Planning a new website? Get insight from the pros at Ironistic on how to best approach creating a hierarchy that will match your goals.
Think of it like a grocery store. Your homepage is the store itself. It’s the main face of the building, of any signage, and any advertisement that makes you want to shop there. You might have a little bit of information available, but you don’t include everything. Can you imagine getting an ad in the newspaper or seeing a sign out front of the store that listed every single item that a grocery store had?
Once you’re in the building, things are typically categorized along with other similar items. If you are making a stir fry for supper, you typically go to an aisle called “Global Foods” (or something similar). Within that aisle, you go to the Asian section and it has rice, soy sauce, water chestnuts, bamboo shoots, etc. The same should apply to your website.
If someone wants to learn more about your services, they should go into one “aisle” or navigation item, and see all of your services. Then, they find the section that they are interested in — let’s say Employee Engagement. Once they are in Employee Engagement, they can get as much information as you are willing to provide on the topic. Depending on how much information you want to provide or how deep you want to go within that topic, you may add more pages (and reapplying the grocery store concept) or just keep it on the single page.
Probably the most important part of this whole thing, though. Getting out of a grocery store, no matter what aisle you go into, it all leads to the checkout counter. Don’t forget that every single piece of your website should lead to some sort of checkout.. Whether it’s buying something right then and there, or it’s sending you an email to learn more or to connect. Always, always, always make them go past the checkout lanes.
Creating a website hierarchy is done in a couple of ways. The first is in the order of content that appears on the page. Using a homepage as an example — the most important messaging is at the very top of the page, beneath that would be the second most important piece and so on down the page.
Another way to create hierarchy on a website is visually with text or images. Using a large size font for a heading and a smaller one for a sub-heading creates a very clear visual hierarchy. The user will see and read the larger statement first.
Images can be used in this manner as well. Combining large images with smaller ones, or with shapes/patterns will also create hierarchy. The user will focus on the image first and then the elements surrounding it.
The goals of a website determine the hierarchy of content on the home page. The first image/message users experience should provide insight into your organization’s purpose, service, or product. Then, if the goal is to increase newsletter subscribers, display the SIGNUP form next. If the goal is to provide the steps of a process, then ensure they are listed chronologically — organized content that is relevant to the user will keep the user coming back for more.
Creating a website hierarchy comes naturally during the planning and strategy phase when you are going over the higher level of how you want your site to be laid out. It’s always good to give a lot of thought of how users will navigate through your site, so it’s an easy and pleasant experience. Building a sitemap that makes sense at the start will save you time down the line.
Website hierarchy must be created based on your goals and business objectives! From the homepage, how do you want to structure your site? Where do you want your visitors to go once they reach your homepage? It’s important to minimize the number of mouse clicks when designing the navigation menu for a website hierarchy.
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