Say What?

A card sort can be a useful tool in designing user-friendly website navigation paths. (Navigation paths may take the form of menus or may be the order in which pages are linked.) A card sort is a simple technique in which a group of users are asked to categorize a given set of items.

Card sorts are traditionally conducted with identical sets of index cards given to groups of 3-6 participants. Each group is asked to put the index cards into categories and to give each category a descriptive name.

The discussion during a card sort is often as enlightening as the statistical results from the sort. Although an online card sort lacks this in-person anecdotal evidence, an online sort does allow for wider participation and more regulated statistical analyses.

Surveys and card sorts are tools we use to guide our decision-making. They are not answers to what links or pages “should” or “should not” appear on our website or how our website “should” or “should not” look.

The pages are listed below and in the column to the left.

The Williams Homepage Online Card Sort of Nov. 2011

Online Card Sort
The Participants
The Study
Categories Gone Wild
Raw Groupings
Refined Groupings
Unsorted Items by Group
Unsorted Items Across the Board
Comments
Comment Themes
Using WebSort
In Conclusion