Principles of information architecture

What is Information Architecture?

Information Architecture (IA) is the essential step to be carried out upstream of any digital project. Concretely, it means defining the structure on which the visual elements, functionalities, interactions, and navigation will be based.

Why does Information Architecture matter?

If a designer is not thoughtfully structuring and presenting content to a user, they are not considering a users context and how they will extract value from what is being designed when interacting with a product or service.

Imagine being suddenly transported into an environment you know nothing about. You don’t know where you are, what the place is made of, and where you can go from there. This is very similar to using a product with no IA — it feels like a maze with no coordinates.

Such products harm user experience. People don’t know how to reach their goals or, in other words, find their way out of the maze.

Principles of information architecture

In our definition above, information architecture looks at organisation, labelling, navigation, and search to support usability and find-ability.

Objects

The first principle of information architecture is that of objects. In essence, it revolves around the fact that every piece of content on a UX architecture should be treated as a living thing. Every object has its own tendencies, behaviours, and life cycles, which must be considered independently, and in relation to one another when working on information architectures in UX.

Choices

The principle of choices in UX information architecture is concerned with the decisions a user makes while interacting with something, or from the designers side, the decisions which the user is allowed to make. This principle states that too many options can burden, or paralyse users from progressing meaningfully, therefore, offering a few, meaningful choices is always a better choice.

Disclosure

The third principle to consider when designing a content information architecture in UX, is disclosure, which much like the previous principle demands restraint from the designer. This principle states that the user should only be shown enough content to decide whether they’d like to progress further into the design, or not. This ensures that all aspects of the architecture are appreciated, and internalised, with proper breathing space, before the user chooses to move forward.

Exemplars

The next principle of designing a UX information architecture is that of exemplars. The first use-case principle on the list, this states that if the options are not self explanatory, it’s important to present examples to the user, to help them make a more informed decision. The principle also makes clear that visual imagery makes for great exemplars, and do help users internalize the nature of options better than text.

Front Doors

Dan Brown’s fifth principle of UX information Principles of data design
What is info Architecture?
Information design (IA) is that the essential step to be dispensed upstream of any digital project. Concretely, it suggests that process the structure on that the visual parts, functionalities, interactions, and navigation are primarily based.

Multiple Classifications

The principle of multiple classifications states that users should always have more than one way to search all available content on a program. Most sites do this by having a search bar, as well as top level menus, but there are far more ways UX designers can be clever with providing navigation options.

Focused Navigation

The penultimate principle of designing content information architecture for UX is that of focused navigation. This principle states that navigation should be a focused, deliberate process on both how the designer creates it, and the user interacts with it. Clearly separate items as per their function, and alleviate overlap in types of content wherever possible.

Growth

The final principle of UX information architecture is perhaps the most important of all, and ties together all previous points. This is concerned with the scalability of your design, informing designers that the content one begins with initially will at one point be but a fraction of the total content on the design. For this reason, making programs which are scalable, modular, and easily expandible is one of the most important things to keep in mind when creating an information architecture.

Takeaway

These principles are a great place to start when learning what it takes to create a solid Information Architecture for a project. While these principles are tailored to creating IA for a website, it’s possible to adapt them to other digital or even non-digital products

Hope this helps .