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A little label love goes a long way

by Christine Benson on December 2nd, 2009

I’m currently seven months pregnant. Rather than developing nesting tendencies and actually cleaning my home, I have developed an addiction to reading craft blogs.

On many of these blogs, I’ve noticed the trend of labeling the comments section with something more customized than the standard "comments."
 
Here are a couple of examples:
 

not talking to myself

superCool

It’s a great combination of being human and still being useful. This small change demonstrates an individual’s voice, but also clearly communicates the goal of the section.
 
I also thought it was a great example of how content (rather than design) can show brand and personality. These are blogs that are built on standard templates, but with this one little change, I suddenly felt a connection to a human on the other end.
 
Added bonus? People seemed to comment on these blogs more than the ones simply labeled "comments" or "leave a reply".
 
Many companies are locked into template designs that they feel constrained by, resulting in lamentations about being unable to add a lifestyle image or change a font. These projects are often time-consuming and expensive. Neither of those terms are popular, especially in the current economic climate.
 
So, when half of the room is screaming for a redesign while the other half is screaming back about time and budget, consider focusing on how the content can improve your site.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 2nd, 2009 at 9:07 am and is filed under Content Strategy, Editorial Strategy, User Experience, Web Content, Web Writing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

  • http://www.odannyboy.com/ Dan Saffer

    It's interesting that you draw the distinction that labels are content and not design. I'm not sure I agree. Just because they are words doesn't necessarily make them content. Are menu labels content?

    In my opinion, content implies a unique entity: a story, an article, a movie, a podcast, etc. Anything that is templatized (i.e. able to be replicated across multiple pages/screens without loss of meaning/context) is part of design.

    This isn't to say a copywriter shouldn't be involved, but that elevating labels to the level of content seems to be a reach. Is labeling strategy next? :)

  • ChristineBenson

    Dan, thanks for your comment. I would say design determines that there is a label, content defines what the label says. I'm not so concerned about who figures that out, designer, copywriter, IA, Content Strategist, etc, as long as the label is useful. Just because it's content doesn't mean that only a writer can produce it.

    I do also define menu labels text as content, based on the same distinction above. Since menu labels are related to the content within that section, I'm not sure how the information on page would be content but the labels wouldn't be. The goal of calling these content is to avoid seeing mock-ups with “Label 1″ and “Label 2″ and instead plan for the content from the beginning. That way the designs are created based off of what content the site is actually going to support.

  • tiagopedras

    I totally agree with this attitude. I think that these kind of small changes can not only be an influence in communicating brand and personality as they can also serve as a different way of communicating function (think of labels as in online forms).
    Great post as always!

  • bencurnett

    It's a bit more than a label here, but here's is a really strong illustration of how content crosses into other parts development http://snip.li/e48671

    “Labeling strategy” has a ring to it… :-)

  • bencurnett

    It's a bit more than a label here, but here's is a really strong illustration of how content crosses into other parts development http://snip.li/e48671

    “Labeling strategy” has a ring to it… :-)

  • kevincesarz

    Great idea. I tried to improve a 'Comments' section with a comment excerpt (“this is what happened to me . . . ) rather than predictable headers – (auto repair, tire care, rebates, etc.). Received push back from developement. Suspect it was from creating an editable element that would require care and feeding.

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