A big part of information architecture work is making key information findable.
Whether information is considered key or nice-to-know relies on business goals and user tasks. Key information is identified through analytics data, customer feedback, and stakeholder interviews. Key info is referred to as top tasks, user needs, or JBTD (jobs to be done).
If one of the key reasons users visit your company website is for something unrelated to the core business, what do you do?
- Keep the content (and the traffic it brings)?
- Delete it?
- Highlight it?
- Hide it?
- Rewrite it?
This is an interesting problem I’ve had to solve more than once as an information architecture consultant. You may be thinking, why would a company publish something unrelated to them, and how would users even find it?
Here’s an example of unexpected traffic sources from a client, a big public library in the US. Founded in 1869, the library had a rich history and offered generously to residents. Despite talking to library patrons and staff stakeholders, the picture wouldn’t have been complete without looking at the data.
I was surprised that the site’s third most visited page was something I hadn’t heard about before, but not as surprised as I was when I clicked on it. The third most visited page on the site, visited by thousands of users every month, contained… death notices.
This necrology file contained local cemetery records and newspaper obituaries dating back to 1833. Apparently, the library served as a database of death records in the area during earlier years and a place for residents to request obituaries. Stakeholders confirmed this, but were taken by surprise by the significance of these resources to patrons.
Another example was from a religious non-profit organization focused on philanthropy, advocacy and community events. Thousands of users were finding the site by searching for… celebrity updates.
Death and fame are likely not applicable concepts to the digital products you’re working on, but if you’re reading this, you are likely interested in content architecture decision-making and how to decide whether to keep, remove, or update content.
Here are the key questions to consider for better decision-making related to content.
These apply to unexpected traffic sources like the ones mentioned above, but also to content more generally.
Is the content expensive, difficult, and time-consuming to source? This may include finding relevant sources, required updates to publishing workflows, tool/integration limitations, moderation concerns.
Does the content relevance diminish a few days or hours after publishing? This may include time-sensitive information, news cycles, or trend-related content.
Is the content unrelated or only tangentially related to company mission? This may include death and fame 🙂
Is the content challenging to maintain? This may include limitations related to technology, content governance, SME availability, or team size.
Is there an unclear link between business value and the value the user gets from the content? This may include scenarios when users get little to no value that could benefit them long-term and that’s related to how the business makes money or makes an impact.
Are there solid alternatives where the user can find the content? This may include alternatives such as other sources or other content formats altogether that you can redirect users to.
If you answered “yes” to all of these, the return on investment for the content simply isn’t there and you can safely delete (while working with an SEO expert to minimize disruption across search engine results).
The content reality for large website redesigns is a bit more nuanced, but that’s why there’s a large library to help you make data-driven, impactful content decisions, including resources like:
- How to create a content architecture that actually converts: Beyond basic sitemaps
- Should we be deleting old content?
- How to manage stakeholder feelings in content decisions for website redesigns
- How to organize 3 acquired companies into one coherent website
- “But it’s right there on the website!”
I’m also only one email or one call away if you want to discuss your specific situation and get some recommendations for next steps. Maybe you’re not ready for information architecture consulting yet, which is why it’s good to know your options.
In the case of the public library, knowing that the third most visited page was a necrology index really impacted the project:
- If it wasn’t for analytics data, the necrology directory URL could’ve been easily overlooked in the content inventory spreadsheet that’s used to track migration decisions
- The directory wasn’t displayed in the main website navigation, so users had to rely on search; knowing this ensured that we had carefully considered the desired search experience for thousands of users
- The directory had thousands of entries; knowing this allowed engineering partners to assess migration feasibility early on, which turned out to be crucial due to unexpected complexities and the need for a specific loading method
- Thousands of residents would lose a valuable resource not available elsewhere
- The library could advance its mission of making information freely available for everyone
Looking at search queries, I also found that many of the library’s website visitors assumed the main website served as the book directory, which wasn’t the case. Identifying this user expectation ensured we could incorporate guidance for users into design, as well as consider the technical and business feasibility of merging the main site with the book listings directory.
Save this article for your next information architecture planning session so your team can take a more organized, data-driven, and impactful approach when deciding whether to keep, remove, or update content.
