Strategies LLCTaxonomy

November 13, 2008 Copyright 2008 Taxonomy Strategies LLC. All rights reserved.

Enterprise Web Taxonomy Design Best Practices

Joseph A Busch, Founder & Principal

2Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

Taxonomy Strategies LLC: http://www.taxonomystrategies.com/html/aboutus.htm

Business consultants who specialize in applying taxonomies, metadata, automatic classification, and other information retrieval technologies to the needs of business.

Spin-off from Metacode Technologies, developer of XML metadata repository, automated categorization methods stack and taxonomy editor acquired by Interwoven as MetaTagger product line.

More than 50 years experience among our members. Metadata and taxonomy community leadership.

President, American Society for Information Science & Technology Dublin Core Metadata Initiative Board Member Chair, PRISM (Publishers Requirements for Industry Standard Metadata)

working group Co-editor, PRISM, XPointer, 3 IETF RFCs, and Dublin Core 1 & 2 reports.

Founded: 2002Location: San Francisco, CA Members:

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Recent & current projects: http://www.taxonomystrategies.com/html/clients.htm

CommercialGovernment

Not-for-Profit

4Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

Agenda

Taxonomy business case and use scenarios. Taxonomy project start-up tasks. Taxonomy tasks and deliverables.

5Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

What is a Taxonomy?

A categorization framework agreed upon by business and content owners (with the help of subject matter experts) that will be used to tag content.

6 broad, discrete divisions (called facets) 2-3 levels deep. Up to 15 terms at each level. 1200 terms total. With some logic—hierarchical, equivalent and associative relationships

between terms.

6Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

Effectiveness of taxonomies

Categorize in multiple, independent, categories.

Allow combinations of categories to narrow the choice of items.

4 independent categories of 10 nodes each have the same discriminatory power as one hierarchy of 10,000 nodes (104) Easier to maintain. Easier to reuse existing material. Can be easier to navigate, if

software supports it. 42 values to maintain (10+6+11+15)

9900 combinations (10x6x11x15)

Main Ingredients

Cooking Methods

Meal Type Cuisines

• Chocolate• Dairy• Fruits• Grains• Meat &

Seafood• Nuts• Olives• Pasta• Spices &

Seasonings• Vegetables

• Breakfast• Brunch• Lunch• Supper• Dinner• Snack

• African• American• Asian• Caribbean• Continental• Eclectic/

Fusion/ International

• Jewish• Latin American• Mediterranean• Middle Eastern• Vegetarian

• Advanced• Bake• Broil• Fry• Grill• Marinade• Microwave• No Cooking• Poach• Quick• Roast• Sauté• Slow

Cooking• Steam• Stir-fry

7Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

What technology analysts have said

“Better structure equals better access: Taxonomy serves as a framework for organizing the ever-growing and changing information within a company. The many dimensions of taxonomy can greatly facilitate Web site design, content management, and search engineering. If well done, taxonomy will allow for structured Web content, leading to improved information access.”

“Adding metadata to unstructured content allows it to be managed like structured content. Applications that use structured content work better.”

“Enriching content with structured metadata is critical for supporting search and personalized content delivery.”

“Content that has been adequately tagged with metadata can be leveraged in usage tracking, personalization and improved searching.”

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Potentially quantifiable taxonomy benefits

Reduce customer service call center/associate support requests. Improve call center efficiency and effectiveness. Increase telemarketing conversions. Reduce cost per unique user (UU) Improve search engine optimization (SEO) Decrease searches with zero hits (on website enterprise search). Increase number of links (internal cross-cutting links) Reduce time/cost to build new web sites, implement web services

and develop applications. Increase number of web pages with metatags. Comply with regulations.

9Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

What uses must a Taxonomy support?

Tagging Content Management Dynamic Publishing Search Navigation

“ When we talk about a taxonomy, we are not only talking about a website navigation scheme. Websites change frequently, we are looking at a more durable way to deal with content so that different navigation schemes can be used over time.”

– R. Daniel “Taxonomy FAQs”

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Why build and apply a Taxonomy? Taxonomy enables usability and re-usability

Content users… as well as what’s going on in front of the

screen.

What’s going on behind the screen …Content managers

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Taxonomy benefits

In front of the screen: Web property publishing and use Standard categorization enabling dynamic content delivery. Content re-use in multiple distribution channels – internal web, external web and

print. Content re-use in customer facing FAQ s on specific topics and products. Orienting Googlers—even when they land on a page fifteen layers deep. Ensuring consistent values for analytics across channels (website analytics) Reduce time to on-board new web properties.

Behind the screen: Content retrieval for authors and web managers Finding a piece of content that exists. Determining ownership of the content and if can it be re-utilized. Enabling alerts – if new, by subscription, by interest, by individual, etc. Keeping content fresh, accurate and in compliance with regulations.

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Alignment with enterprise applications

Data analytics and web analytics count attributes. You can’t count document-like content unless it is categorized. You can’t compare document-like content categories to

structured data values unless they use the same (or similar) frameworks.

13Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

Aligning with enterprise applications

Dublin Core is a de-facto standard across many other systems and standards

RSS (1.0), OAI (Open Archives Initiative)

Inside organization – CMS (content management system) e.g., MOSS, portals, etc.

Mapping to DC elements from most existing schemes is simple

Metadata already exists in enterprise applications

SAP, EMC Documentum, MS Office, etc.

Source: Todd Stephens, BellSouth

Per-Source Data Types, Access Controls, etc.

Dublin Core

Taxonomies, Vocabularies, Ontologies

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Agenda

Taxonomy business case and use scenarios. Taxonomy project start-up tasks. Taxonomy tasks and deliverables.

15Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

Taxonomy start-up tasks

Identify target content to be focused on. Provide a list of websites (and/or other target content file stores) Prioritize this list for the purposes of the taxonomy project.

Gather any query logs, usage statistics and usability surveys. Collect any existing documentation related to audience

personas, content organization, metadata, keywords, and any other guidelines or standards.

16Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

Taxonomy start-up tasks (2)

Designate who will be the project manager / single-point of contact.

Develop a list of stakeholders and interview candidates Minimum of 6 and usually less than 12 interview sessions. One-on one interviews, or focus groups.

Schedule stakeholders briefing Schedule interviews to start immediately after the briefing.

17Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

Agenda

Taxonomy business case and use scenarios. Taxonomy project start-up tasks. Taxonomy tasks and deliverables.

18Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

Define and quantify business benefits

  Potential Benefits Cost per %

ReduceCurrent

No%

IncreaseAnnual Benefit

1Reduce call center customer service/support requests $ 20 1% 10,000,000   $ 2,000,000

According to HDI 2007 Practices & Salary Survey, median cost per incident reported via phone, e-mail and self-service was $20, $16 and $5 respectively. In phone interview, John M said there were 10M calls in 2007.

2 Improve call center efficiency & effectiveness $ 44,014 3% 300   $ 330,105

According to PayScale, median call center salary for company is $44,014. In phone interview, John M said there were 300 agents.

3 Reduce cost per UU (unique user) $ 0.10 10% 19,196,774   $ 191,968

2007.com+ Inet visitors from web summary report. What are the total estimated costs attributed to .com + Inet?

5 Decrease searches with zero hits $ 15 10% 100,000   $ 150,000

Cost per is difference between self-service and phone call. How many zero result searches? Can this be inferred to be a customer service call?

6 Increase number of links (internal cross-cutting links) $ 20   200,000 100% $ 4,000,000

Specifically counting links to related content. Usually, this is in right column box, but could be embedded in text. Not included are top, left or bottom nav which are usually part of the template. How many links of this type are there currently? How much does it cost to create such a link? How much of an increase should be considered a target benefit?

7 Reduce time/cost to build new website $ 100,000 50% 5   $ 250,000

How much does it cost to build a new website, or re-design an existing one? How much could reasonably be saved by improving content re-usability?

8 Increase no. of web pages with metatags $ 3   50,000 100% $ 150,240

How many pages have metatags? How many metatag values total? How much does it cost to add metatags to a page? How much increased metatagging should be considered a benefit?

  Total         $ 7,072,313

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Develop use cases and use scenarios: Intranet examples

Content related to business areas or facilities By geographic location, by type, by specific facility, by access

restrictions, by audience, etc.

Company-wide content By business function, by topic, by access rights, etc.

Use Case: Create a safety policies and procedures website for facilities organized by State.

Use Scenario: Find all safety policies and procedures related to a facilities located in Oregon.

Use Case: Locate any content that has policies and procedures around a particular topic.

Use Scenario: A policy regarding smoking company-wide has changed and references to outdated policies should be removed. Find official policies, as well as newsletters related to the smoking policy company-wide.

20Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

Develop use cases and use scenarios: .com examples

Web content managers By content type, by topic, by location, etc.

Public users seeking information by topic, by location, etc.

Use Case: Provide search for dividend schedules, earnings statements and stock splits; and the corresponding press releases for a specific time period.

Use Scenario: An investor who recently sold stock is preparing taxes and would like to do a concise .com search so that they can find historical information about their holdings.

Use Case: Find and recall all public-facing pages that describe a specific safety tip.

Use Scenario: Find and recall all public-facing pages that discuss child safety.

21Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

Create a typology of use cases

Intranet

Ac-cess Right

Audi-ence

Bus Func-tion

Content Type

Pro-duct

Geog Loc

Job Type Org Topic

Find content related to a specific location by …                  

Find company-wide content by …                  

.com                  

For web content managers, find content by …                  

For public users, find content by …                  

Primary

Secondary

22Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

Audience ProductsLocationOrganization Content Type

Product Line

Application

Technology

Industry Solution

Person

“Is a” groups of Products

Draft the high-level taxonomy: Oracle.com example

23Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

Illustrate with tagging examples: Travel approval form

Facet Value

Content Type Form

Organization

Business Function Travel

Product

Geo Location

Topic Approval

Job Type

Audience Employees

Access Right All Employees

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Build detailed taxonomy: NASA Taxonomy websitehttp://nasataxonomy.jpl.nasa.gov/

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Validate the taxonomy: Analysis example

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Form the taxonomy governance team

CorporateCommunications

Taxonomy Editor

Content Sponsors IT Implementers

Other Staff

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Develop taxonomy integration roadmap

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Develop communication model

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Key components to a successful taxonomy project: Project best practices

Incremental, extensible process that identifies and enables users, and engages stakeholders.

Engage stakeholders from the start and throughout the process. Talk with implementers as early as possible. Keep your audience in mind. Strive for subject-based categorization. Be consistent. Control depth and breadth. Make a long-term investment. Develop and carry out a communication plan. A means to an end, and not the end in itself . Not perfect, but it does the job it is supposed to do—such as improving

search and navigation. Improved over time, and maintained.

Strategies LLCTaxonomy

November 13, 2008 Copyright 2008 Taxonomy Strategies LLC. All rights reserved.

Questions?

Joseph A. Busch, +1-415-377-7912, jbusch@taxonomystrategies.com

www.taxonomystrategies.com

31Taxonomy Strategies LLC The business of organized information

Enterprise Web Taxonomy Design Best Practices

The message has finally gotten through—to build an effective portal and web framework you need an enterprise taxonomy strategy. This enterprise interest and focus is one of the key differences we see in recent taxonomy projects. Developing the business case, getting stakeholders on board, engaging in a collaborative process, validation, education, training and developing an implementation roadmap are more important than ever before. Business managers now expect that information on an organization’s public websites and intranets be findable, and that web services such as RSS feeds and alerts, guided navigation and search result filtering, mashups and visualization, and others be available. This talk will discuss what an enterprise web taxonomy is and then describe the key tasks and outcomes in a typical enterprise-wide taxonomy project. Examples will be provided from many large public and commercial organizations will be used to illustrate best practices. What are the most the typical and most compelling use cases and use scenarios for developing a taxonomy? What are the critical start-up tasks in a taxonomy project? What are the best criteria for identifying business stakeholders to participate in the project, how do you get

them involved, and what should be their role in the taxonomy development process? What do business managers need to know about taxonomy and why it’s important? What are the best practices for taxonomy development tasks and deliverables such as the high-level

taxonomy design? How does an enterprise web taxonomy align with other enterprise information and data management

applications?