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Vilfredo Pareto, His Highly Useful Principle, and Information Architecture

Vilfredo Pareto, His Highly Useful Principle, and Information Architecture. Web Site Strategy and Tactics Workshop Ann Arbor, Michigan | September 20, 2002 Louis Rosenfeld www.louisrosenfeld.com. Who I Am. Independent information architecture consultant (Hewlett-Packard, Ford, CDC, SAP)

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Vilfredo Pareto, His Highly Useful Principle, and Information Architecture

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  1. Vilfredo Pareto, His Highly Useful Principle, and Information Architecture Web Site Strategy and Tactics Workshop Ann Arbor, Michigan | September 20, 2002 Louis Rosenfeld www.louisrosenfeld.com

  2. Who I Am • Independent information architecture consultant (Hewlett-Packard, Ford, CDC, SAP) • Co-author, Information Architecture for the World Wide Web (O’Reilly, 1998; 2002) • Co-founder/president, Argus Associates (1990-2001) • Regular contributor to CIO, Internet World, and Web Review magazines • Lecturer at University of Michigan, speaker on Nielsen/Norman Group UX tour • Biases • Fortune 500 consulting • Librarianship/information science background

  3. The Infinite Flexibility of the Web:Providing information in many ways

  4. Yes, we can provide information in many ways

  5. Uh-huh, many, many ways…

  6. Sometimes things can get out of hand Originally from http://www.geocities.com/rickvonsloneker/amazon.gif

  7. An Expensive Problem • More information architecture means higher costs • Information architecture development is expensive • Information architecture maintenance has a high overhead • More information architecture doesn’t necessarily mean greater benefit to users • Too much information architecture = bad information architecture

  8. Pareto’s Principle:a.k.a. the “80/20 Rule” • "A minority of input produces the majority of results.” • (www.paretolaw.co.uk/principle.html)

  9. Pareto’s Principle:Information architecture applications • Useful IA guidelines (not rules) • 80% of your site's users belong to 20% of the site's audiences • 80% of users' information needs are served by 20% of the site's content • 80% of users' navigational needs are served by 20% of all possible architectural components • 80% of users' information needs are addressed by the top 20% of all searches • 80% of IA effort should be invested in 20% of total architecture • Many others likely

  10. #1: 80% of your site's users belong to 20% of the site's audiences All users sweet spot Audiences

  11. Sweet Spot:Serve most important audiences • “Important” can mean different things • Example: UMBS site • Important = most numerous (e.g., students, prospective students) • Important = most influential (e.g., administration, sources of grants) • Serving 100% of audiences is unrealistic • Useful approaches: • Stakeholder interviews • Demographic tools

  12. #2: 80% of users' information needs are served by 20% of the site's content Information needs sweet spot Content

  13. Sweet Spot:Focusing on important content • Develop plan for content assessment, including content value criteria: popularity, currency, accuracy, authority, etc… • Invest effort in making top content more accessible; e.g.: • Top content: manually indexed + automatically spidered for searching • Lower value content: automatically spidered only • Useful approach: content analysis

  14. #3: 80% of users' nav. needs served by 20% of all possible IA components Users’ needs sweet spot IA components

  15. Sweet Spot:Support most important means of finding • Determine major information needs; e.g.: • Known-item searching: provide search system that supports narrowing results, A-Z site index • Orientation: provide site-wide taxonomy, table of contents • Research: provide search system that supports broadening results • Task completion: provide contextual navigation • brint.com is good example of what not to do • Useful approaches: persona and scenario development, user interviews, user testing

  16. #4: 80% of users' info. needs addressed by the top 20% of all searches Most common searches sweet spot All searches

  17. Sweet Spot:“Best Bets” for common searches Useful approach: search log analysis

  18. #5: 80% of IA effort should be invested in 20% of total architecture • Most user interaction with IA in these five critical junctures, so focus on them • Main page: deemphasize investment in favor of following four junctures • Search interface: go beyond shrink wrap • Search results: present appropriate result components; configure result ranking or clustering to meet users’ needs • Browsing/navigation page (e.g. “taxonomy”): • “Found” documents: provide appropriate contextual navigation (i.e., “where to go next”)

  19. Want More? • This presentation: • www.louisrosenfeld.com/presentations/020920-umbs.ppt • Pareto’s Principle: • www.paretolaw.co.uk/principle.html • www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_principle • Discussion of the 80/20 Rule and IA: • louisrosenfeld.com/home/bloug_archive/000122.html

  20. Contact information • Louis Rosenfeld LLC • 902 Miller Avenue • Ann Arbor, Michigan 48103 USA • lou@louisrosenfeld.com • www.louisrosenfeld.com • +1.734.663.3323 voice • +1.734.661.1655 fax

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