September 09, 2002 New Thinking:
Information architecture: carrying out a classification situation analysis

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• Underline or otherwise mark potential classification terms.
• Type these terms into a spreadsheet.
• Beside each classification, list the source of where you got it from.
• Number the amount of times you come across a particular classification. This will be a good gauge for its popularity.
• Don't worry about repetition at this stage. List everything that you think makes sense.
• Don't be too analytical at this stage. Type down whatever you think might be relevant classifications.
• Focus on the top-level classifications. You can collect possible lower level classifications in a separate document, but don't spend too much time on it.

The actual classification situation analysis should cover the following areas:

1. Organization objectives and strategy analysis: Classification is the ultimate distillation of organization strategy. Carefully analyze your organizational objectives, mission statement and other relevant material, and draw out appropriate classification terms.
2. Reader survey: It's really important to talk to the target reader of your content. How would they like to see content classified? Create reader types/personas, and list possible classifications for each type.
3. Current content analysis: This is a rich source for potential classification terms. Go through your current content and see what sort of important terms are cropping up again and again. Perhaps you already have an existing classification structure. This can be an important building block for the new one.
4. Common search words analysis: If you already have an existing website, analyze how people are searching it. What are the most common words and phrases being entered? This is good material for your classification list.
5. Author and specialist survey: Talk to the people who create the content. How would they like to see it classified? Get some consulting from information specialists. See what ideas they have.
6. Competitor content analysis: Your competitors are a great source for classification ideas. Examine the most popular websites to see how they are approaching classification. Even if you're planning an intranet, try and see how similar intranets are classified.
7. Industry publications analysis: Are there relevant industry publications out there? How are they structured? Don't just focus on online publications. Look at print too. How do they organize their magazines and reports? Examine table of contents and indexes.
8. General industry analysis: Are there any groups out there that are seeking to establish common metadata standards? With a little bit of research, you might find that a lot of your classification work has already been done.

Gerry McGovern
 

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