Content Review Prioritization
Action for Children’s online parenting advice service, Parent Talk, launched in 2020 and has supported over 1.8 million families. As the service has grown and the team has learned more about the needs of its users, they’ve added more content to meet those needs. Now, with around 240 pages of advice on a range of topics and a team of 2 senior content designers maintaining the content, it is crucial to ensure the advice is based on evidence of user need and provides accurate and up-to-date help and support. To accomplish this, the team looks for evidence, insight, and feedback when deciding what to review and what needs changing.
The team prioritizes content based on several criteria:
* **High traffic content with low user satisfaction:** Using a tool called Askem to collect feedback on the helpfulness of content, the team prioritizes reviewing content that is frequently viewed but has a below-average satisfaction score, has shown a significant drop in user satisfaction, or has a particularly low satisfaction score or feedback that requires urgent attention, regardless of the article traffic.
* **High risk and topical content:** The team focuses more review time on themes identified as high risk and ensures these articles go through additional safeguarding and subject matter expert checks. Reactive reviews are conducted when necessary, either due to internal or external feedback highlighting advice needing changes, or because the subject is topical and needs to be reviewed to ensure the advice is current.
* **Topics where search ranking has been lost:** Since Google launched its Helpful Content Update last year, the team commissioned an audit of Parent Talk’s search rankings. This audit helped identify key terms where ranking has been lost, and the team is working to improve the content identified to ensure those who need it can find it and that the content is as helpful as possible.
* **Content that is out of style:** Regularly reviewing the style guide to ensure the guidance is aligned with best practices for accessibility and findability, the team addresses inconsistencies in style across the site, such as articles that pre-date the latest style guide updates. A recent content audit looked at the word count and Hemingway readability scores of all articles, with the goal of simplifying content with a higher reading age. Articles that are too short or have a high reading age are prioritized for review.
* **Related content in the user journey:** The team does not view a single article in isolation and maps out related articles to identify overlapping topics, gaps in information, and pages that can be combined to cover a topic in more depth.
Using Data to Improve Content
When reviewing and updating content, the team leverages insights from existing and potential users to enhance the content.
* **Article feedback on Askem:** Feedback on articles from subject matter experts provides insight into what is and isn’t working, but it’s essential to ensure suggested changes are accurate and reflect the needs of other parents, not just one or two.
* **Themes from chats:** Parenting coaches provide data on themes service users require support with, allowing the team to review and rewrite articles with the coaches to ensure those needs are met.
* **Keyword data from Google search console:** The team uses Google search console to understand the search terms users are already employing to find content. They ensure any changes to the article continue to serve the needs identified in the search terms, carefully avoiding removing content related to those terms and instead focusing on expanding and improving upon it.
* **Search volume research and social listening:** While data from Askem, chat themes, and search console provide insights into the needs of existing users, the team also seeks to understand the needs of potential users by analyzing search insight tools (Semrush, Answer the Public, Google’s ‘People Also Ask’) to identify what people are searching for, and examining forums like Mumsnet and social media channels to understand the issues parents and carers are discussing elsewhere and the language they use.
With all this insight, the team updates and improves content with their subject matter experts. The updated content undergoes an appropriate sign-off process for the topic risk level, and a review date is set for when the content needs to be revisited again.
This article summarizes the article ‘An evidence-based approach to content reviews’ found on UX Collective at: ‘https://uxdesign.cc/an-evidence-based-approach-to-content-reviews-e45d99ade7fb’.