b3

Hierarchical organization at a glance

Site Genre: Pattern Group b

magnify image Figure B3.1Yahoo! uses hierarchies to categorize thousands of Web sites (left). Categories range from Arts & Humanities to Society & Culture.???

Background

Used as part of MULTIPLE WAYS TO NAVIGATE (B1) and BROWSABLE CONTENT (B2), this pattern provides a way to organize large amounts of content when the content can be structured in a hierarchy.

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PROBLEM

Organizing information in a hierarchy of categories can help customers find things, but building an effective hierarchy is not easy.

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SOLUTION

magnify image FigureB3.3 Use words that are familiar to your customers without overloading a single category with too many subcategories.

Build a hierarchy of categories with input from customers or from experts known for good communication skills in the subject area. Use descriptive category names that are distinctive from one another. Use techniques such as card sorting to develop the categories and labels, and use techniques like category identification and category description to test. Repeat items in multiple categories where it makes sense. Keep the maximum number of subcategories per category below 50, and avoid generic terms like miscellaneous.

Other Patterns to Consider

Use card sorting, category identification, category description, and the techniques in FAMILIAR LANGUAGE (K11) to find the names of your toplevel and second-level categories. Use CATEGORY PAGES (B8) as directories to content in subcategories. This pattern can be combined with other organizational patterns, including TASK-BASED ORGANIZATION (B4), ALPHABETICAL ORGANIZATION (B5), CHRONOLOGICAL ORGANIZATION (B6), and POPULARITY-BASED ORGANIZATION (B7).

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