Content Design

Content page design best practices again

Luke started at NCSA

Thought about their categories and organized it according to how it related to everything

We optimize for a hierarchy in the application… but it really is broken out into pieces on the internet(its chunked out)

Web ecosystems
Content is broken out into different types, communication, display surface, content creators, content aggregators, search… So how do we build for that?
People are searching and not just using your site hierarchy

Understanding this context….
Communication – people linking to your content and passing it along in im, email or even blogs or discussion boards

Display surfaces – mashups, facebook, places where people add content and links to content

Content creation tools – blogging(people are framing it before they get to your site)

Content aggregators – RSS, myYahoo, delicious, dig

Search engines – very demanding and what happens when people get to your page?

Break out of your page when people get there

Context, related and the content

Content
Make what shows up in the page title should be your headline (match them up)
Content should be the focus, having too much ads or other links is not good so make it your focus, cross reference to other actions related to the content is ok. If you give people what they want then they will be apt to use related links.

People don’t stay long
People don’t read the entire article and typically only scan. So keep it short.

• Favor visual hierarchy over site hierarchy
• Make it scannable

Related
Spare the site map and extra junk. You don’t need to give access to everything. But instead most content is related so give them access to the related stories or content, not the other stuff. Provide “related detours”. Give them action oriented materials. But don’t over do it. The simplest choice is the back button.

Get related calls to action noticed – pay attention where people are looking and place those links there

Best practices
• Related calls to action are ok if good content
• Limit number of choices
• Think through presentations

Context
Where you are and what you can do.
Know where they are coming directly from and modify your page to show more options based on their search.

Best practice
Utilize the minimum amount necessary to build