Re: keywords - controlled vocabulary versus freeform

[Hilary]

On a content strategy/taxonomy project I'm working on right now, we are working with the client to create a controlled vocabulary. The most challenging set is the topics - no surprise there. The client feels that there's a very long list of topics that's needed. We are cross-referencing this against the actual search logs & will start with a shorter list. We will also have a free-form keyword field. The challenge is that every variation of every keyword means that there's no guarantee that someone looking for that content will find it - which is the primary challenge we are addressing with this project. However, the keywords do serve a great purpose, which is to point out what terms may need to be incorporated into the controlled vocabulary when it's revisited a couple of times a year.

As for another issue that you raised, about using keywords that are used frequently in the content itself, that doesn't seem necessary to me, since search engines will already "see" those terms in the content (especially if they are used in the headings or near the beginning of the piece).

One thing you didn't mention is exactly what you do with the keywords. With a controlled vocabulary, you can let users sort results in a list of search results, or pull in related links automatically using your CMS - which I don't think is possible with just keywords.

I hope that helps!

Hilary Marsh  |  312-806-7854  |  hil...@hilarymarsh.com

Content strategy for associations, real estate, nonprofits, corporations:

websites, blogs, social media, e-newsletters

http://www.hilarymarsh.com 

also hilarymarsh on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Slideshare, etc.

On Apr 10, 2013, at 8:11 PM, egr <egr...@gmail.com> wrote:

One of my many roles as an in-house CS is to oversee metadata, particularly keywords. I've been training our numerous content creators in our firm on some basic concepts/best practices on keywords:

• limit the list to 3-5
• use the page's unique words that are used multiple times throughout and are in the title
• don't duplicate words; use one from the main stem (e.g. instead of using retire, retiring, retiree and retirement, just use retire)

I've been asked to consider whether we should be using a controlled vocabulary rather than our current sort of free form. I'm not even sure how I can do a controlled vocabulary when we have so many content creators writing about varied topics.

 

Anyone out there fans of a controlled vocabulary?

How do you build that?

How often (if at all) is it updated?

Does it yield better search results--internal and external?

 

Thanks!

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[Matt Moore]

Hi EGR,

I think it depends what the keywords are used for. Is it search,
constructing navigation, grouping like content together? What you are
using them for depends on whether you need a controlled vocabulary.

As Hilary notes (and what I say below repeats some of her other
points), if you are using them to enhance the findability of articles
then you need to focus on words that are not in the article. If it's
more that the keywords are about aiding navigation - i.e. if I want to
bring up articles on "Istanbul" then they need to be tagged to that -
then it kinda makes more sense.

One thing to remember when you build a controlled vocabulary is that
you typically identify synonyms. If you can link your controlled
vocabulary to your CMS and your search engine then a controlled
vocabulary and synonym list means that when someone types in
"Istanbul" for search they will also get documents about
"Constantinople" and "Byzantium". Which is nice.

Back to your questions:

> Anyone out there fans of a controlled vocabulary?

Yes, when it's appropriate to do so. One really important thing to
note is that if it's a purely manual system dependent on content
creators referring to some long list of words somewhere then it's
going to be very, very hard to implement well. Understand the
capabilities of your CMS and your search engine and see what you can
automate.

> How do you build that?

Always focus on the outcome you want rather than creating a nice,
locially neat, abstract structure. If search is the key thing then
perhaps start with 1. search terms entered by users of your content
ordered by frequency of use and 2. keywords added by your content
creators also ordered by frequency of use. How do they compare? Any
obvious mismatches that lead to dud search results?e.g. content
creators tag things using "Byzantium", users search with
"Constantinople" and don't find what they need. Hey presto - obvious
controlled vocabulary issue. You can buy "pre-constructed"
vocabularies for lots of domains but expect that they will need
tailoring in some way and don't skimp on the user-centric approach
(and it sounds like you may have a lot of ground to cover).

> How often (if at all) is it updated?

All depends on how quickly your content, your creators and your users
change - and how much time you have. Probably somewhere between
annually and quarterly.

> Does it yield better search results--internal and external?

It can. But if poor search results are your problem then I'd try to
diagnose why that's happening. Is it how the search engine has been
configured?

Cheers,

Matt

[Rahel Bailie | IDI]

Just a quick aside - the major search engines stopped using keywords for search over a year ago. So while keywords are useful for many things, search results aren't one of them.

Sent from my iPad

[Matt Moore]

Rahel,

It's important to distinguish between different types of search engine.

Are you talking about Google, Bing, etc? In which case you may be right.

I'm talking about GSA, FAST, Lucene type search engines - which are different.

Cheers,

Matt

[Laura Creekmore]

Agreed. If you're working on a search appliance for your site, do NOT use your SEO understanding alone to inform your work. Make sure you know how the appliance works, and use strategies to enhance that.

Laura Creekmore
615.500.4131
la...@creekcontent.com
http://www.creekcontent.com

[Lisa Trager]

I was just listening to a bunch of Marshall Cutts videos, http://www.theshortcutts.com/ - specifically about keywords.  Although Google does not use the metagag keywords in its algorithm, it certainly pays attention to page titles, and meta description.  as well of course to the use of keywords in the text on the page.  Hence, I am recommending that our own agency still go through the exercise of researching keywords - and in particular long-tail terms.  The real benefit of course is that it helps to reveal and uncover topics that a domain can develop content for and become the 'expert' source. 

I am also more on the controlled library side of things - for the benefits of tagging other content and then being able to help users filter contextually relevant content to that term.

Hope this helps!


Lisa L. Trager
Senior Content Strategist
DraftFCB
Twitter: Lisalt

On Wednesday, April 10, 2013 11:11:19 PM UTC-4, egr wrote:

One of my many roles as an in-house CS is to oversee metadata, particularly keywords. I've been training our numerous content creators in our firm on some basic concepts/best practices on keywords:

• limit the list to 3-5
• use the page's unique words that are used multiple times throughout and are in the title
• don't duplicate words; use one from the main stem (e.g. instead of using retire, retiring, retiree and retirement, just use retire)

I've been asked to consider whether we should be using a controlled vocabulary rather than our current sort of free form. I'm not even sure how I can do a controlled vocabulary when we have so many content creators writing about varied topics.

 

Anyone out there fans of a controlled vocabulary?

How do you build that?

How often (if at all) is it updated?

Does it yield better search results--internal and external?

 

Thanks!