How to Plan Your Website
When starting on a new website, having a blank canvas can be daunting. While you may have an idea of what you want to say, it can be a challenge to determine the best way of grouping information to make it easy for your audience to find what they need, while ensuring that you communicate everything you need to say, in a simple and streamlined manner.
Card Sorting is a method used to plan and organise the information on your website.
The results of the card sorting will inform the structure of your website, as well as indicating the required functionality for each page/section.
Here’s how you get started:
1 — Gather
Get a stack of index cards or Post-It notes and a pen. On each card/note, write down a concise few words that best describes a piece of content (eg. ‘Our mission’, ‘Our team‘, ‘Our history’) or a user action (eg. ‘ask a question’, ‘donate’, ‘volunteer’) . The words you use should be simple and intuitive.
Tips:
Be specific. A card that says “Downloads” is not specific enough. Much better to have a few cards, with “Download price list” and “Download case study”, etc. Likewise for “Contact”. You’ll want cards that say “Email address”, “Map” and “Office hours” instead.
Avoid scientific words or jargon.
Be thorough. You can always throw away or revise cards later, so put down EVERYTHING. And don’t forget the boring things like your Privacy Policy.
2 — Sort
Once you have all the cards written out, it’s time to sort them. It might be a good idea to do this with a colleague, your web designer or even better — real members of your audience.
Cluster the cards together into groups or categories, always remembering what it is you want your audience to do on your site.
Then, come up with a name or title for each group, write it on a separate card/note and stick it at the top.
Once you’ve put all the cards into groups, take a high-res photo (make sure you can read the cards!) or type the results out into your computer.
Tips:
You can have duplicates. Let’s say you want your audience to be able to subscribe to your newsletter from either your homepage or about page. Just write out another card and group it accordingly. Or, perhaps consider having the link at the bottom of every page, as part of your footer - in which case, you’d have a title card that says “Footer” with this card underneath.
Label internal links. If you have content on one page that links to another page, indicate this on your cards.
You might end up with leftovers. It’s not uncommon to have a couple of cards that don’t fit nicely anywhere else, but if you have a lot, it may be a sign that your clusterings aren’t quite right. This would be a good time to think about whether they are really necessary, or if they could be absorbed into others.
Think about hierarchy. Remember what you’d like your audience to be doing on your site and think about putting the calls-to-action in the most prominent locations, and reserving the secondary information for something like a secondary menu or footer. For example, your online shop would want the products featured prominently, but “Returns Policy” could sit in a less visible location.
Try multiple different groupings. It can sometimes help to take a photo of a couple of different approaches and sleep on it and/or discuss them with other people before firming up what’s best for your target audience.
3 — Craft your website content
Crafting the actual website content (words & pictures) is the next big step, and the best way to do it really depends on your website’s purpose, audience, brand values and so much more.
You can read my tips on How to Write Your Website Copy in this blog post.
Card sorting is not just for new websites; it can also really help improve the user experience on old websites that may have had content added on or changes to the business over time
