CXM: Bridge Content, Commerce and Community with Taxonomy

By David Hillis (@davidhillis) Oct 25, 2011

There is a saying in the software industry that goes, “Choose two: fast, cheap, or good.” The same can be said of content, commerce and community — otherwise known as the three C’s of web experience. It’s difficult to make two of these elements work together; three is a herculean task. But it doesn’t have to be.

The problem is that content, commerce and community are generally managed in different systems. Content is the domain of the web content management system, commerce is managed in an e-commerce platform or ERP, and community requires a social business or community platform. Moreover, each of the three C’s has a distinct workflow. A website visitor writing a social review is very different from a web marketer creating a web page, or an e-commerce transaction with fulfillment.

Yet, there is only one customer experience, and content, commerce and community need to be seamlessly woven into that experience. The best way to achieve this is with taxonomy. Taxonomy is the common thread that can make content more discoverable, apply social reviews and content across the website, and drive commerce and transactions on a site.

What is Taxonomy?

Taxonomy is just a fancy word for categorization, with a twist — taxonomy is hierarchical. At each level of taxonomy you have categories and sub-categories. For example, a taxonomy that describes geographic locations will include sub-categories for regions, countries, states or provinces, counties, cities, and so forth.

Taxonomy can define any type of category or topic on a website. You can build taxonomies for audiences, product attributes, pricing, topics or any other “facets” you want visitors to your site to use in discovering content.

Why is Taxonomy Important?

Taxonomy can bridge disparate systems and tie all of the elements of a content, commerce and community site together. Whether surfing a website using search, faceted or guided navigation, or recommended content, taxonomy is the glue that holds the experience together.

Navigating the Three C’s

There are eight ways people generally navigate a content, commerce and community website. Let’s look at how taxonomy underlies these pathways.

The following table outlines each navigation type, the software system where it is generally managed, and whether it is based on a categorization or taxonomy system.

Content, Commerce and Community Navigations

Navigation Type	Description	System	Taxonomy
Information Architecture (IA)	Defines all sections, sub-sections and tertiary pages. It is how people navigate your website.	Web CMS	No
Search	Encompasses keyword search as well as category search.	Search Engine	Yes
Faceted Navigation	Also called “Guided Navigation.” Provides browse-by-category navigation.	Web CMS	Yes
Catalog Listing	Product information and data.	ERP or Commerce	Yes
Bi-Directional	Classic example is product accessories. Related content is complex because it is generally a two-way link (the product links to the accessory and the accessory to the product) and a many-to-many relationship (many accessories for each product and many products for each category).	Web CMS	Yes
Contextual	Implicit content recommendations and audience segmentation.	Cross Web CMS, marketing automation, community, and other systems	Yes
Tags	A simple “flat” taxonomy. Can be user generated or created as part of the overarching taxonomy. May be expressed as links or tag clouds.	Community	Yes
Inline Links	Simple, yet powerful, inline links are created in web and social content to point to other web pages.	Web CMS and Community	No

Of these eight types of navigation, only two are traditional web navigation: the information architecture and inline links. All of the other navigation types are based on taxonomy concepts such as keywords, categories and segmentation.