Affinity Mapping - Use a different approach to build IA
Using affinity mapping to build Information Architecture (IA) from the bottom up allows for a more intuitive and user-centered organization of content, revealing natural patterns that better align with audience needs.
What is affinity mapping?
Affinity mapping is a method that helps you organize information by grouping similar items together, starting from the bottom. Imagine you have a collection of articles scattered across a table like a deck of playing cards. Instead of organizing them by traditional groupings like suits, you start by examining each card individually and grouping them based on inherent similarities, such as color or face value. This method reveals natural patterns and creates an IA that fits the unique traits of your content and your audience's needs.
Benefits of affinity mapping
- User-centered: Affinity mapping focuses on how users naturally group information, leading to a more intuitive IA.
- Flexible: Affinity mapping allows for adjustments and refinements based on user feedback and changing needs.
- Organic: Patterns and groupings emerge naturally, aligning the IA with the content’s inherent structure.
Use affinity mapping to build your IA
- Gather content: Collect all the pieces of content you need to organize. This could be PDFs, Word documents, pages from a KB, or other types of information. This content will serve as Article pages.
- Examine each piece of content: Review each item individually, focusing on its main themes, keywords, and relevant attributes.
- Group by similarities to discover Guides: Use themes, keywords, and relevant attributes to group Articles based on similarities. These groups of articles will become Guides.
- Identify parent pages: With your Guides in place, look for patterns and relationships between them to determine parent Category pages.
- Find your way home: Use the patterns to create parent Categories that guide users to the Homepage. These should reflect natural content groupings and make sense to your audience.
- Test and refine: After creating your initial IA, test it with real users. Gather feedback and make adjustments to ensure it meets their needs and expectations.