The Subtle Art of Meeting People Where They Are
Imagine you are shopping for a new rain jacket. You click on the first link where you think jackets will be, only to find they are not there. So you click on another link. Then another link. Still not jackets so you click another link. Then one more link. At this point, you can’t find the information you need — and you really need a new rain jacket — and feel frustrated.
To avoid this problem for your users, it’s important to understand how they organize and categorize information. Creating navigation that is accessible and usable means creating an information architecture (IA) that reflects your users’ understanding of words. IA focuses on organizing information in a way that makes sense to your audience — and meets them where they are.
At SiteCrafting, our user experience research team helps clients design websites that meet people where they are using two research methods: card sorting and tree testing.
What is card sorting?
Card sorting is a research method that helps us understand how people think about information and how it should be organized.
In a card sorting study, users of a website or web application are asked to group cards into categories. After grouping topics together, participants will name and label those categories. By having participants organize and name the categories they created themselves, we gain insights into how people describe information in their own words.
When conducting a card sort in-person, participants are given actual cards (typically, these are written index cards or sticky notes) to group together. In contrast, card sorts can also be conducted remotely through several online card-sorting software tools.
Benefits of Card Sorting
- It involves actual users – Listening from the users’ perspective is highly valuable because it gives us an understanding of their thought process and how to meet their expectations.
- It provides actionable insights – Through card sorting, we gain a clear understanding of how users think about organizing and grouping information together.
- It establishes a foundation for IA – Card sorting structures websites in ways that align with how users see and interact with information.
- It drives decision-making – Card sorting can answer questions about website navigation such as what information should be on the homepage, what types of sections should be created and what content should new sections include.
Open and Closed Card Sorting
There are different techniques for conducting a card sort study, an open card sort and a closed card sort. In an open card sort, participants organize and name information in their own language. In a closed card sort, users are tasked with organizing cards by predetermined categories.
Conducting a card sort study is the first step in determining your website’s information architecture and navigation. To evaluate a proposed website menu structure, follow up with a tree test study for best results.
What is tree testing?
Tree testing tells us how easily people can find information on a website, and exactly where people get lost. During a tree test, participants are asked to evaluate a proposed site structure. We take the categories that participants created in a prior card sorting (or an existing website navigation structure) and provide a series of tasks for them to complete. We observe participants clicking through the site structure and understand the path they take to find information. Tree test studies are typically conducted using online software tools.
Benefits of Tree Testing
- It provides measurable insights – Tree tests provide quantitative metrics such as the amount of time spent finding information to complete a task, the paths participants took before selecting an answer and how many participants got the right or wrong answer.
- It informs designs – Tree testing can be conducted well in advance of designing page layouts or navigation menus. We can explore various solutions freely and continue to refine the menu categories and labels at a low cost.
- It validates information architecture – Tree test studies help us understand if the content is organized in a way that makes sense to people.
Conclusion
By using card sorting and tree testing, we can create navigation that helps people find what they’re looking for faster. Oftentimes, creating a better user experience comes from getting out of our own heads and simply asking others what they think. Card sorting helps us meet people where they are by allowing them to use their words instead of us forcing our descriptions.
We all describe the world around us differently and card sorting taps directly into that phenomenon. However, card sorting on its own is not sufficient: we also need a way to validate our findings and tree testing provides it.
If people want to buy a rain jacket, and we’ve done card sorting and tree testing, they’ll do so via navigation that is fast, useable and intuitive.
Want to learn more? Join us for a webinar with our UX team on March 30 at 11am.
