This is a preview version of the Content Modelling Workshop that I've co-written with Cleve Gibbon. So far we've given this workshop in Cape Town and Minneapolis. Coming soon to Helsinki, and hopefully elsewhere. This deck introduces the ideas and methodologies of content modelling. It's a subset of the slides for the workshop. The full workshop also includes more information on structured content, benefits of content modelling, many group exercises and discussions, and tips on how to putting these practices to work in real projects.

1. CONTENT MODELLING: THE ART OF
DESIGNING STRUCTURED CONTENT
Rachel Lovinger @rlovinger & Cleve Gibbon @cleveg
Sample slides from the workshop
Photo by EricGjerde

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INTRODUCTIONS
PhotobyRohannaMertens
Cleve Gibbon
CTO
Cognifide
Rachel Lovinger
Experience Director
Razorfish

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• ‘70s – the child of database programmer and
an editor
• ‘80s – student, photographer, writer, and
filmmaker
• ‘90s – making interactive training programs
• Early ‘00s – web developer, working on
presentation templates that displayed
content from a CMS
Today, I do content strategy as part of a User
Experience department, collaborating with
people from many disciplines.
HOW I GOT HERE (CONTENT STRATEGIST)
Rachel,Age 9

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• ‘70s – hyperactive child to nightshift nurses
• ‘80s – designer, come gamer, and console
hacker
• ‘90s – student, lecturer, modeler and UI
developer
• Early ‘00s – platform developer / architect
building trading platforms
Today, I work equally across with content and
technology to create engaging platforms to
better serve customers
HOW I GOT HERE (CONTENT TECHNOLOGIST)
Cleve,Age 6

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• The content strategist uses the content model to:
• Validate experience concepts & designs
• Explore the needs of the content creators
• Drive the development of taxonomies
• Communicate the content design details to those implementing the CMS
• Instruct content producers
• The content technologist, uses the content model to:
• Get the business to pop the content bonnet from the get go.
• Bring technologists upstream into content conversations.
• Engage humans in the key elements of content architecture.
• Provide a visual reference point for structured content.
• Paint the incomplete content picture and highlight the obvious gaps.
• Drive discussions around responsive design, mobile, targeting, translation, …
CONTENT MODELLING

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• Part One: Background
• Let’s talk about structured content
• Content Modelling Overview*
• Benefits of content modelling
• PartTwo: Creating Content
Models
• Which content should be modelled?
• Content types
• Content properties
• PartThree: Refining
Content Models
• Attributes vs. relationships
• Chunking & assembling
• Adaptability
• Part Four: Putting it to
Work
• Responsive design
• Content APIs
• Meaningful structure
• CMS architectures
• Content architecture*
WORKSHOP AGENDA
* Section included

7. PART ONE:
BACKGROUND

8. CONTENT MODELLING
OVERVIEW

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Chart Song
Album
Page
Artist
Profile
HOW DO WE GET TO STRUCTURED CONTENT?
Manage content separate
from display (CMS)
Content Modelling
Rich Metadata
Image by Richard Cyganiak and Anja Jentzsch
Web Standards

10. - Mark Boulton
http://www.markboulton.co.uk/journal/structure-first-content-always
You can create good experiences
without knowing the content.
What you can’t do is create good
experiences without knowing your
content structure.

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CONTENT MODELLING IS…
…structured content design.
It’s both an art and a science.
• The art is “designing” something that is simple, clear and relevant.
• The science is “engineering” elegant structures with integrity and
consistency to house sustainable content.

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HOW IS IT DONE?
• It’s data modelling for content (and we’ve been doing it for a long,
long time within the software industry…).
• Content modelling mines, defines and refines structured content.
• The tangible output from content modelling are content model(s).

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WHAT IS A CONTENT MODEL?
A content model is a formal representation of structured content
as a collection of content types and their inter-relationships.
• Defines and documents all the different types of content you will
have for a given project.
• Provides detailed descriptions and specifications of each content
type, their attributes and relationships with each one another.

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HIGH LEVEL CONTENT MODEL: DIAGRAM
Landscape of
content types
Chart Song
Album Page
Artist Profile

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CONTENT MODEL: DIAGRAM
Identify and express
key content
relationships

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More info about the underlying data storage & specs
DETAILED CONTENT MODEL: SPREADSHEET

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DETAILED CONTENT MODEL: DOCUMENT
Create documents using
Word,Wikis, PowerPoint

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• A content model helps clarify requirements and encourages
collaboration between designers, developers setting up the CMS,
and content creators.
• Content modelling helps bring the content strategy to life while
also making sure:
• The designs are complete and accurate
• The business user needs are taken into account
• The content management solution (incl. CMS) supports the content needs
• The content strategy is sustainable
CONTENT MODELLING FOSTERS ALIGNMENT

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MODEL THINKING
Business Creative/UX Tech
Content (Production, Management, Delivery) Strategy
Comps
Wires
Specs
Prototypes
Architecture
APIs
Goals
Audience
Plan

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• Validate designs and
planned content
• Identify constraints
and capabilities
• Influence CMS
selection
• Design UI
customizations
• Ground designs in an
information model
• Discuss content
sources
• Discuss content
workflow
• Pose requirements
questions
• Get aligned on labels
• Discuss resources
needed
• Create training and
guidelines
MODELS SUPPORT DISCUSSION & DECISIONS
Business Creative/UX Tech

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• Content models are formal representations of structured content.
• Content models should be simple, clear and relevant.
• Content modelling is both art and science.
• Value modelling over the model.
• Use the process and the model to drive discussion and develop
alignment on content across disciplines.
SUMMARY

22. PART TWO:
CREATING CONTENT
MODELS

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• Which Content? – Determine which content in a design needs
to be modelled
• ContentTypes – Identify the various configurations of content
that are distinct enough to be unique types in the system
• Content Properties – Define each content type in detail
• Attributes – Enumerate the content and metadata elements that make up
each type
• Relationships – Express how content types relate to each other
COMPONENTS OF A CONTENT MODEL

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Use the designs and determine which content* will be:
WHICH CONTENT SHOULD BE MODELLED?
CMS
Display
Dynamic
Other

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• Which types of content are different enough that they might
warrant a unique structure?
• Ex:Article, quiz, slideshow, recipe & event are fairly distinct.
CONTENT TYPES
© A List Apart, Jeff Baker and Alex Graham, Washington Post, Food Network, and Barnes & Noble
Article Quiz
Slide
show
Recipe
Event

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• Figure out the separate elements, or attributes, of each one. Think
about how each segment of information will be used.
• Related content items can be linked to or embedded.
• Ex: Book & author each
have their own page.
CONTENT PROPERTIES
Event
Event Name
Location
Date & Time
Event © Barnes & Noble
Book Page (link)
Author Page (link)
Event Type

27. PART THREE:
REFINING CONTENT
MODELS

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• Attributes vs. relationships – Determine which parts of a
content type are core attributes of the type, and which are
relationships to other types
• Chunking & assembling – Consider the decisions points around
how granularly the content will be chunked, and how those chunks
will be assembled
• Adaptability – Further refine the model by creating additional
attributes that make it easier for the content to adapt to a wide
range of contexts, platforms, devices, and channels
REFINING CONTENT MODELS

29. PART FOUR:
PUTTING IT TO WORK

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• Responsive Design
• Content APIs
• Meaningful Structure
• CMS Architectures
• Content Architecture
PUTTING IT TO WORK

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• More content through increased interactions.
• Increased complexity through more experiments.
• Fewer resources to manage more content.
• We’re approaching the unmanaged content tipping point.
• Technology not equipped to plug people/process gaps.
• Mindset shift to getting content everywhere.
• Immature multi-channel publishing for marketing.
• No time to define and shine!

32. - D. Keith Robinson, Think Vitamin
http://blog.teamtreehouse.com/redefining-content-management/
There are four important
pieces to the content
management puzzle:
content, people, process and
technology.

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Sustainable content requires us to understand:
• how best to apply technology (CM Ecosystem)
• to support the processes (Workflow)
• that people use to produce (Author Experience)
• and consume (Customer/Service Experience)
• structured content (Content Modelling).
⇒ Content Architecture is the Design Phase
CONTENT ARCHITECTURE

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CONTENT ARCHITECTURE
Content
Strategy
Content
Management
Why
Content
Architecture
What How
Actionable
Plan
Operational
model
technical
solution
http://www.clevegibbon.com/content-architecture/
sustainable
content

36. WRAPPING UP

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• Structuring content is an interdisciplinary task
• Content modelling is the art & science of designing structured
content
• Content modelling enables responsive design, enhanced authoring
interfaces, and smart components
• Content models define and express content types, content
attributes & content relationships
• Creating and refining content models is an iterative process that
informs and is informed by design, business needs, and technology
• When we put content models to work we arrive at responsible
responsive design, content APIs, meaningful structures, and
effective use of CMS architectures
• Sustainable content requires a well-design content architecture
WHAT WE’VE LEARNED

38. Karen McGrane
Content Strategy for Mobile
Rahel Bailie & Noz Urbina
Content Strategy for Decision Makers
Sara Wachter-Boettcher
Content Everywhere
Bob Boiko
Content Management Bible
Ann Rockley & Charles Cooper
Managing Enterprise Content
Heather Hedden
The AccidentalTaxonomist

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PEOPLE TO FOLLOW
At the intersection of Content Strategy, Responsive Design, Structured
Content, and the Future-Friendly Web.
• Karen McGrane (@karenmcgrane : slideshare : blog)
• Rahel Anne Bailie (@rahelab : slideshare : blog)
• Sara Wachter-Boettcher (@sara_ann_marie : slideshare : blog)
• Noz Urbina (@nozurbina : slideshare : blog)
• Cennydd Bowles (@Cennydd : blog)
• LukeWroblewski (@lukew : slideshare : blog)
• Ethan Marcotte (@beep : blog)
• Brad Frost (@brad_frost : slideshare : blog)
• Mike Atherton (@mikeatherton : slideshare : blog )
And of course…
• Rachel (@rlovinger : slideshare : blog)
• Cleve (@cleveg : slideshare : blog)
• Kerry-Anne Gilowey (@kerry_anne : slideshare)

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Cleve Gibbon
@cleveg
cleve.gibbon@cognifide.com
THANK YOU
PhotobyRohannaMertens
Rachel Lovinger
@rlovinger
rachel.lovinger@razorfish.com