As a UX designer should I audit the content while someone else is responsible for website content?

Question

I am trying to redesign a website, I started with creating content audit for this website, There is another person who is in charge of website's content (This person has no idea about UX design process). In this case should I create this document ? Or there is no point to create this document ?

And what is the use of this content audit in the process of redesigning the website?

It seems creating this document was not useful at all for them! They didn't understand the purpose of this document.

Answer 1

And what is the use of this content audit in the process of redesigning the website?

http://uxmastery.com/how-to-conduct-a-content-audit/

From UX Mastery:

The main purpose of a content audit is to produce a listing of the site’s content, usually in a big spreadsheet.

This list of content will come in handy at various stages of the project. If you’re re-doing the information architecture, you’ll return to it again and again to remind yourself of the details of each page; you can also use it to talk to authors about managing and rewriting their content; and if you’re going to be moving to a new content management system, you’ll use it to keep note of what you started with, and where you’re up to.

That said, having a comprehensive list of content isn’t the only benefit of this process. Just by taking the audit you’ll get a much better understanding of the content. You may find things you didn’t know existed, spot duplication and identify all kinds of relationships in the content. It can also serve as a precursor to a more comprehensive content analysis, but that’s a topic for another post!

Answer 2

Would another tool help? Perhaps if you got them engaged in the process of content strategy instead of delivering something (Document? Spreadsheet?) that spells out a single vision, you might get the results you need.

It would be slower, because they would be doing the work, but it would easier (less work at the start, anyways) for you.

Hope this helps - post the results, I'd love to hear how you got it all sorted out.

https://gathercontent.com/

Answer 3

I would add to what has been said by dmacfour the idea of using a content audit to highlight aspects with higher user benefit:

• What is the content that better helps the users to achieve their goals?
• What areas of the website will need to be addressed in order to
  maximise the needs of the users?
• Are they particular user journeys that require focusing on specific areas of the website and their content?

These are some examples of how you could shape the research question in order to justify the need of a Content Audit and how this will meet a standard UX approach.