Visualising IA with MindNode

17 Jul 2017, by Calum Shepherd

It’s time to break the blogging drought with a hands on post.

When producing an information architecture for a recent website our team decided use mind mapping techniques, as opposed to opting for a more conventional site-tree.

“Information architecture is the practice of deciding how to arrange the parts of something to be understandable” - IA Institute

We decided to use software to help us achieve this. It would have been ideal for us to use a physical space to collaborate. However, one wasn’t available - so we thought this the next best solution.

MindNode2 is a nice little application available from the Mac App Store. It became a our primary method to visualise our early thoughts both within the team, with stakeholders and with users.

You can add nodes as and when new information or topics become available through user research, search demand, conversations with stakeholders and insights from subject matter experts.

Diagram Tips

• Line Colours - separate different topics, or to highlight different audiences
• Line Weightings - suggest the volume or the complexity of the information
• Arrows - highlight related nodes, or vital cross-linking
• Node Types - suggest the type of content (e.g. video, image etc)
• Notes - explain where it came from e.g. user research

You can then create a couple of additional main nodes to act as a legend.

It’s all vague enough that people won’t mistake it for a final piece of work. It’s also flexible enough that if you move things around all the nodes will dynamically move and resize.

You can read more about information architecture on Web Designer Depot

So, have a go and let me know how you get on.