Card sorting techniques

May, 2003

The question
A Society member is charged with becoming an "expert" on the card sorting method of classification. She's looking for best practices, recommendations, tools, and tips on how to formulate questions.

What is card sorting?
Card sorting is a pen-and-paper exercise used to find out how people organize information or to test existing organization schemes. The process works like this:

1. Label a group of blank index cards with categories, subcategories, and content from your Web site.

2. Number the cards so ou can more easily analyze the data later./p>

3. Ask a user to sort this stack of cards into piles that make sense to them and label the piles with sticky notes. Ask them to talk out loud while they work.

4. Take good notes and record the labels and contents of their piles.

Open card sorts allow users to create their own categories ("piles"). Closed card sorts require people to use your categories.

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