---
title: "My STC Webinar on Organizing Content – This Thursday at 4pm EST"
date: 2011-11-30
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canonical_url: https://idratherbewriting.com/2011/11/30/my-stc-webinar-on-organizing-content-this-thursday-at-4pm-est/
---
# My STC Webinar on Organizing Content – This Thursday at 4pm EST
> **[Organizing Help Content: Breaking Out of Topic-Based Hierarchies](http://stc.org/education/online-education/live-seminars/item/organizing-help-content-breaking-out-of-topic-based-hierarchies?category_id=53)**
> Organizing help content so that users can both find and learn information often requires technical writers to break out of the traditional topic-based folders and move toward faceted navigation, search engine optimization, interface text, level-based help, and other methods for organizing content.

In theory, this is the same presentation I gave at the last STC Summit. In reality, it's a much different presentation. I've taken everything I learned from my Summit presentation, including feedback from attendees (which I received just last week, if you can believe it) and made this material much better.

The problem of my original presentation was one of ambition. I tried to tackle one of the most difficult challenges in help authoring: enabling users to find exactly what they're looking for quickly and easily in a mountain of possible help information. I set up the presentation as a solution, but noted its shortcomings and ultimate failure. That left a lot of people uneasy.

In my revised approach for the webinar, I take a different track. Rather than presenting a single solution, I present 10 approaches to findability that veer outside of a traditional table of contents. These alternative approaches include search, metadata, user research, indexes, quick reference guides, personalization, interface text, tags and categories, alternative modes (such as video), and level-based learning.

My new argument is that while no single method solves the findability problem in its entirety, each contributes toward an increase in findability. If you were to add all the solutions together, the net result would be a dramatic increase in findability.