IA vs User Flow: Understanding the Differences and How to Use Them Together

When I first heard the word ‘taxonomy’, I had no idea what it meant. I remember enthusiastically nodding my head at my boss about how awesome it is while frantically Googling it under the table. We’ve all been there early on in our careers. Although, what I found left me feeling even more confused — something about classifying animals? Whether you’re as confused as I was all those years ago or just in need of a refresher, this quick guide to all things taxonomy will sort you out.

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What is a taxonomy in information architecture?

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In information architecture, taxonomy refers to how information is grouped, classified and labeled within a shared information environment. The overarching structure of that shared information environment is the information architecture (IA) and we find our way around it using the navigation. Think of an IA as a house. The taxonomy determines which pieces of furniture belong in each room and we navigate around the house via doorways and hallways. It all fits together to create one shared environment.

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For a website architecture example, think of an online shoe store. The shoes might be organized and labelled by color, size, style, season or collection — that’s the taxonomy. The overall picture of where those groups of shoes live is the IA and in our pursuit of new shoes, we might navigate that structure via a navigation bar at the top of the page. In the amazing Grand Taxonomy of Rap Names visualization below, we can see how the information is categorized, connected and labeled through the lines and the colors. There’s no structure or hierarchy to it yet; that would be the next step in the process to build the IA.

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Creating a taxonomy

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There are so many different ways to carve information up into a taxonomy and the key drivers for determining that are your content and, of course, your users. Your taxonomy needs to make sense to your users.You may be starting from scratch with a new website or you may have inherited a taxonomy that for whatever reason just isn’t fit for purpose. The first step when creating an initial taxonomy is to do a comprehensive audit of your content. Ask yourself, is your content relevant? Is it up-to-date? Is it all necessary? Are there opportunities to delete or condense content? Once you have your content sorted, you’re ready to move on to the next step of running a card sort with users.Running a card sort early in your taxonomy creation process will allow you to build it up from an evidence based foundation. There’s no point guessing then testing and potentially going back to square one, when you can co-create with your users and then test that informed approach to validate and further evolve your thinking.When you’re designing your card sort, you’ll need to decide if you’re going to do an open, closed or hybrid sort. Here’s a very high level look at what each type involves:

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• Open: participants sort cards into groups and name their own categories
• Closed: participants sort cards into categories determined by you
• Hybrid: participants sort cards into categories determined by you AND they can also make up their own.

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This early in the taxonomy creation process, it’s best to start out with an open card sort. Not only will this tell you how your users expect your content to be grouped, but will also provide insight into the language and labels that they would expect that content to be associated with. You never know, an open card sort may even surface something you hadn’t considered. At this stage of the process, it’s important to be open to ideas and new possibilities and an open card sort will do just that.Once you’ve settled on the type of card sort you’ll be running, you’ll need to test which can be done through a tool such as Optimal Workshop’s OptimalSort. OptimalSort enables you to run unmoderated card sorts remotely (or print out cards for a moderated/in-person card sort!). After your participants have completed your card sort, you can access the benefits of OptimalSort’s powerful result analysis functions.

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Learn more about running a card sort and more through our 101 guide.

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After you’ve run your initial open card sort with users, you should have everything you need to create the first iteration of your taxonomy. Consider everything you learned during the card sort and cross reference that with your business goals and any tech constraints you might be facing. Don’t stress too much about nailing it this time around — remember this is the first iteration and as you test more and learn more, you can make changes. Build out your taxonomy in Post-it notes with a team and then whack it into a spreadsheet to make future testing and iteration activities easier.

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How to test a taxonomy

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Now that you have the first iteration of your taxonomy, it’s time to have a go at structuring those groups into an IA and running a tree test. A tree test works like a card sort but in reverse — it allows you to test your thinking by working backwards. Optimal Workshop’s Treejack is an online tree testing tool that helps you assess the findability of your content without any visual design elements. All you need are clear objectives for what you’d like to learn more about and a spreadsheet version of your draft IA (told you it would come in handy! ).

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Learn more about Treejack and tree testing through our equally handy 101 guide.

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Another way to test your taxonomy thinking is to run another card sort. However this time, a hybrid or a closed card sort might be more suitable. A closed card sort would be useful if you’ve got evidence to suggest that your group labels are making sense to users but you’re not 100% sure what belongs in each group. A hybrid sort will let you go one step further and tell you if your content does in fact fit within those labels and if not you’ll also pick up some new ideas to iterate your taxonomy further.

Developing a taxonomy is like any other design process. Bring users into your process as early as you can and never stop iterating, improving and learning.Oh, and about those animals — I wasn’t entirely wrong. The way we classify animals (e.g., vertebrates and invertebrates) is a taxonomy. There are taxonomies everywhere and they’re not all digital. From libraries to supermarkets, we are immersed in taxonomies. It's the role of information architects to determine how these taxonomies are presented to us and how we navigate through them — the possibilities are truly endless!

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Further reading

• "What is information architecture" — a guide we created to help people learn more about information architecture, including stuff for beginners and those who are more advanced.
• "An introduction to taxonomies" — an article from UXBooth's Sarah Khan that details what taxonomies are, taxonomy displays and more.

According to Abby Covert, author, teacher and community leader in the field of information architecture (IA) : ‘IA is the way we arrange pieces of content to make sense when experienced as a whole. By this definition: there is information architecture in everything. Mindblown?’

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😮 (That’s a resounding yes from an IA rookie like me.)

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In this issue of CRUX we go in search of information architecture and have some surprising encounters in the worlds of emoji, elevators, walking tracks, games and more. We meet UX designers, developers, researchers and even a Senior Park Ranger. It seems you can have your ‘IA hat’ on without even realising it. That’s the power of information architecture.

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Some highlights from this issue:

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• UX research and strategy specialist, Q Walker explores the world of emoji from an information architecture perspective and sparks curiosity along the way. Have you ever wondered why clock emojis are organized under travel and places? 🤔

• We talk to Senior Park Ranger David Rogers about the thinking behind creating and building New Zealand’s national walking track network and reveal how information architecture can also live ‘in the wild’.

• UX developer Ben Chapman delves into the classification systems of libraries over time and ponders the pros and cons for users of moving information online.

• We talk to Sam Cope, Lead UX Designer at Wētā Workshop’s Interactive division about what it takes to drive design decisions with the end user in mind - something crucial for any video game’s success, whether it’s a blockbuster or something more niche.

• And much more about information architecture in unexpected places….

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The stories and people in this issue of CRUX certainly captured our imagination and attention - we hope they inspire and even surprise you too.

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Get comfortable and settle in for a great read. Welcome to CRUX #6.

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A plug for the next issue

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Do you have a burning idea to share or a conversation you’re dying to kickstart that’s of interest to the world of UX?  Now’s your chance.  We’re already on the lookout for contributors for our next edition of CRUX for 2022.  To find out more please drop us a line.

Click, click, click, BOOM! There it is. That thing you were looking for. You couldn’t find it on other websites, but you found it here, and it was easy. You feel like a hero. You thank the website and you leave with a sense of achievement.

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What if you could replicate that feeling on your website? What if you could make every user journey so satisfying? By combining information architecture and user flow, you can.

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But what are they and how are they different? In this article, we’ll explain how they influence website design and how you can (and should) use them together in your project. We’ll also discuss different user flow research techniques, how they inform great information architecture, and how it doesn’t have to be difficult or time consuming.

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What is Information Architecture? 🏗️

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Information architecture is the system and structure you use to organize and label content on your website, app or product. It relates closely to user experience design, but it’s slightly different. Think of it as the structure or framework upon which user-facing assets are built.

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That being the case, if your information architecture has flaws, your website design will have flaws. It determines how information will be accessible, usable and relevant on your website and should be treated as a critical element of your project. How can we ensure that we have our content organized efficiently to promote seamless interactions?

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The answer is research. Without research you’re just guessing. The problem with guessing is that, well, you’re guessing. You tend to organize, categorize and label things the way that you (and maybe your team) would organize things. It’s biassed and subjective. In reality, people process information in all sorts of different ways and good information architecture should reflect that. You’ll often hear us say ‘test early and test often’. This mantra helps to avoid any little niggles during the user experience design process. Card sorting and tree testing are a couple of techniques that you can use to test early.

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Card sorting is a research technique that asks users to categorize different pieces of information or content. It’s best used when you have specific, information-related questions. For example, you may want to categorize products in an online store in the most logical way. Or you may have a mountain of blog post categories that need refining. Whatever it is, the benefit of a card sort is that you end up with consensus of how your users expect to see information. Card sorts can even be performed remotely using tools such as OptimalSort.

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Tree testing examines how easy it is for your users to find information using a stripped back, text-only representation of your website - almost like a sitemap. Rather than asking users to sort information, they are asked to perform a navigation task, for example, “where would you find today’s best deals?”. Depending on how easy or difficult users find these tasks gives you a great indication of the strengths and weaknesses of your underlying site structure.

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As the base structure of your website or app, information architecture has a fundamental influence on how well users access and use your content. It makes sense then that when designing it, you should receive real-world user feedback early on in the piece. Fortunately, there are great online tools like Treejack to quickly and easily test your site structures, categorization and labels.

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What is User Flow? 🌊

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User flow describes the steps involved for a user to complete a certain task. It lays out what needs to happen for a user to get from starting point to a defined finish line. Why is it important? Because we want that journey to be as efficient as it can possibly be. If it’s not, the user will be left frustrated and dissatisfied, no matter how beautiful the website design is.

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At the heart of user flow is, you guessed it, the user. A path that seems obvious to designers might be confusing to an end-user. It’s important to distance yourself from the project and put yourself in the user's shoes. Even better - watch the user. How do they react to a fork in the road? How do they get back on track? Where are they stumbling?

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User testing is a great way to observe user flow. But what are you testing? Normally you test based on a user flow diagram. A user flow diagram is generated based on insights from your research from card sorting, tree testing, and questionnaires, for example. It visually outlines the possible paths a user can take to achieve a certain task. The basic structure of a user flow diagram considers the following:

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• A critical path
• Entry points
• User end goals
• Success metrics (time to completion, number of clicks)
• Steps the user will take in between

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Once you have created a user flow diagram you can test it with your users. User testing can be remote or in person and uses a variety of techniques depending on the constraints of your projects. You may consider testing something rough and conceptual like a paper prototype before producing more detailed prototypes.

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How to Use Information Architecture and User Flow Together 🤝🏻

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By doing the work upfront to create great information architecture you put yourself in a great position to create great user flow. After all, information architecture is designed based on user research. Performing content audits and creating content inventories help to inform early content decisions, followed by user research techniques such as card sorting and tree testing. This research has a direct influence on user flow, since information and content has been given meaning and structure.

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The foundational work in designing information architecture leads to user flow diagrams which, as we discussed, are helpful tools in creating seamless user flow. They bridge the gap between information architecture and final user experience by visualizing pathways of specific tasks. By performing user tests on prototypes, the researcher will inevitably find speed bumps, which may highlight flaws in information architecture.

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Information architecture and user flow are integrated. This means there should be a constant feedback loop. Early research and categorisation when building information architecture may not translate to seamless user flow in practice. This could be due to integration factors outside of the digital ecosystem you’re designing.

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User flow and information architecture are complementary components of creating exceptional website design. Designers should make a conscious decision to apply both in synchrony.

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To Sum it Up 🧾

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Understanding the relationship between information architecture and user flow is important for any website design. Information architecture provides the organization and structure of content, where user flow applies that structure to how users execute certain tasks in the simplest possible way. The two are intertwined and, when used effectively, provide a framework to ensure seamless, user-friendly website design.

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User research and user testing heavily influence the design of both information architecture and user flow. We want users to feel a sense of accomplishment rather than frustration when using a website. Achieving this requires an investment in understanding user needs and goals, and how they consume and categorize information. This is where research techniques such as content audits, tree testing, card sorting and user testing become invaluable.

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We’ve always placed high value on solid research, but don’t be put off by it. The research techniques we’ve discussed are highly scalable, and you can be as involved as you want or need to be. Sometimes you don’t even have to be in the same room! The most important thing is to get outside of your team’s bubble and gain real user insight. Check out our information architecture services to ensure you’re on the right path towards powerful, user-centric website design.