making your content findable -- tagging and categorizing for bloggers -- podcamp toronto 2013

Making Your Content FindableTagging and Categorizing for Bloggers

Tags and categories presentationPodCamp 2013

Robin [email protected]

Copyright 2013 Robin Macrae. All Rights Reserved.

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PodCamp 2013 presentation v1a F (Slidy) | Tags and categories series | zWordPressz | 164_p25 | 2013-02-22 (1)

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Overview and background(A)Is this presentation for you?(1)finding information in your space is difficult1.

it's easy to lose track of where you are2.

time onsite is not as high as it could be3.

you take authoring seriously4.

you have valuable content5.

you plan on being around for a while6.

Make the case that tagging and categorization are essential to any seriousweb-based work.

The more complex a hypertext space — a site — the more important therole of these two key information architecture elements.

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The plan (2)

Overview

why are you here1.

background2.

a few caveats (message, length, examples, plugins)3.

my Tags and Categories thesis4.

1.

A basic orientation to tags and categories

a tag, a Category and a taxonomy1.

what is a tag, a category?2.

a custom taxonomies diagram3.

the case for Categories, categorization is hard wired4.

categories at work5.

2.

The blogosphere

95% of blogs use tags and categories ineffectively1.

a few good examples2.

3.

Blog stages of growth model

the issues1.

a blog's evolution2.

recommendations3.

the long term benefit4.

go forth and categorize!5.

4.

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Study that scheme (3)

we've just used our first categorization scheme, a classification of the slidesby topic

1.

compare its informational value to

a search box1.

a sidebar widget and its list or cloud of keywords2.

a presentation with slide bullets but no slide titles3.

2.

The authoring of a presentation is a good example of content and classificationiterations (PowerPoint outlines).

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My background (4)

my experience as a practitioner vs theory1.

one massive integrated personal workspace or “site”2.

built many large content heavy sites for every size from individuals andworkgroups to enterprises

3.

my enterprise consulting practice

information architecture — organize and structure information1.

content strategy and development, the CMS pattern2.

complex information products and content applications3.

metadata and taxonomies integral aspect4.

4.

WordPress and SharePoint bias and limitations5.

working with Seth Earley and Earley & Associates6.

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Caveats (5)

What are you building? The basic strategy —

you need structure and organization when you author content worthorganizing

1.

discover the underlying order and then nurture and cultivate iteratively2.

new content extends, explains or relates in some other way to existingcontent

3.

our primary interest today is navigation and findability4.

this applies to any content management system (CMS)5.

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My Tags and Categories thesis(6)

“TaC” is the label I use to refer to the tags and categories in a blog such asWordPress and any other CMS platform.

TaC — important but poorly understood and used — confusion isunderstandable

1.

TaC essential to effective blogging for readers and authors2.

usage changes as blog grows and evolves3.

authors must use them in creating content (eating your own dog food)4.

these organizing tools are late to the authoring party5.

authoring driven classification schemes essential to Semantic Web(share and reuse data across applications, enterprises and communities:Wikipedia entry)

6.

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A basic orientation to TaC(B)A tag, a Category and ataxonomy (8)WordPress enables and promotes the use of tags and Categories (Add New

Post panel)

two of the four steps in authoring a post (the other two are a post's title and bodycontent)

1.

what's OOTB: three taxonomies, an API, lots of plugins2.

1.

In WordPress, we're surrounded by classification schemes

for example, edit panel's columns — tracking posts by date, author, revision1.

but it's “water, water, everywhere but not a drop to drink”2.

the primary scheme for posts is Categories and is poorly used as a rule3.

2.

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What is a tag? (9)

Is a tag just a cute name for a keywords index?1.

fast, easy and cheap way to organize post content2.

the poor relative of indexing3.

“uncontrolled” vocabulary4.

high risk of proliferation and eventual chaos5.

progress from trivial and helpful to specialized and invaluable

some use in early blog stage especially given alternatives (date, etc.)1.

very useful when used for indexing2.

6.

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What are is Categories (10)

Categories — the builtin WordPress hierarchical taxonomy for posts1.

Categories is a taxonomy

a classification mechanism1.

the basic procedures2.

the Taxonomy API (no UI, hacks and plugins required)3.

2.

a taxonomy is

a method of organizing by grouping things which share identified characteristics1.

can be and often is hierarchical2.

a WordPress blind spot (Codex, etc.)3.

3.

topical is most common but infinite number of ways to classify including

temporal (date, time period, etc.)1.

author2.

physical (length, size, scope)3.

stage or type of work or process4.

relationships5.

geographical6.

4.

the book pattern

book pattern is helpful in thinking about categories and tags1.

chapters are categories and indexes, tags2.

when would I use a book's table of contents vs the index?3.

Lorelle credit4.

5.

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Custom taxonomies diagram(11)

This diagram is from What are "custom taxonomies"? (Joost de Valk), thedeveloper of the Simple Taxonomies plugin.

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The case for Categories (12)

information architecture (“IA”) — this is metadata — that's the key

organization and structure1.

findability2.

navigability3.

reuse4.

hypertext quality5.

1.

Categories are the key to creating an information space2.

use Categories in order for Categories to be useful (eat your own dog food)

invest in and commit to using Categories yourself1.

find Categories useful yourself before readers will find it useful2.

3.

hierarchical depth deepens context and improves usefulness4.

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Categorization is hard wired(13)

to categorize is an innate human characteristic and capability

tagging is not a natural ability

1.

classification schemes

the builtin ones in WordPress1.

recipes (meals, ingredients, season, cuisine: Epicurious: Thai; browse)2.

library catalog vs coffee's 800 facets/attributes3.

2.

paradigm shift from physical to faceted classification (Wikipedia)

Everything is Miscellaneous book by David Weinberger

3.

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More Categories capabilities(15)

Categories may be used for various purposes

navigation/finding: browsing a hierarchy1.

Category specific templates2.

list selectively (metadata filtering: Category Tagging)3.

populate navbar in themes (e.g., Tarski)4.

create and use a content type (Asides)5.

control a private set of posts (Category doesn't display if all posts areprivate)

6.

add images (Category Image(s))7.

suppress certain categories8.

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95% of blogs use tags andCategories ineffectively (16)

using Categories as if they were tags with multiple selections1.

too many tier 1 Categories (analysis paralysis) and no tier 2, etc.2.

single taxonomy view3.

performance issue using Categories as canonical URLs (Category inPermalinks Considered Harmful, Otto on WordPress)

4.

don't refactor so Categories don't evolve from rudimentary initially used5.

don't use them themselves and think that they're just for readers6.

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A few good examples (17)

A List Apart

a topic scheme for categories1.

excellent way of handling what are referred to as “topics”2.

only seven categories at the top: for example, Topics > Content > Content Strategy3.

each category is annotated with a useful description4.

top level ones display their sub-categories name and link, descriptions and articlecount but not posts themselves

5.

articles are often in more than one category but few are in more than three6.

there are no tags and search isn't emphasized7.

1.

Epicurious: browse : categories | recipes | cuisine | Thai2.

Victor Lombardi's Noise Between Stations blog a moderately complexthree tier categories scheme by an IA — Category Archives

Matt Mullenweg in Victor Lombardi (2004):

Look at how the information architects go crazy with sub-categories. Ilove it!

3.

Toronto Public Library's Advanced Search, a classification scheme —categories — albeit by the way things are organized as opposed to topically

4.

RWG, Index; TaC (def), People (Log)5.

dog blog: TorontoDogBlog.com, Ottawa Dog Blog, Modern Scottie Dog,Scottish Terrier and Dog News

6.

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Blog stages of growth (D)The issues (19)

a blog evolves through stages — a strategy or plan is a good idea1.

with plugins, hacks, APIs, category specific templates, etc.,customization is rampant in tags and categories but not necessarily to goodeffect

2.

multiple categories and tag proliferation risk3.

custom taxonomies: are they an alternative when hierarchies aren'tsupported in custom taxonomies?

4.

The search argument5.

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A blog's evolution (20)

a blog evolves — the stages are 50, 250 and 1,000+ posts — illustrate whya plan is important

1.

in the early stage, given the number of posts, categories change and tags oflittle use

2.

crucial role of refactoring3.

this is information architecture: navigation, findability, reuse, hypertextquality all of which show the importance of metadata

4.

For both tags and Categories, these core capabilities will only become moreimportant and easier to use and manage as WordPress develops. More, betterand easier. So a strategy is a good idea.

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Recommendations (21)

categories are a crucial; tags not so much1.

categories are the key to creating an information space2.

use caution assigning posts to multiple categories3.

don't use categories as the Permalink structure in the initial stage of a blogbecause they will change as the blog evolves

4.

understand and address the tag proliferation risk5.

in general, date is a poor navigation scheme and way of classifying content— who cares about your process?

6.

develop your scheme to reflect the stages of development (50, 250 and1,000+)

7.

use it in order for it to be useful (dog food)8.

depth deepens context and improves usefulness9.

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The long term benefit (22)

Ultimately, your use of categories will determine the long term value andviability (survival) of your blog.

What is the impact of an effective categories strategy?

the evolution of your blog's content theme(s)1.

the quality of your hypertext2.

your personal productivity3.

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Go forth and categorize! (23)

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making your content findable -- tagging and categorizing for bloggers -- podcamp toronto 2013

Design

categories series zwordpressz

presentation v1a f slidy

categories thesis

categories presentationpodcamp

use of tags

content applications

new content

content strategy