Main modeling principles

Caffeinated content type

Continuing with the coffee example, the first step of coffee preparation is to decide what kind of coffee you will make. Those coffee recipes represent different content types. One recipe allows you to make the same coffee repeatedly, and so do content types. They allow you to create content items – instances of the content type. For example, Australian coffee drinkers love flat whites, cappuccinos, and lattes, so those are the content types you should focus on when opening a cafe in Sydney. Do not focus on the coffee cups when buying and making coffee. A flat white in a ceramic mug is the same as in a glass mug.  The important part here is not to focus on the form.

Decide what’s essential for your business

Each project will have its content types. To determine the content types, look at the most critical information you are trying to convey. What’s important? Analyzing your Google Analytics and its search keywords is easy if you re-platform an existing project. That’s what is important for your visitors. Match that with the business needs, and you’ll slowly understand your core content. With new projects, the approach is similar, but since you don’t have previous data, look at your goals or set personas and their needs.

The form comes last

Don’t focus on how the content types will be presented to your visitors yet. Thinking about how the content will be shown only at the end of the content modeling process is a good sign. This mind shift is essential when re-platforming, as most other typical CMS platforms are biased towards a form of presentation. Most commonly, it’s their focus on the web and pages. To overcome the bias, do a content audit and group pages with similar content together. Metadata and tagging will help with this process. Maybe you have several flat white recipes with different mugs or dosages.

Content model for the web

Suppose you’ve come to Kontent.ai because of your website. In that case, we recommend including Web Spotlight in your subscription and using its predefined content model to get ahead at the start. Yet, put effort into preparing a content model in this case, too, so you can get the benefits of using a headless CMS. Every project has some calls to action, so create a CTA content type to progress your visitors toward their goals and yours. If stakeholders want to manage them directly, include them in the model. That’s how you should approach each decision – consider whether the content type is useful for your business and customers. Think about who your internal and external stakeholders are and who’ll be responsible for managing that content.

With extendability in mind

It’s impossible to create a perfect content model on the first try. Still, you can get pretty close by following a few basic approaches. Getting a good content model is a process of refining what you came up with in the beginning. That means the model you create on your first try should at least be extendable so things don’t break. Every content model should be extendable.

Chunk it

To make your model extendable is to make it future-proof. One of the techniques to achieve extendibility is to chunk your content sufficiently. What’s the smallest reusable piece? It’s probably not a word or an unimportant sentence. Still, reused disclaimers, quotes, or images with metadata are often good starting points. Even if you miss it and embed it into a longer text, it’s okay if there is a universal content chunk type that you can use later to help you move your embedded information into a reusable content item. Chunking content sufficiently supports your modelʼs flexibility.

More chunk types

Chunks themselves should be extendable. Every time you add an element to a content type, ask yourself if it’s related to others and if creating a chunk or a separate content type out of those makes sense.  You ensure uniformity in content structures by utilizing separate content types for various content chunks. This approach also simplifies adding a new element to a specific chunk across the entire content model. Different chunk types should be implemented as stand-alone content types to support uniformity and extendability.

Don’t forget usability 

With all the structuring, linking, and chunking, it’s easy to go overboard. Try always to remember that the content model needs to be usable. Once in a while, try creating a few items to see how complex the assembly model is. Try not to have more than 2-3 levels of hierarchies so editors don’t lose the context of their work. Keep an eye on the depth of the hierarchies you create. It’s better to have relatively flat, 2-3 level hierarchies.

Semantic relationships come first