The dictionary, a book’s index, and the encyclopedia supports her claim.
Beyond the Frame does contain extensive citations in the margins. Most academic papers would also include these sources ordered alphabetically in a bibliography. I’m not sure how useful that would be for myself or my readers, so I don’t maintain such a resource.
Time
On the other hand, I do present chronological information in two different ways. All the posts in Beyond the Frame are presented in reverse chronological order. This ordering is typical in most blogs.
Beyond the Frame also offers a timeline of events relevant that are significant when talking about the transmission of information through time. All events are introduced within articles that provide a deeper dive on the subject.
This timeline is not one of the more popular pages on Beyond the Frame but it provides me a sense of time and space as a researcher.
Category
Martin notes that categorization is fundamentally different than ordering by location, letter, or time; categorization is the act of grouping. After items are grouped, they still need to be ordered.
Beyond the Frame uses two tools for creating categories:
A strict set of tags: #doing, the #humanities, #personal updates, #science and informatics, the #suchness of knowledge, and #tools for thinking.
A post-specific set of keywords. These keywords will proliferate endlessly as I add new posts.
I chose this tag and keyword system as a way to organize my thoughts. It could be criticized by the author of Everyday Information Architecture for not considering the needs of the readers or the strategic goals of Beyond the Frame as a general information resource. Lisa Maria Martin thinks about information architecture much like a designer thinks of user experience. She asks about who is on the site and what they're trying to accomplish. She even suggests vague and unanswerable questions, such as asking what users care about. Everyday Information Architecture doesn't actually explore the latter question seriously. But this is the sort of hand waving occasionally found in this book.
Hierarchy
Hierarchies are a more abstract tool for ordering than location, letter, or time. For example, I can create a hierarchy by listing the top five most-read posts on Beyond the Frame, from the most popular to the least popular:
The Mothers of the Mother of All Demos #humanities, #science
MLK and “Domestic Terrorism” #humanities, #suchness
Be Here Now #personal, #suchness, #review
Fix My Code #humanities, #suchness, #review
Truth Storms the Capitol: #humanities
This is an ordered sequence. The associated collection of tags (category labels) can also be sequenced by popularity:
#humanities
#suchness
#review
#science, #personal
Nested categories can turn these flat hierarchies into multi-dimensional affairs. For example, posts tags as #suchness offer a bevy of keywords: classical, ambient, music, notation, encoding, time, fidelity, information fidelity, computational art, information theory, myths, buddhism, relationships, documentary, oneness, atari, zen, psychedelics, etc...
When designing an effective architecture, Martin asks the reader to answer two questions: who is visiting the site and what that person whats and needs. The author is a bit ambiguous here. Elsewhere in the book she doubts the effectiveness of user persons. I wholly agree with this position. But the two questions she raises sound a lot like user personas.
Rather than sketch a portrait of some imaginary readers of my blog, I'll offer up some analytics. Beyond the Frame saw roughly 22,000 unique visitors in 2021, down from 32,000 unique visitors in 2020. Those people mostly came from Hacker News, Reddit, Twitter, an IndieWeb profile page, and Metafilter.
These are mostly news aggregation sites, so it shouldn't be a surprise that "The Mothers of the Mother of All Demos" and "MLK and “Domestic Terrorism”" were the top performers - both articles referred to current events. They provided additional context and analysis that couldn't be found in major publications.
"Fix My Code" and "Be Here Now" came from more abstract prompts. Julian Shapiro manages to articulate the way abstract motivations connect with audiences: "Does writing this article get a weight off your chest?", "Do you obsess over the topic and want others to geek out on it too?", etc....
"Fix My Code" and "Be Here Now" are likely read by people who want passionately argued, well-researched articles on narrowly focused subjects. Hierarchy helps these people discover other articles with similar motivations, as Martin points out. #humanities is probably too broad to be effective. Changing the tag to #sts (or #ScienceAndTechnologyStudies) would offer a meaningful narrowing. #humanities may be more inclusive, but #sts offers more clarity and specificity. This is the sort of clear thinking that Everyday Information Architecture helps enable.
Canonical Listings, Mnemonics and Randomness
Katherine Bertolucci opined that canonical listings, mnemonics and randomness offer additional organizational methods overlooked by Wurman.
Examples of canonical listings include a book's table of contents and the order of books in the Bible.
"LATCH" itself is ordered as a mnemonic. Adding Canonical Listings, Mnemonics and Randomness to this list could yield LAMTRCCH, which destroys the mnemonic. MR. C. LATCH works much better. Note the letters are sequenced by mnemonic, not their significance or alphabetical position.
Martin argues that randomness is a choice, and thus an organizational principle. The author warns the reader to watch out for sequences that seem random but could be meaningful chains. For example, a grocery list that starts with milk which reminds the author to add cereal.
Finding Information
Ordering information is an attempt to make information findable. The first step is to understand priorities. Martin suggests a process of enumeration to reveal priorities. Count the number of appearances of a keyword or the number of pages dedicated to a site's various offerings.
Information architects also have to understand that people often arrive from a place of not-knowing.
If a person knows exactly what they're trying to find but they don't know where to find it, a search engine likely works best.
People also find information by narrowing the context. For example, finding a lunch based on location or conducting research based on subject.
Re-finding is also a type of not-knowing. They know exactly what they want, but do not know how to look for it.
Conclusion
I have neglected some of the most practical tips in Everyday Information Architecture. Lisa Maria Martin spends a lot of time discussing her many spreadsheets used to organize all the information she collects on behalf of her clients. These spreadsheets are used to improve the architecture of her client's websites.
I actually found these hands-on examples the least useful wisdom in the book. That's why I don't cover them here. A different reader for a different purpose might find them interesting. But they don't carry the intellectual weight of a true methodology.
The book's best moments relies on the work of others. I might use this book in an introductory class to teach applied concepts, but digging into the concepts behind information architecture is better done elsewhere.
[The presentation of information] can’t be arbitrary, because every decision we make - or fail to make - changes the way the information is perceived.
~ Lisa Maria Martin
Everyday Information Architecture follows Richard Saul Wurman's assertion that information is infinite, but the ways of structuring information is not. According to Wurman, information can be ordered by Location, Alphabetically, Time (chronologically), Categorically, or Hierarchically (aka LATCH). Lisa Maria Martin thoroughly explores these methods and adds two more based on the work of Katherine Bertolucci.
I'll use my own blog, Beyond the Frame, as a way to concretely explore the book’s methodology. My blog offers an analysis of our information age: from the social impact of technology to the meaning of computational aesthetics found in art and nature. The potential breadth can be overwhelming; principled organization is required.
Exploring LATCH
Location
Each post on my blog contains location metadata. Ordering all posts by location reveals the following:
Turin, Italy: 25 posts
Berlin, Germany: 7 posts
Udine, Italy: 1 post
Bardonecchia, Italy: 1 post
Peoria, IL, United States: 1 post
This information says something about the author but I suspect it's not the most pertinent way of ordering writing about the information age.
Alphabet
Lisa Maria Martin opines that alphabetizing is for research, not discovery. The dictionary, a book’s index, and the encyclopedia supports her claim.
Beyond the Frame does contain extensive citations in the margins. Most academic papers would also include these sources ordered alphabetically in a bibliography. I’m not sure how useful that would be for myself or my readers, so I don’t maintain such a resource.
Time
On the other hand, I do present chronological information in two different ways. All the posts in Beyond the Frame are presented in reverse chronological order. This ordering is typical in most blogs.
Beyond the Frame also offers a timeline of events relevant that are significant when talking about the transmission of information through time. All events are introduced within articles that provide a deeper dive on the subject.
This timeline is not one of the more popular pages on Beyond the Frame but it provides me a sense of time and space as a researcher.
Category
Martin notes that categorization is fundamentally different than ordering by location, letter, or time; categorization is the act of grouping. After items are grouped, they still need to be ordered.
Beyond the Frame uses two tools for creating categories:
A strict set of tags: #doing, the #humanities, #personal updates, #science and informatics, the #suchness of knowledge, and #tools for thinking.
A post-specific set of keywords. These keywords will proliferate endlessly as I add new posts.
I chose this tag and keyword system as a way to organize my thoughts. It could be criticized by the author of Everyday Information Architecture for not considering the needs of the readers or the strategic goals of Beyond the Frame as a general information resource. Lisa Maria Martin thinks about information architecture much like a designer thinks of user experience. She asks about who is on the site and what they're trying to accomplish. She even suggests vague and unanswerable questions, such as asking what users care about. Everyday Information Architecture doesn't actually explore the latter question seriously. But this is the sort of hand waving occasionally found in this book.
Hierarchy
Hierarchies are a more abstract tool for ordering than location, letter, or time. For example, I can create a hierarchy by listing the top five most-read posts on Beyond the Frame, from the most popular to the least popular:
The Mothers of the Mother of All Demos #humanities, #science
MLK and “Domestic Terrorism” #humanities, #suchness
Be Here Now #personal, #suchness, #review
Fix My Code #humanities, #suchness, #review
Truth Storms the Capitol: #humanities
This is an ordered sequence. The associated collection of tags (category labels) can also be sequenced by popularity:
#humanities
#suchness
#review
#science, #personal
Nested categories can turn these flat hierarchies into multi-dimensional affairs. For example, posts tags as #suchness offer a bevy of keywords: classical, ambient, music, notation, encoding, time, fidelity, information fidelity, computational art, information theory, myths, buddhism, relationships, documentary, oneness, atari, zen, psychedelics, etc...
When designing an effective architecture, Martin asks the reader to answer two questions: who is visiting the site and what that person whats and needs. The author is a bit ambiguous here. Elsewhere in the book she doubts the effectiveness of user persons. I wholly agree with this position. But the two questions she raises sound a lot like user personas.
Rather than sketch a portrait of some imaginary readers of my blog, I'll offer up some analytics. Beyond the Frame saw roughly 22,000 unique visitors in 2021, down from 32,000 unique visitors in 2020. Those people mostly came from Hacker News, Reddit, Twitter, an IndieWeb profile page, and Metafilter.
These are mostly news aggregation sites, so it shouldn't be a surprise that "The Mothers of the Mother of All Demos" and "MLK and “Domestic Terrorism”" were the top performers - both articles referred to current events. They provided additional context and analysis that couldn't be found in major publications.
"Fix My Code" and "Be Here Now" came from more abstract prompts. Julian Shapiro manages to articulate the way abstract motivations connect with audiences: "Does writing this article get a weight off your chest?", "Do you obsess over the topic and want others to geek out on it too?", etc....
"Fix My Code" and "Be Here Now" are likely read by people who want passionately argued, well-researched articles on narrowly focused subjects. Hierarchy helps these people discover other articles with similar motivations, as Martin points out. #humanities is probably too broad to be effective. Changing the tag to #sts (or #ScienceAndTechnologyStudies) would offer a meaningful narrowing. #humanities may be more inclusive, but #sts offers more clarity and specificity. This is the sort of clear thinking that Everyday Information Architecture helps enable.
Canonical Listings, Mnemonics and Randomness
Katherine Bertolucci opined that canonical listings, mnemonics and randomness offer additional organizational methods overlooked by Wurman.
Examples of canonical listings include a book's table of contents and the order of books in the Bible.
"LATCH" itself is ordered as a mnemonic. Adding Canonical Listings, Mnemonics and Randomness to this list could yield LAMTRCCH, which destroys the mnemonic. MR. C. LATCH works much better. Note the letters are sequenced by mnemonic, not their significance or alphabetical position.
Martin argues that randomness is a choice, and thus an organizational principle. The author warns the reader to watch out for sequences that seem random but could be meaningful chains. For example, a grocery list that starts with milk which reminds the author to add cereal.
Finding Information
Ordering information is an attempt to make information findable. The first step is to understand priorities. Martin suggests a process of enumeration to reveal priorities. Count the number of appearances of a keyword or the number of pages dedicated to a site's various offerings.
Information architects also have to understand that people often arrive from a place of not-knowing.
If a person knows exactly what they're trying to find but they don't know where to find it, a search engine likely works best.
People also find information by narrowing the context. For example, finding a lunch based on location or conducting research based on subject.
Re-finding is also a type of not-knowing. They know exactly what they want, but do not know how to look for it.
Conclusion
I have neglected some of the most practical tips in Everyday Information Architecture. Lisa Maria Martin spends a lot of time discussing her many spreadsheets used to organize all the information she collects on behalf of her clients. These spreadsheets are used to improve the architecture of her client's websites.
I actually found these hands-on examples the least useful wisdom in the book. That's why I don't cover them here. A different reader for a different purpose might find them interesting. But they don't carry the intellectual weight of a true methodology.
The book's best moments relies on the work of others. I might use this book in an introductory class to teach applied concepts, but digging into the concepts behind information architecture is better done elsewhere.
August 22, 2023
The book is a quick read that presents the subject in a way that everybody can understand. Depending on your learning objectives, a variety of materials are offered that may be helpful.
Although the majority of the content is inherently platform-independent, the examples and content are largely focused on websites.
The section on tags and taxonomy is another thing I disliked. Although the author tries to explain it as a separate element, it just seems like an extra section of labels and categories. It doesn't add to anything you would have determined during the UX research process, in my opinion, unless you work in marketing or other areas.
Despite all of that, I would suggest it to anyone who is interested in IA but is unsure of where to begin.
Although the majority of the content is inherently platform-independent, the examples and content are largely focused on websites.
The section on tags and taxonomy is another thing I disliked. Although the author tries to explain it as a separate element, it just seems like an extra section of labels and categories. It doesn't add to anything you would have determined during the UX research process, in my opinion, unless you work in marketing or other areas.
Despite all of that, I would suggest it to anyone who is interested in IA but is unsure of where to begin.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 5, 2025
Practical, easy-to-follow guide to information architecture with tips and examples, based on plenty of experience.
Notes
Systems of Organization
LATCH organization framework
• Location (e.g., map, country, room, diagram)
• Alphabet. Used for info retrieval within list, not navigation. For discovery, not research. Only use when users already know what they’re looking for.
• Time (e.g., calendar, email inboxes, chronological social media feeds). Even when content isn’t time-sensitive, timing adds context (e.g., publication date).
• Category (e.g., topics, themes, other predetermined groupings). Excellent for breaking down large data sets into smaller, more usable, more findable pieces. Useful for discovery.
• Hierarchy (arranging items according to value, least to most or most to least). Requires assigning value to info, which could be inherent or imposed.
Hierarchy as organizational method is about order of info itself. Page hierarchy is about how pages are arranged within system (i.e., sitemaps). Information hierarchy is about relative importance of info in an environment.
Content Analysis
Audit is process of reviewing website; inventory is product that results from audit.
Qualitative audit is focused on content quality (readability, voice and tone, how well it matches brand, etc.). Quantitative audit is focused on numbers (of pages, images, words, etc.). All audits have mix of qualitative and quantitative factors.
How much content is on site?
Determine which properties and platforms are involved and what changes will be made to content, then count pages.
What kind of content is it?
• How much is evergreen?
• Is it marketing a product or service?
• Are there articles, blog posts, other journalistic content?
• Is it research-based (white papers, reports)? How is it made available?
• Is there a lot of documentation or support content? How is it made available?
• Are there forums or other community-based content areas?
• What kind of rich media (images, video, etc.)?
How is site structured?
• Is it easy to navigate?
• Do URLs match expected paths?
• Are there breadcrumbs or other wayfinding features?
• Are any areas duplicated or missing from menus?
• Can you easily understand relationships between pages?
• Are pages with similar content constructed same way?
• Does content flow logically on each page?
• Do things work as you expect?
How effective is content?
• Is it easy to read?
• Is it clear?
• Is it helpful?
• It is full of typos?
• Does it sound like the brand?
How is content managed?
• How is it written and edited?
• How is it published in CMS?
• How is it governed over time?
• Ask people high and low in org what their biggest content pains are.
Parsing data
• Number of pages
• Number of images
• Word count
• Comparative readability
• Number of links
Categories And Labels
Categorization factors
• User needs
• Business goals (ideally, these align with user needs)
• Current state
• Future state (strategy driving design, resources for content creation and maintenance)
Better to examine what users need (their actions), rather than who they are (their personas).
Users appreciate straightforward labels with familiar language. Pay attention to words (especially verbs) people use when interacting with site or product.
Use "us," "our" for org that owns site. Use "you," your" for users. Avoid possessive pronouns when not needed.
Site Structure
Don't put external links in nav, for consistent experience. Put them within page in appropriate context.
Sitemap fields/columns
• Page ID
• URL
• Menu label/link (only if there are many mismatches between links, labels, page names)
• Name/headline
• Section (area of site)
• Notes
Focus on what’s structurally relevant; no need to record every single file, blog post, newsletter, etc. For items like these, note in sitemap that there are multiple.
Navigation and Wayfinding
Navigation structures
• Main nav (aka primary nav, global nav): access to most important content
• Secondary nav: access to secondary content (e.g., institutional or operational content, such as About, News)
• Utility nav: access to portals, accounts, shopping carts, sometimes search and social; not always needed
• Search
• Social nav: access to social media, partner sites, other external properties
• Header nav: usually secondary or utility nav, but sometimes separate
• Footer nav: usually repeat main nav with 1st level of child pages or curated list of pages
Don't give too many paths to content, or users will be indecisive. Don't create too few paths, or users will give up navigating.
Don't create "quick links" (collection of links with little or no context, description, explanation, listed in module or sidebar). They're result of poor organization. If you have lists of links, ensure they're clear, specific, contextual and right way to meet user needs, not result of unsolved findability issues.
Avoiding "quick links"
• Why can’t content be found through more traditional routes?
• How might link list derail or distract from other links?
• How might additional context and more specific labels help users understand links?
Information-seeking behaviors
• Known-item seeking: user knows what they're trying to find, but not where to find it
• Exploratory seeking: user doesn't know what they're trying to find
• Re-finding: user is looking for specific info they previously found (version of known-item seeking)
• “Don’t know what you need to know”: user doesn't know what they're trying to find or even what question to ask (version of exploratory seeking)
Resources
Information architecture books
• Information Architecture for the World Wide Web by Lou Rosenfeld and Peter Morville
• Information Architecture: Blueprints for the Web by Christina Wodtke
• How to Make Sense of Any Mess by Abby Covert
• Organising Knowledge by Patrick Lambe
• The Accidental Taxonomist by Heather Hedden
Content strategy books
• The Elements of Content Strategy by Erin Kissane
• Content Strategy for the Web by Kristina Halvorson and Melissa Rach
Notes
Systems of Organization
LATCH organization framework
• Location (e.g., map, country, room, diagram)
• Alphabet. Used for info retrieval within list, not navigation. For discovery, not research. Only use when users already know what they’re looking for.
• Time (e.g., calendar, email inboxes, chronological social media feeds). Even when content isn’t time-sensitive, timing adds context (e.g., publication date).
• Category (e.g., topics, themes, other predetermined groupings). Excellent for breaking down large data sets into smaller, more usable, more findable pieces. Useful for discovery.
• Hierarchy (arranging items according to value, least to most or most to least). Requires assigning value to info, which could be inherent or imposed.
Hierarchy as organizational method is about order of info itself. Page hierarchy is about how pages are arranged within system (i.e., sitemaps). Information hierarchy is about relative importance of info in an environment.
Content Analysis
Audit is process of reviewing website; inventory is product that results from audit.
Qualitative audit is focused on content quality (readability, voice and tone, how well it matches brand, etc.). Quantitative audit is focused on numbers (of pages, images, words, etc.). All audits have mix of qualitative and quantitative factors.
How much content is on site?
Determine which properties and platforms are involved and what changes will be made to content, then count pages.
What kind of content is it?
• How much is evergreen?
• Is it marketing a product or service?
• Are there articles, blog posts, other journalistic content?
• Is it research-based (white papers, reports)? How is it made available?
• Is there a lot of documentation or support content? How is it made available?
• Are there forums or other community-based content areas?
• What kind of rich media (images, video, etc.)?
How is site structured?
• Is it easy to navigate?
• Do URLs match expected paths?
• Are there breadcrumbs or other wayfinding features?
• Are any areas duplicated or missing from menus?
• Can you easily understand relationships between pages?
• Are pages with similar content constructed same way?
• Does content flow logically on each page?
• Do things work as you expect?
How effective is content?
• Is it easy to read?
• Is it clear?
• Is it helpful?
• It is full of typos?
• Does it sound like the brand?
How is content managed?
• How is it written and edited?
• How is it published in CMS?
• How is it governed over time?
• Ask people high and low in org what their biggest content pains are.
Parsing data
• Number of pages
• Number of images
• Word count
• Comparative readability
• Number of links
Categories And Labels
Categorization factors
• User needs
• Business goals (ideally, these align with user needs)
• Current state
• Future state (strategy driving design, resources for content creation and maintenance)
Better to examine what users need (their actions), rather than who they are (their personas).
Users appreciate straightforward labels with familiar language. Pay attention to words (especially verbs) people use when interacting with site or product.
Use "us," "our" for org that owns site. Use "you," your" for users. Avoid possessive pronouns when not needed.
Site Structure
Don't put external links in nav, for consistent experience. Put them within page in appropriate context.
Sitemap fields/columns
• Page ID
• URL
• Menu label/link (only if there are many mismatches between links, labels, page names)
• Name/headline
• Section (area of site)
• Notes
Focus on what’s structurally relevant; no need to record every single file, blog post, newsletter, etc. For items like these, note in sitemap that there are multiple.
Navigation and Wayfinding
Navigation structures
• Main nav (aka primary nav, global nav): access to most important content
• Secondary nav: access to secondary content (e.g., institutional or operational content, such as About, News)
• Utility nav: access to portals, accounts, shopping carts, sometimes search and social; not always needed
• Search
• Social nav: access to social media, partner sites, other external properties
• Header nav: usually secondary or utility nav, but sometimes separate
• Footer nav: usually repeat main nav with 1st level of child pages or curated list of pages
Don't give too many paths to content, or users will be indecisive. Don't create too few paths, or users will give up navigating.
Don't create "quick links" (collection of links with little or no context, description, explanation, listed in module or sidebar). They're result of poor organization. If you have lists of links, ensure they're clear, specific, contextual and right way to meet user needs, not result of unsolved findability issues.
Avoiding "quick links"
• Why can’t content be found through more traditional routes?
• How might link list derail or distract from other links?
• How might additional context and more specific labels help users understand links?
Information-seeking behaviors
• Known-item seeking: user knows what they're trying to find, but not where to find it
• Exploratory seeking: user doesn't know what they're trying to find
• Re-finding: user is looking for specific info they previously found (version of known-item seeking)
• “Don’t know what you need to know”: user doesn't know what they're trying to find or even what question to ask (version of exploratory seeking)
Resources
Information architecture books
• Information Architecture for the World Wide Web by Lou Rosenfeld and Peter Morville
• Information Architecture: Blueprints for the Web by Christina Wodtke
• How to Make Sense of Any Mess by Abby Covert
• Organising Knowledge by Patrick Lambe
• The Accidental Taxonomist by Heather Hedden
Content strategy books
• The Elements of Content Strategy by Erin Kissane
• Content Strategy for the Web by Kristina Halvorson and Melissa Rach
April 22, 2020
Everyday Information Architecture by Lisa Maria Martin is a practical guide to getting started with information architecture (IA), and while I might call it important introductory reading, I wouldn’t tag this book as beginner material.
Martin structures Everyday Information Architecture as a process you might work through as part of a website’s re/design. She walks readers through analyzing and organizing content and structures while fitting those concepts into real-world examples that deftly contextualize the work. It’s this layering of the conceptual with the practical that makes this book readable and immediately useful.
Humor seems to be a real point of contention for “technical” books and documentation, which tends to turn all content into something like Triscuit crackers; incredibly dry and lightly salted with the indignation of underpaid employees suppressing their personalities. Fortunately for us, Martin shirked this trend and brought her humor to the book, and while some of it didn’t land for me, it never distracted. In a way, allowing her personality to speak in the book helped to show how much she cares about her work and the field, which in turn made for an engaging read that appeals to reader involvement.
The book is also full of Martin’s relevant professional experiences and sharp visuals, all of which is underpinned with a well-balanced call for ethical use of IA. Yes, IA matters, and yes, it can have real-world effects, and we as individuals involved in the tech industry have some responsibility in righting a moral compass that’s strayed far from true (see: dark patterns, social media dysmorphia, filter bubbles, etc.). Which is all to say, I can’t recommend Everyday Information Architecture enough as a book you should make space for on your shelf.
5/5 Will read again.
TIP: At the time I bought this book, it cost about half as much through the publisher as it did through Amazon. Assuming this isn’t screwing over the author and publisher, I think you can see where the better deal is.
Martin structures Everyday Information Architecture as a process you might work through as part of a website’s re/design. She walks readers through analyzing and organizing content and structures while fitting those concepts into real-world examples that deftly contextualize the work. It’s this layering of the conceptual with the practical that makes this book readable and immediately useful.
Humor seems to be a real point of contention for “technical” books and documentation, which tends to turn all content into something like Triscuit crackers; incredibly dry and lightly salted with the indignation of underpaid employees suppressing their personalities. Fortunately for us, Martin shirked this trend and brought her humor to the book, and while some of it didn’t land for me, it never distracted. In a way, allowing her personality to speak in the book helped to show how much she cares about her work and the field, which in turn made for an engaging read that appeals to reader involvement.
The book is also full of Martin’s relevant professional experiences and sharp visuals, all of which is underpinned with a well-balanced call for ethical use of IA. Yes, IA matters, and yes, it can have real-world effects, and we as individuals involved in the tech industry have some responsibility in righting a moral compass that’s strayed far from true (see: dark patterns, social media dysmorphia, filter bubbles, etc.). Which is all to say, I can’t recommend Everyday Information Architecture enough as a book you should make space for on your shelf.
5/5 Will read again.
TIP: At the time I bought this book, it cost about half as much through the publisher as it did through Amazon. Assuming this isn’t screwing over the author and publisher, I think you can see where the better deal is.
January 6, 2022
I have to admit I had totally different expectations from this book. This is may be partly due to the slightly misleading (or misread) title and partly due to my ignorance to the fact that information architecture is an actual thing, like a real job. When I decided to read this book, I had something much more vague and abstract in mind. This book is anything but abstract - if anything, it was a bit to concrete for my tastes. The 'everyday' in the title of the book lead me to think that this book will approach the nature of information and how it can be organized and managed in a more general way, but instead this was a something akin to a beginners guide to information architecture (the actual job in the domain of designing or redesigning websites).
There were some more general ideas in the introduction and in the first chapter, but from there on, the book was very specific to the redesign of websites. What the book then basically consists of is guides on how to analyse the content of an existing website, how to conduct different audits, how to create a sitemap and different ways of navigation for the website, and explanations why these things, along with taxonomies are important for the design of a website.
For people with the specific tasks of an information architect, I'm sure this book can be a helpful resource, for my needs and interests it was a bit too specific to be of much use.
There were some more general ideas in the introduction and in the first chapter, but from there on, the book was very specific to the redesign of websites. What the book then basically consists of is guides on how to analyse the content of an existing website, how to conduct different audits, how to create a sitemap and different ways of navigation for the website, and explanations why these things, along with taxonomies are important for the design of a website.
For people with the specific tasks of an information architect, I'm sure this book can be a helpful resource, for my needs and interests it was a bit too specific to be of much use.
February 7, 2020
Another great book from A Book Apart! Although I'm not a web developer and might not ever be, I enjoy reading about web developer things and learning why certain things about certain websites drive me crazy. This one was written in a super conversational style and was very funny! And with lots of great examples and illustrations. I'll keep buying and reading A Book Apart's books because they're good, and they look great lined up on the shelf.
August 18, 2021
"The way we organize web content might help someone get a job, pay their bills, write their representatives, connect with a loved one. It might make them feel seen--or feel silenced. It's up to us. When we organize information, we change it. Let's change it for the better."
Practical books and give a lot of context on the reason why we need to organize a sea of information. Wil definitely re-read this as a refresher.
Practical books and give a lot of context on the reason why we need to organize a sea of information. Wil definitely re-read this as a refresher.
May 7, 2019
I'm working on an information architecture project right now, so there are a lot of practical applications for the strategies and deliverables in this book. I enjoyed the examples and case studies and loved the humor, anime references, and insistence on designing with ethics. I definitely want to read more on the subject as a result of reading this.
January 4, 2020
A thoughtful and quick read on the basics for information architecture. A fairly easy read despite perhaps what I don't personally consider altogether interesting subject matter. Well chosen examples highlight the impact a little attention to information architecture can improve your work products.
Reminds me a lot of "Don't make me think" by Steve Krug.
Reminds me a lot of "Don't make me think" by Steve Krug.
January 8, 2022
Practical, hilarious, and absolutely of a time (2019) that is both intensely relevant and rapidly receding. The focus is on IA for the web, but the lines around "web" are getting fuzzier all the time and the advice could easily translate to any work involving information, which is literally everything.
January 11, 2022
I picked this book up thinking it was going to be about databases. It's definitely not! But I read it anyway and I'm glad I did. It has several nuggets of good advice and guiding principle (in particular about navigability) that are broadly applicable. The author also has a clear and fun tone throughout.
September 29, 2022
Exceptional. Clear, concise, funny in the best possible, slightly understated way. It's so refreshing to read something where each sentence has a clear point that backs up the paragraph's point, which backs up the chapter's point. Nothing extraneous, but plenty of links and references for those who are looking to deep dive into an area. A gift :)
May 10, 2024
Most educational books run a bit dry, but Lisa kept me engaged with her humor, sprinklings of personal anecdotes, and helpful figures to give context to information. I whipped this book out in two days and learned a lot in the process. This is definitely a book I'll keep coming back to for reference.
August 18, 2019
Absolutely wonderful. Martin takes what would be a very boring topic and makes it compelling and entertaining. Blending her practices with best in class examples, the author systematically breaks down the components of IA and origination. If you're a designer I highly suggest this book.
September 21, 2020
This book was recommended to me first by a library coworker and then by a tech coworker. I'm a (new) UX writer and this was a great, short insight into how we can make our users' lives heaven or hell.
Took some good notes for this that I'll pin on my inspiration board.
Took some good notes for this that I'll pin on my inspiration board.
December 12, 2021
Good anecdotes but ultimately felt a bit too light on details to be useful. I'm developing an ontology at work but didn't find much advice that really helped here, but it might be different for someone in a different context.
June 2, 2022
کتاب تجربه یه طراح چیره دست و نرد تجربه کاربره که تمامی مراحلی که خودش انجام داده رو نوشته.
این کتاب شامل راه کارهای شناخته شده طراحی تجربه کاربر و بهترین روشهای زیادیه.
مثال های خوب و روشنی هم داره.
یه طراح تجربه کاربر که نمیدونه باید چکار کنه، باید با این کتاب پیش بره.
این کتاب شامل راه کارهای شناخته شده طراحی تجربه کاربر و بهترین روشهای زیادیه.
مثال های خوب و روشنی هم داره.
یه طراح تجربه کاربر که نمیدونه باید چکار کنه، باید با این کتاب پیش بره.
March 20, 2024
Quick read, and a few interesting notes. More geared towards sites than maybe what I was look for (how the hell can I help organize Confluence...). A few ideas to explore, but maybe not what I was looking for.
Read
April 19, 2024Information Architecture would seem like a bit of a dry topic to write about, but Martin infuses humor, and fun into her writing. Her passion come through even in this brief book. She also brings up ethical concerns that designers and content creators should be thinking of when we organize data.
November 24, 2019
An excellent, pithy, humorously written crash course to information architecture in the digital age. Highly recommended.
January 8, 2020
Quick, approachable, and decidedly practical. I’m preparing for my first IA-intensive project in awhile, and this was a great refresher.
January 28, 2020
Very helpful in thinking about how to dissect and organize information.
June 2, 2020
A nice intro to organizing content, easy read.
August 5, 2021
A must read for everyone interested in information architecture and content design. Love with how much fun it was written by Lisa Maria. Thank you!
December 24, 2023
Great for technical writers too.
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