Piloting Semio classification software

May, 2001

One of the participants in this month's "Introduction to Business Taxonomies" course and roundtable reported on a pilot classification project conducted by her company. The goal of the pilot was to find out whether Semio classification software and The Brain visualization software would be a cost-effective way of improving navigation on the corporate intranet. This article discusses the piloting process, design and analysis of user tests, and conclusions. The bottom line? An automated tool like Semio can significantly reduce the time required for taxonomy development and maintenance, but human editors are still required to review preliminary results. Editing is an iterative process that needs to be performed more than once.

The importance of testing
We've learned about the limitations of search engines the hard way, through experience. That's why we're skeptical about vendor claims that software can replace humans in creating and applying business taxonomies. On the other hand, the potential for time and cost savings is great if only some of the claims are true. The problem is finding reliable comparative data to use in justifying the cost. Both the content and the application have to be similar in any test to make a meaningful comparison, and that is rarely the case in business taxonomies. In our course, for example, we show how similar content (information about strategic planning) can be organized in three very different ways depending on the audience and application. Testing software before you buy is currently the best way to get reliable data for making a purchasing decision.

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