Last week I saw Luke W speak and he brought up the term “Content Experiences” to talk about where we are in terms of designing for the Web. He asserts that, for the most part, we no longer design “Web sites.” The term “site” isn’t all that accurate anymore, as we’re doing away with the “page” metaphor and the top-down hierarchical organization of content. For the most part, I agree.
Back in 2005 I wrote about how this effects a more traditional Web design process.
You could see the shift coming back then, and I think this kind of thinking is becoming more and more relevant. Sure there is a place for the “traditional brochureware” type web sites, but even then you’ve got to take more of a “content-centric” and contextual view as the way people access content has changed even for the most straightforward of sites. You’ve got mobile, RSS, etc. And don’t forget the effect Google has on people getting to your content. The homepage is less and less relevant as a front door. It’s more like an index or billboard that people go to when they’re lost. It’s those interior pages that really mark the entry for most people into your “content experience.”
Take the Blue Flavor site for example. We see much more traffic to our blog posts then we do to our homepage. In fact, if you take the top 10 pages accessed right now the homepage accounts for about 10% of our direct traffic. The rest is from blog posts and interlinking from those blog posts to other internal pages such as our about and services pages.
That’s not to say that the homepage isn’t important, only that, even with a traditional, information-based site (or experience) like ours it’s important to look at each bit of content individually and in context to make sure it’s supporting the goals (both user and business) we set out for it.
It’s an interesting time for the Web as a context (I’m not sure “medium” is the best word in this case) and as things change (whether it’s evolving or converging) we’ll need to adapt how we plan, architect and design. I’ve got some thoughts brewing on that. Stay tuned.
For now, anyone have a better term for the new “content-centric” web than “Content Experience?” If not then, thanks Luke, I’ll use that.
I agree, and I think the shift in behavior from browsing to searching has contributed to this a lot. We see far less traffic on our newspaper homepages than we used to. They’re still our most-trafficked page, but more and more people are getting to stories and other content directly via Google searchs and links from other sites. It’s defiintely worth thinking about when you’re designing content-heavy sites these days.