27 April 2026
The first step of any website design should be a review of the content and plans for how it may grow over time. Without the content as a foundation, the website structure turns into a guessing game.
Start with Structure
Starting with the big picture early pays off. Simple exercises, like using sticky notes with content headings that can be moved around and reworked or sketching wireframes, help reveal patterns, build a hierarchy, and determine user pathways before the visual design enters the chat and muddies the waters. This keeps the focus on how the information is organized and how people will move through it.
Findability
A heavy reliance on the search feature is a sign of a weak structure. The gold standard is clear navigation and a logical hierarchy, all working together to make information discoverable and ultimately an intuitive website experience.
What This Looks Like in Practice
I was recently involved in an enterprise intranet migration project. The old intranet’s content had exploded over a decade without a plan. The navigation mirrored internal departments, labels were inconsistent, information was outdated, and important resources were buried.
During the migration to a new platform, rather than simply move content over, I took the opportunity to restructure the system. The new intranet organized content around user tasks, and frequently used resources and tools were prominently displayed to prioritize quick access. The result was an intuitive intranet organized around user needs.
Striving for Great UX
Great UX is a happy marriage between content and design. The visuals should be strong, and people should be able to quickly and confidently find what they need. My work focuses on structuring content in a way that even large, complex systems feel intuitive, usable, and well-designed.