Organizing content into meaningful categories to create a logical structure for users to navigate.

Taxonomy Design

Dale Clifford
Smart Design Kit
2 min readApr 18, 2024

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Taxonomy Design: A Guide to Information Architecture

Taxonomy design is an important part of information architecture. It helps to organize content into meaningful categories and subcategories, making it easier for users to find what they’re looking for. In this guide, we’ll cover the basics of taxonomy design, including how to get started, best practices, and examples.

Getting Started

The first step in taxonomy design is to identify the purpose of the taxonomy. What is the goal of the taxonomy? What types of content will it contain? Once you’ve identified the purpose, you can begin to create the categories and subcategories.

How To

When creating a taxonomy, it’s important to keep the user in mind. Think about how users will interact with the taxonomy and how they will search for content. Consider using keywords that are relevant to the content and that users are likely to search for.

  • Start by identifying the purpose of the taxonomy.
  • Create categories and subcategories that are meaningful and relevant to the content.
  • Use keywords that are relevant to the content and that users are likely to search for.
  • Optimize for SEO by including keywords in the category and subcategory titles.
  • Keep the user in mind when creating the taxonomy.

Best Practices

When creating a taxonomy, it’s important to keep the user in mind. Think about how users will interact with the taxonomy and how they will search for content. Consider using keywords that are relevant to the content and that users are likely to search for. Additionally, it’s important to optimize for SEO by including keywords in the category and subcategory titles.

Examples

Here are some examples of taxonomies:

  • A blog taxonomy might include categories such as “News”, “Opinion”, and “Reviews”.
  • An ecommerce taxonomy might include categories such as “Clothing”, “Shoes”, and “Accessories”.
  • A library taxonomy might include categories such as “Fiction”, “Non-Fiction”, and “Reference”.

Originally published at Smart Design Kit.
This publication may contain affiliate links to external websites.

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