LinkPulse Categorization
Categorization includes designing a hierarchy of categories that meet you requirements for user interface analysis and reporting. Our experience is that categories are tied to a location on a page rather than the content present at that location at a given time. The argument for this being that you should be able to compare a user interface before and after changes has been made. This implies that most websites have similar category structures.Your first step is to establish category level one (1). This level should be generic enough to apply to all pages on a site. If some pages for instance do not have a right hand menu, the generic level one can still be applied to the whole page by applying top, left, center and bottom (not in the illustration).
Links in the categories in the example could the look like this:
- /sgo/left/http://www.site.no/destinasjon.html
- /ego/center/http://www.site.no/destinasjon.html
Pleas note that the category "left" is tagged using "sgo", whereas "center" uses "ego". This is typical for the use of these log modules.
At this point you may
- See how clicks are distributed on a particular page, or accumulated over several pages
- See what main elements drive traffic to a desired outcome
- Identify underperforming pages
- Identify main elements that do not perform well enough to fill attractive space
Sub categories
On some or all pages you will need more details on how the GUI works.
Even if the "center" category in the illustration above performs as expected, parts of that category may be underperforming.
Imagine that "Nyheter" in the center category above for some reason do not deliver traffic to the news section.
You need to be able to identify this problem and you need to monitor the effect of changes you make to mend it.
To achieve this you need more dimensions in your category structure.
Category levels are separated by "_" (underscore)
Links on the 3rd level should the look like this:
- /ego/center_L_1/http://www.site.no/destinasjon.html
/ego/center_L_2/http://www.site.no/destinasjon.html
Onsite can assist in defining category structure, or they can be drawn on top of printout of representative pages. Usually the front page, a section page and the article page will suffice to establish a global set of rules.
Any pages differing will then usually follow from the basic rules.
After defining the hierarchy the categories need to be implemented. For this job there is a choice between a manual and an automated method.
Regardless of implementation method, the template system of the site is at the core of this process and the team that set up or maintain this should coordinate the process from the from the customer end.
Please contact us at Onsite Solutions for more detailed information.