If all this sounds like a lot of work, don’t worry – it’s not. Most of this is very straightforward, and we’ll be able to fill in most of the answers in a single sitting (or a single kick-off meeting, if we're working with a team).
Whether our tree-testing plan is simple or more complex, we do recommend:
When you're planning a tree test, you may find it helpful to use this simple questionnaire to fill in the answers to the questions posed throughout this chapter:
Here’s a typical high-level timeline for 3 rounds of tree testing (testing the existing tree, testing our new trees, then testing our even-better-with-revisions “final” tree):
Time required | Activity | Details |
---|---|---|
(varies) | Earlier IA work |
|
1 week | Round 1 |
|
3 days | Create new trees |
|
1 week | Round 2 |
|
1 week | Round 3 |
|
If we’re just planning 1 or 2 rounds of testing, it should be easy to take this and cut it down to what is needed.
Over the course of hundreds of tree tests, we've refined our work down to a detailed checklist of everything we do in a tree-testing project.
Note that this is a superset of everything that might apply; we normally start from this template and delete the items that don't apply to a specific project.
Note also that this is a very detailed checklist, with lots of items that may not make sense yet. Not to worry - they will explained in the subsequent chapters of this guide.
Next: Chapter 4 - key points