Do you ever get lost when looking for information on a website?

Well maybe lost is a bit strong”¦ let’s just say confused – where you’re not sure how the information is organized or what the authors mean when they classify information.

In WordPress, articles, which are called posts, are listed in chronological order with the latest post at the top of the list.

One of the nice features of WordPress is the built-in capability to assign posts to categories. This provides website owners to organize information, making it a little easier to find.

Categories should be thought of as the table of contents. Often a book’s table of contents has the chapter name and either a brief description or bullet points of what each chapter is about.

In a similar manner, WordPress categories and have sub-categories. When a category is created, WordPress provides space to insert a category description. However, most WordPress themes do not have a feature to display category descriptions.

Once a website owner has created categories and assigned each post to a category, the website owner can use another built-in feature to provide a list of categories to the right (or left ) of the main content. Each item in this list is a link to all the posts within that category. These posts, again, are listed in chronological order with the latest post at the top of the list.

It is typical for website owners to use one to two word terms for a category. If a reader is intimately aware of the subject matter, this can work well. But if they’re not quite sure, it leads to confusion.

We must take the approach that readers do not sufficiently understand our subject matter and must, therefore, be led through the maze of information we post to our website.

Here are a few suggestions to make our reader’s life easier”¦

• Use more descriptive category names
• List the category name at the top of each page of category posts
• Better yet, provide a description of the category at the top or the list of category posts
• Create series of posts – write a master post for the series and implant the navigation scheme for the series within the master post and each post in the series
• Post series are created for the key questions your clients are asking of you
• Consider writing a page or post that describes the best way for readers to find what they’re looking for
• Create a must read post or category – making sure what you mean by must read

Fortunately, the Catalyst Framework and the Client Focused Template make it easy to develop a meaningful navigation system for readers.

I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living, it’s a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope. Which is what I do, and that enables you to laugh at life’s realities. ~Dr. Seuss

Being observant and looking at situations for opportunity and as a source of ideas is at the heart of being a great innovator.

In “The Innovator’s DNA”, Jeffrey Dyer and Hal Gregersen, and Clay Christensen pinpoint five characteristics demonstrated by great  innovators:

Associating: drawing connections between questions, problems, or ideas from unrelated fields

Questioning: posing queries that challenge common wisdom,

Observing: scrutinizing the behavior of customers, suppliers, and competitors to identify new ways of doing things,

Experimenting: constructing interactive experiences and provoking unorthodox responses to see what insights emerge, and

Networking: meeting people with different ideas and perspectives.

How can we use these traits to enhance what  your tribe experiences from your communications?

Associating

Look at what else your clients buy. Study how and why they do what they do. Form alliances with a few of the people who provide these complimentary products. The purpose of the alliance is to generate ideas and ways to better serve your mutual market niche. You can even guest post on each other’s websites. In addition look at activity in other markets. For example, if you’re in the technology market, see what you can learn from the consumer products industry. As ideas come, think of how you can experiment (see below) to see if it could work for you.

Questioning

Ask different more thought provoking questions. Change “what is important” questions into “what would be different” questions and “why is this important questions” and “how have you approached this” questions. Turn these questions into a research study and make the results available to your clients.

Observing

Read what others are writing. Capture ideas from how your clients market their product – think about what can you learn about how you can help them. Take note of what your competitors are writing about and how they are marketing. Think of ways you can differentiate yourself – how can you offer similar products at a lower cost or higher valued products at a premium cost.

Experimenting

Place ideas on your website and seek comments. Link to discussions on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. The goal is to get people talking about your ideas. Get people excited about participating by discussing ideas they’re interested in. Use ideas from clients to help them get feedback.  Track feedback and send people summary findings. The longer you can keep the discussion of an idea alive, the more exposure you receive. Set a goal to become a thought leader in your specialty. This way you become a go to person for advice.

Networking

As you exchange ideas with people, take note of information you can use in your website content. Set up an area of your website with special information and send people you meet to this area as a gift to them. Be sure to give approbation to people for their thoughts as you use them in your website content. Continue discussion started at a networking event on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. This way you can get others involved and expand the reach of your ideas. Again, use information from these discussions to add value to your website content. While you’re at it, give others ideas how to add value to their website content.  Adding value to others is never out of style.

Ideas are essential”¦ but even more so is taking action and turning great ideas into opportunities and turning these opportunities into growth.