Content Audits: Guessing to Strategy
Rethinking What a Content Audit Is
Before this week, my understanding of content audits was fairly surface-level. I had some informal experience reviewing websites and learning materials for family projects, but I never quite knew what I was looking for. I relied on my fundamental knowledge of what good design looked like, what information hierarchy made sense, and what content seemed useful. The video How To: Content Inventory and Audit by Anna Kaley and Chapter 8 of the Content Audits and Inventories book by Paula Land helped both expand my perspective and give me guidelines to follow in future projects.
Seeing the Bigger Picture
The most impactful takeaway for me was just how comprehensive a content audit can be. I had previously thought of audits as just checking for outdated information or broken links, but Land outlines a much more strategic process. She describes four categories of audit criteria that all work together to accomplish multiple goals:
Business purpose and value - addresses elements that affect how well your content supports your business objectives.
User value - addresses issues that directly affect the user's qualitative experience with the content.
Content presentation - addresses the look and feel of the content.
Usability and interaction - addresses whether content is usable and easy to interact with.
While there are many sub-criteria’s that can fall under each general criteria, I found Land’s breakdown to be straightforward and it serves my purpose: providing a starting point.
Speaking the User’s Language
Both Kaley and Land bring up the idea of checking whether content is “user-focused”, meaning how well does the content support either user tasks or answers their questions. Under the “user value” criteria, Land mentions how Gerry McGovern (an expert on website content) challenges readers to look for “customer carewords”. These are key words and phrases that customers use and they provide a framework for what kinds of terms should be used in content, links, and headings. This concept made me think about how easy it is to fall into the trap of using jargon that doesn’t resonate with users. However, by focusing on the words that customers naturally use, content becomes more effective. This is something I would like to apply in both professional and personal projects.
Mapping the User Journey
Land’s idea of content appearing “in context” also resonated with me. I’ve often experienced frustration when navigating websites, having to jump between multiple pages just to find one specific piece of information. Seeing this issue framed as part of the “customer journey” helped me understand that my frustration was not a result of my inability to navigate webpages, rather it may have been the result of poor planning. This is especially valuable for me because it connects directly to how I think about designing learning experiences.
I am interested in becoming an instructional designer and one thing I’ve struggled with is feeling directionless when reviewing or improving content. I knew how to spot issues, but I didn’t have a clear process for addressing them. These new frameworks gives me a step-by-step way to evaluate content with intention and purpose. Whether it’s a website or an instructional module, guiding users smoothly from one step to the next is essential.
Final Thoughts
What excites me most is that I can immediately apply this knowledge. I’ve worked on family business websites and learning materials before, and now I feel like I can bring real value to those projects. Instead of relying on intuition alone, I can use these criteria to make more informed decisions and explain my reasoning more clearly. Overall, this week’s material filled in gaps in my understanding and moving forward, I see content audits as a meaningful process that can improve both user experience and business outcomes.
