Structured content design focuses on communicating effectively to an organization’s patrons, constituents, and customers, wherever they are and however they choose to access content. While it is the cornerstone of effective, scalable content design for the web, it’s also much more than just a “web” technique: it is a way to prioritize effective communication across contexts.
Over the last several years I’ve become an ardent advocate of “structured content design.” This is the process of designing digital resources (like websites and apps) from the content out, as opposed to creating interaction and visual design first, then shoehorning the content into it right before (or right after) launch. A structured content approach to digital work has a number of advantages over typical “interface first” processes.
As the systems of information for which we design get more complex and more fluid (hospitals, government, and higher education are all good examples), it is increasingly important that we explicitly express the rules that underly the visible structures we deliver. So where does this leave us with site maps? They’re still effective communication tools (and clients do love them), but I think we’ve moved beyond the point where they’re a foundation of information architecture.
I helped Seattle Children's redesign their website's global navigation and home page to better meet the needs of their users, the requirements of their content, and the goals of their business. Now, their site more usable, more welcoming, and more clearly aligned with user and organizational priorities.
I helped Shoreline College understand the journey users take through their Academic Programs offerings, and designed a taxonomy and navigation model that supports that journey from the user's perspective. Now, site visitors can browse programs by the topics that interest them—without having to negotiate the department, division, and degree hierarchies in which those programs are situated.
With the growing need of responsive web solutions and adaptive, flexible content, there are new reasons for designers to roll up their sleeves and get into “code.” Since HTML is, at its core, a layer of description wrapped around content, working at this level helps designers think more critically about their content and about the architectural implications of that content. While considering markup won’t replace our content audit, user research, or taxonomy work any time soon, it can increasingly function as an important part of the design process.