Content strategy for a global health research institute
My Role: Leading the overall effort and determining the content activities, creating a content inventory and managing an audit, conducting workshops for voice and tone, revising taxonomy, UX writing, and guiding / participating in other activities.
What was the business problem?
IHME is a global population health research institute that resides within the UW.
It was a forward-thinking institute led by research scientists that had an outdated digital presence and content management system.
The main website, health data.org, was being upgraded from Drupal 7 to 10, which required a complete re-coding of the site. This was an opportunity to re-evaluate how the site was structured, improve usability and accessibility, and establish new content standards.
Who did I collaborate with?
Writers and editors
Content manager
Experience designers
Developers
Product manager
User researcher
Stakeholders
Scientific research teams
Senior scientific leadership members
Why did I chose these content activities?
I thought about the overall content activities the team needed to accomplish and how to sequence them so that they could be accomplished in preparation for UX design activities, and then also in parallel.
I needed to hire a vendor to facilitate a brand redesign so I planned information architecture studies and trained a product manager to help facilitate them ahead of design.
After the vendor transitioned design materials to us, I was able to divide work between writers and editors to work on UX writing as well as accomplish a few pages myself.
Defining content types and metadata
I partnered with a Drupal developer and a content manager in defining content types and metadata fields for the Drupal 10 migration. We reviewed existing content types and discussed gaps with internal teams.
I also revised our existing health topics and geography taxonomies to better support the content model and to improve search relevance.
View the full content model in Figma >
Content model for Drupal 10
Drupal 10 content model in Figma
Information architecture redesign and labeling
When I started this project, I interviewed leaders and staff across the institute about their thoughts on the organization’s digital properties, what they think works well, and where thing could be improved. Everyone mentioned it was difficult to find information on the website. If internal people had trouble, I knew external audiences must be having an even harder time.
I created a plan to conduct a benchmark usability study of the current site, then test again post-redesign. In addition to that study, I also guided studies to re-organize the site and change labels iteratively.
Card sorting
Tree testing
Usability testing
What was causing friction?
Organizational-centric words like “GBD,” which spells out to Global Burden of Disease, the organization’s flagship research output.
Audiences didn’t intuitively know how to classify health conditions into diseases and risk. We also observed browsing fatigue from needing to navigate down three levels. I decided to flatten the hierarchy organization and expose categories visually in a mega-menu style navigation for the redesign.
Documentation:
Sample information architecture metrics
Revised labels in a mega-menu navigation structure
“Before” navigation example
Drop-down menus with high-level categories
Publishing the new navigation
I facilitated a discussion about how to iteratively publish the new navigation and guided an iterative release. The small team I was directly managing didn’t have any developers so we published it ourselves. To ensure we were successful, we completed one section at a time and tested iteratively.
Voice and tone definition and baseline test
The organization’s brand was getting an update. The content manager, who was learning and growing into UX Writing, and I partnered in aligning the digital voice and tone to the new brand values.
UX writing focused on scientific research pages
IHME’s core pages were the research that the leaders wanted policymakers and health professionals to use and make important decisions with around the world.
I trained my team, including writers, in user-centered design methods for content creation. View rewritten health topic pages >
I facilitated workshops where we brainstormed the key questions of our audiences, then solicited input from stakeholders on the scientific research teams.
I mentored staff on creating specific and representative link names for better usability and accessibility.
Alcohol use - before content rewrite
Alcohol use is a well-known risk factor for certain conditions, such as cirrhosis of the liver, fetal alcohol syndrome, and injuries related to drunk driving. Alcohol consumption can also contribute to chronic illnesses like heart disease, stroke, and some cancers. Interpersonal violence, self-harm (suicide), and unintentional injuries can also be fueled by alcohol.
Globally, alcohol use is a major risk factor for death and disability overall, ranked among dietary risks, high blood pressure, smoking, and household air pollution. In some countries, alcohol use is the number-one risk factor for men. Explore the contribution of alcohol to diseases and injuries in our GBD Compare data visualization.
Alcohol use - after content rewrite
How much alcohol is safe to drink?
The risks of drinking alcohol depend on age, local disease patterns, and underlying health conditions:
For young adults ages 15–39, there are no health benefits to drinking alcohol, only health risks.
For people over age 40, drinking a small amount of alcohol may provide some health benefits.
Young people tend to experience a higher rate of injuries as a result of alcohol use, leading to an increase in death and disability for that age group.
For older adults without underlying health issues, having 1-2 standard drinks per day may reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease, stroke, and diabetes. However, over consuming alcohol can lead to additional health problems, like liver cirrhosis and some cancers.
Content management guidance
A content team managed the organization’s style guide and performed basic website updates. I facilitated discussions with them to define what kind of content should be within web pages and maintenance for specific components.
Home page example: we defined the type of content that would be promoted for each component and their publishing schedule.
The footer needed to be updated monthly with trending topics from web analytics until there was an automated solution in place.
We defined criteria for adding new health topics to the site based on management priorities, academic publishing flow, user interest from web analytics and the media.
Content governance defined by component intent
My team and I wanted to make sure each area had a purpose and intended audience.
Lessons learned
This was a large project with multiple parallel workstreams. This focused content work was one workstream of many. At the same time, I was getting a brand refresh approved, a digital design system started, and managing a usability and accessibility transformation. I delegated work and partnered and/or mentored team members to ensure we were all working towards common goals, but there were. a lot of moving pieces.
Looking back, I would have partnered with the communications team more to think through how to talk about the work happening at all levels of the organization for more visibility. My director left the organization halfway through this project and the new director didn’t come on board until about 6 months later. There was a communication gap with top leadership because I didn’t have a conduit to advocate for this work.
I learned I need to advocate for my work and team in creative ways if I don’t have access to all levels of the organization.
