How usable are non-designed products?
Content audit + heuristic analysis | Facebook
The project
Wordland Design was hired by Content Team managers at Facebook to audit 20 Facebook Enterprise products for content usability and adherence to Facebook's Content Standards.
My role
I was the lead Content Designer and conducted the content audit and heuristic analysis of Facebook’s Enterprise products.
Summary
Wordland Design was hired by Content Team managers at Facebook to audit 20 Facebook Enterprise products for content usability and adherence to Facebook's Content Standards. They were aware that many Enterprise products were launched without design support.
I audited the products and used Facebook's internal Content Design team’s heuristic rating system for UX content usability and strategy.
Our clients were happy with our work and extended our contract to help on an unexpected information architecture (IA) project.
Audit evaluation
Each product was reviewed in detail. Screenshots were taken and then marked up, clearly highlighting usability and content standard improvement opportunities. I added my findings to Facebook’s heuristic template, including the content improvement recommendations.
The heuristic template lived in a clunky Excel document and consisted of about 30 general usability and content-related questions. I created an Excel tab for each product and input my data. It was helpful to have one place to record findings, but the document became hard to digest.
I summarized the audit findings into a color-coded table that offered an overview of each product’s usability status organized by department, and the level of content, design, and development effort needed to clean it up.
Deliverable
We knew our clients would use my findings to support internal budget requests for the content design and development time needed in order. to upscale their products.
I summarized audit findings into an easy-to-read and shareable slide deck. Instead of manouvering around a large Excel file, the slides specifically called out which products and departments needed the most amount of attention to match content and usability standards.
Outcome
While a laborious project, it was still an interesting and important one. The products that received minimal design or content support prior to launch clearly stood out. Our clients appreciated the detailed focus we approached this project with and asked us to assist in an unexpected IA project as Facebook was preparing to rebrand as Meta.