Tips for Gathering and Organizing Content for Your Website

If you've done research on planning a website, you most certainly have come across the phrase that  "content is king" on the web.  Although the phrase has been around awhile now, it still rings true.  After all, while it's very true that great design and/or innovative technology can make a good first impression on the internet, it really doesn't matter if you don't have anything to say!

As professional web designers, we are often asked how a client should start to pull content together for their website.  Although not an exhaustive list by any means, the following should provide some starting points for gathering and organizing content for your next website project.

Tips for Gathering Content

• Do you already have a website?  If so, go through your current website content and evaluate it in detail.  Determine what needs to be added, edited, expanded upon, or removed.
• Do you have printed materials with current marketing information -- brochures, catalogs, manuals, handbooks, etc?  If so, gather everything together as potential resources of information for use on your website.  If possible, gather the original digital files to avoid having to re-type any data.
• Have you received awards or recognition from professional organizations?
• Do you have a list of customer testimonials?
• Does your company or organization have historical data available?  Does your company or organization have a "story"?
• Do you have sales speeches that could be converted to online information?
• Do you have staff bios & photos for key staff?
• Do you have current or past advertising campaigns?  These can contain useful text and imagery for use on your website.
• Do your suppliers offer digital information and photos for products?  Many times, suppliers will have high quality images and data for helping you to sell their products.
• Do you have paper forms that you would like to include on the website in digital format or for downloading?
• Do you have written directions to your office location(s)?
• Do you have press releases that could be included on the website?
• Do you have a company newsletter?
• Do you have a list of current job openings?
• Do you have a list of customer feedback and/or questions that could be incorporated into an FAQs page?
• Does your company or organization do any charity work, or donate to non-profit organizations?
• Do you have a high resolution copy of your logo, and any photos or graphics that you own and would like to include on the website.

Tips for Organizing Content

• Once you have identified the basic materials and text that you would like to include on the site, begin to organize it into "chucks of data" or divide it into categories and subcategories.
• Think about your audience as you organize your content.  Use words and phrases to describe your "content chunks" or categories/subcategories that would make sense to the general public and organize content accordingly.
• Work from the general to the specific.
• Putting a site diagram or organizational flow chart together should help to define the overall size and scope of the project and will help you to identify particular content or site areas that will need to developed, edited, or written.

Once you've gathered and organized the data you feel you would like to include on your website, turn it over to your web designer/developer for further analysis.

Professional web designers and web content developers and copywriters should be able to assist you in refining, enhancing, and finessing your information and organizational structure to best suit your goals for the project and the needs of your audience.