Have you ever gone to a web site and not found what you're looking for?
Have you ever been puzzled or confused by a site's links?
Have you ever been overwhelmed by too much information or gotten lost within a site?
Have you ever been so frustrated with a site that you had to raise your hands to the sky and cry out, "Why must you smite me so?!"
These are the common frustrations of navigating confusing and unusable web sites. Information Architecture is the part of web development that strives to ensure a positive web experience for visitors. It only takes one bad experience to turn off a web user (whether it be potential customers, clients, partners, or employees).
When addressing the layout, organization, and labeling of the content in your site, we can do many things to provide the best possible experience.
1. Current Site and Competitive Analysis
We analyze the existing site (if there is one) and look for the key information and messages you want your audience to absorb and find. In addition, if we have them, we can analyze your web site logs to draw important conclusions as the sites effectiveness.
We also see what your peers are doing to determine important elements such as site standards within your category. What are your peers doing right? What are they doing wrong? What can we learn from this?
2. Information Assets, Content, and Data Analysis
A site is only as good as the information it provides. When evolving a site, we can take a good, hard look at your site to determine the effectiveness of the content.
3. Site and Content Mapping
We begin with an outline of the key areas for your site, paying close attention to the naming conventions, link order, hierarchy, and grouping. Is your main navigation effective and at 7-9 links or less? What content is available, and what do we expect to add in the future. There are many considerations that are vital to a usable web site.
4. Wireframes
These skeletal layouts of a site, sometimes referred to as "storyboards", are a helpful tool when transitioning between the site map and the ensuing visual design of the site, especially when dealing with processes and applications. We lay out the key navigation, elements, and content for a page...not for placement or design, but to visualize how someone would actually use the site, or get a feel for the true amount of elements on a page that someone must sift through.
5. Usability Studies
Usability studies are extremely powerful tools in the evolution of a web site or software application. We have methods of testing throughout the entirety of the web development process. From the current site, to the site map, to the wireframes, to the design, and beyond, we can save you the costs of making changes, and create the most effective application possible.