Customer Segments vs. Site Navigation

"What's the Nav?"

That's been the first thing in almost every discussion about the new Percussion.com project we're undertaking — Site navigation, areas, sections, sub-sections and so on.   Everyone who implements a WCM system wants to start with it.  Gurus call this "Information Architecture" since it is more than navigation, but also things like content types, content componentization, and categorization, and sometimes even workflow.  And it is true that Information Architecture is THE thing every WCM project implementation must have to get going.

However, to date, I have refused to divulge "the Nav" as such.  And as the project overseer for Percussion.com, I'm not trying to delay our launch date either.  In fact, like most of you I suspect, I'd rather have had this done two quarters ago.

The reason I've refused to start with "the Nav" is that, while implementers need it, it's very often the wrong way to start thinking about how to improve the customer experience.  This is because when you start with "what's the Nav?" you tend to think in terms of all the stuff you have to dump out there, and how to best organize it.  You end up in a conference room listing out all your documents, sales tools, event calendars and other things you have to "get out there."  In short, you're starting with yourself and what you have, not with your customers and what they want.

Since the customer experience is what the new Percussion.com is all about, we've taken a different approach.  Instead of trying to define sites and navigation, we started with "how do we want to use the Web to interact with customers?"  This led to the following questions:

• Who uses Percussion.com, in terms of our customer segments? (prospects, customers, partners, etc.)
• When in their lifecycle do they most use Percussion.com?  (vendor selection, project planning, implementation support)
• What do they need to help them in each of these lifecycle stages?

Starting from the types of customers and their needs when visiting Percussion.com ensured we weren't going to be putting content out there just because it's something we have.  We are focused on using the Web as an communication tool for customer interaction, rather than a passive bookshelf of our content.  In that process we've not only uncovered "the Nav" but a ton of content that customers are seeking, that today simply doesn't exist online.