Taxonomy Planning - What to Expect When You Work With a Taxonomist

There are many ways to start a new taxonomy project. In this post, I’m going to look at various methods and their pros and cons, then discuss my preferred approach.

Automation

Automated taxonomy construction uses AI for keyword extraction and finding simple relationships between terms (e.g., blank “is a” blank). It can be a good way to start taxonomy work, but cannot actually construct the taxonomy. Human expertise is needed to flesh out the relationships, verify the keywords (and no doubt find more), and build out the taxonomy.-

Workshop/Card-Sort

In this method, the taxonomist guides the stakeholders through a series of activities to identify the key concepts to be used in the taxonomy. This can be a lengthy process, but highly rewarding. First, it results in a taxonomy fully informed by its intended users. Second, it can facilitate buy-in for the taxonomy project. 

Card-sorting is the most common of these taxonomy building activities. In a card sort, terms are written on cards for users to organize under broader categories. This informs where the terms should go in the hierarchy. If a term could go under more than one category, the users have to choose which category to place it in. In some cases, the term might end up going under both categories, but that is generally not best practice.

Strawman

The strawman approach is where the taxonomist takes a guess at what the taxonomy should look like, then presents it as a proposal to the stakeholders. This is a fast way to get started, but users should be aware that a guess is just that. It will inevitably need revisions.

Adapting Already Existing Vocabularies

There is already a wide variety of taxonomies available on the market that can make a good starting point for the upper levels of a taxonomy. Often these are built for a particular purpose that may not fit the circumstances of the current build. But they can be a good starting point and can cut down on some of the initial work of building a taxonomy from scratch.

Hybrid Approach

None of the above approaches is perfect. The best thing to do is use a combination of these to best suit the needs of the project. For example, you could start with an existing vocabulary, an automated analysis, or a strawman, then customize and flesh out the details with a card-sorting exercise.

In any case, having a trained taxonomist on board to guide you through the process and do the heavy lifting is essential. Contact Entrelac today to discuss your taxonomy project!