When building or restructuring a web , be it an e-commerce site, a content , or an institutional website, a primary question should emerge even before the first line of code is written or the first article is published:

How do we organize the information we need to put online?

The semantic era on the web began when Google launched BERT , and since then we have been living with a dilemma in the organization of information : the base versus the top.

This challenge, while seemingly purely technical, lies at the heart of experience , content strategy, and, increasingly, SEO . The way we structure information on a website not only makes it easier for users to find what they're looking for, but also helps algorithms, like Google's, understand the depth and authority of our expertise on specific topics.

To choose one side of our dilemma, there are two opposing strategies, two philosophical lenses through which we can approach information architecture : the Top-Down and the Bottom-Up . This choice is not trivial or easy to make; it carries profound and direct implications that shape everything from the creation of the taxonomy to how we organize content production, substantially impacting the effectiveness and efficiency of your Semantic SEO .

The Top-Down Strategy: building from the general to the specific.

The Top-Down represents the most classic and perhaps most intuitive method of organizing information. It starts from a macroscopic or panoramic view of the Knowledge Domain to which the website belongs.

The process begins with Domain Analysis and then continues with the definition of the broadest and main categories, the major conceptual pillars that will support the entire structure , selected by the team developing the project. I need to make it clear that this is an exercise in planning and anticipation, in which information architects, SEO specialists, and content strategists first design the skeleton of the site's information, establishing the "continents" before worrying about the "countries" and "cities".

But this process needs to involve everyone in the organization that owns the project, so as not to risk creating an initial map with a biased view of the area of ​​knowledge to which it belongs.

In the image below, we have the first part of the Semantic Workflow , which begins precisely with this analysis, recognizing its importance.

Only after this high-level structure has solidified does the work descend to the subcategories and, finally, to the individual items.

To illustrate this practically, let's imagine a manager planning the launch of a new online clothing store. If they adopt a Top-Down , the first step will be to make a deliberate decision about the main categories the store will offer. The team might define the store's pillars as "T-shirts," "Sneakers," "Jackets," "Pants," and "Socks."

This decision precedes the registration of any product, the writing of any text, or even opening Figma to structure any element of the interface. 

With these parent categories established, the next step will be to detail the hierarchy, creating subcategories such as "Running Shoes" and "Casual Shoes" within "Sneakers," or "Training T-shirts" and "Casual T-shirts."

Only with this architecture defined can the texts, descriptions, and interfaces go into production. Now the specific products, that model of running shoe from brand X, size 42, in blue, will finally be registered and allocated within the existing structure. The structure precedes and governs the content, which is guided by the organization of the information.

The implications of this approach for content and SEO go beyond the organized start of a project. When we talk about content strategy, the Top-Down aligns perfectly with the concept of the marketing funnel , allowing production to begin with top-up content that addresses the broadest topics.

From a semantic SEO perspective, this strategy is particularly important. It allows you to work first on the broader concepts, organizing general information to then help you define the entities that represent the main categories and establish the relationships between them. By doing this, you are essentially building your website's "knowledge network" beforehand.

When the more specific entities (the products, the detailed articles) are finally added, they are inserted into an context , which makes it much easier for search engines to understand the relationship between the specific item and the general concept to which it belongs.

The Bottom-Up Strategy: order arises from the base.

Top-Down approach , the Bottom-Up operates under an inverse, emergent, and organic .

It starts from the idea that the ideal structure is not imposed from above, but rather discovered from the intrinsic characteristics of the elements themselves that need to be organized. The process begins at the most granular level: with an extensive and initially disorganized list of all individual items. Instead of trying to fit these items into preconceived boxes, the Bottom-Up involves a process of grouping by affinity, where items are analyzed and clustered based on their common characteristics. The structure, in this case, is not an initial design, but the result of a deep analysis of the content or inventory itself.

Returning to our e-commerce scenario, applying the Bottom-Up would completely transform and reverse the Semantic Workflow applied to the project.

Instead of defining categories like "Sneakers" or "T-shirts," the process would begin with a database containing all products. The organizers' job would be to analyze this mass of data and form groups. They might notice that a large number of sneakers share the characteristic of "high-impact cushioning," forming a group that could be named "Running Shoes."

Another group could emerge from products with "rubber soles" and "classic design," which would be dubbed "Casual Sneakers." These names, which arose organically from the products themselves, would become the site's categories and subcategories.

In this case, the taxonomy becomes the consequence of the analysis of the items, not its premise.

The impact of this strategy on content and SEO is quite different from the other model. From a content creation perspective, the Bottom-Up demands what can be described as an initial "spraying," shifting our initial focus in content creation to the basic elements: product pages

For Semantic SEO, this approach builds the knowledge network from the bottom up, meaning that the first entities to be defined are the most specific ones (the product "Shoe X Model Y"). The initial work then consists of establishing connections and relationships between these basic entities, either in the written text or through links in the content and interface.

Gradually, as the groupings solidify, these sets of entities are connected to larger concepts (the category "Running Shoes"), which are defined later. Authority is built from the depth of detail, which gradually comes together to form a cohesive whole.

I'm not sure if it's clear, but the bottom-up strategy demands more time and care in designing all parts of the project. Since the categories will be defined later, we face some challenges: our UX team needs to be aware that the categories they will work with to advance any phase will be provisional; the interface designers also need to be aware of this. The copywriting team needs to mark their product descriptions with information indicating that the categories may change names.

Top-Down vs. Bottom-Up: What is the impact on your SEO strategy?

top-down and bottom-up approach cannot be seen as a mere methodological preference; it is a strategic choice with direct consequences for your SEO performance

Each path shapes how each part of the project is planned, how information is organized, how content will be produced, how entities will be defined, and how the semantic authority of your project will be developed over time. We need to understand these differences to align the information architecture with business objectives.

I've prepared the table below to help you visually organize what we've discussed so far:

There is a hidden detail in the application of these strategies that is important to understand, and it lies in the difference between the creation process and the representation of the architecture.

When we navigate a well-organized website, the hierarchical menu structure gives us the impression that it was designed from top to bottom. However, this ultimate clarity may very well be the result of a bottom-up . The clean taxonomy that the user sees may have emerged from the analysis of thousands of products or articles, and not from a pre-defined approach.

Understanding these possibilities elevates the discussion from a simple binary choice to a more sophisticated understanding

The impact on your work as a strategist.

Therefore, from our point of view, your task as a strategist is to analyze which of these methodologies best aligns not only with the nature of your information, but also with the context of your project.

For launching a new website with a well-defined scope, the Top-Down offers control and clarity from the start. But in highly complex scenarios, such as redesigning a large portal, migrating a platform, or re-evaluating an architecture, the Bottom-Up is a safer, albeit slower, path. It forces a deep analysis of the existing content inventory, ensuring that the new structure is a faithful and efficient reflection of the assets you already have, preventing "orphan" or poorly represented categories from harming usability and SEO.

Okay, we've briefly discussed these two ways of organizing information, and you may be full of ideas and happy with what you've read, but I'm not. I want to go further.

Now I'm going to propose a thought experiment: let's imagine that you and I are building a new online store and we need to organize its information to start off on the right foot, before writing anything or opening Figma.

Come with me to build an online store with organization and discovery.

Our dream store and a pile of products

Now I'm going to help you realize a dream: opening your first online clothing and accessories store!

The initial stock has just arrived and you're surrounded by boxes of t-shirts, pants, sneakers, and jackets. The excitement is immense, but soon a challenge arises: how to organize all of this on my website?

You called me to help you, and we're going to start reflecting together on the path we're going to take.

We know that putting all products on a single page would create chaos. We need to create a structure, an information architecture that clearly guides your visitors to the products they want. But what's the best way to do this? How does this organization affect how customers find what they're looking for, and how Google understands the website we're building?

To solve this problem, let's go back to the two approaches we discussed and reflect on which is best for building your store. These are two paths that, although opposed in their logic, seek the same goal: to create a clear customer experience and a solid structure for search engines.

The First Path: Starting with the Departments

This is our "Top-Down" approach, and in this first step, we'll act like the architects of a large department store. We look at your initial product list:

• T-shirts;
• Tennis;
• Coats;
• Pants and
• socks

 And from there, we decided what the main sections of your store would be. We took paper and pen and drew the floor plan, defining departments like "Tops," "Pants," and "Shoes." We felt like architects of a physical store, drawing the floor plan with the aisles and departments. We imagined the flow of people navigating through the aisles.

Only after defining these major “concepts” did we begin to allocate the products to the “shelves.” T-shirts and jackets went to the “Tops & Jackets” department, sneakers to the “Footwear” department, and so on. The hierarchical structure was clear and organized from the start.

Visually, the layout of your store now looks like this:

• Department: Tops & Coats
  • Subcategory: T-shirts
  • Subcategory: Coats
• Department: Pants
  • Subcategory: Sports
  • Subcategory: Casual
• Department: Footwear
  • Subcategory: Tennis

In a real project, we would have many debates about this organization and especially about the naming of each category. That's the part where we have the most back and forth.

But the great advantage of this approach is clarity and predictability . The customer who enters your site immediately understands how to navigate. For SEO, this strategy allows you to define the "bigger concepts" first, focusing your efforts on finding the main concepts you need to talk about.

We are building the house's structure before placing the furniture, preparing the ground to connect the specific products (the "entities") that will be added later.

But what if, instead of planning departments, we started by looking at each product individually?

The Second Path: starting with the products

In this second approach, the method is completely different. Instead of starting with a floor plan, we'll empty all the boxes and spread the products across the floor. Now we have a giant list of items, and we'll start grouping them by what makes sense, without adhering to predefined category names.

The thought process is more like a discovery:

“Let’s take that specific running shoe and that other basketball shoe. They have characteristics in common. Let’s group them together and call this group ‘Sports Shoes’. Now, let’s take that band t-shirt and that t-shirt with a movie print. We can create a group for them called ‘Fun T-shirts’.”

From these groupings, a name for the category "emerged naturally." We didn't impose a structure; we discovered it based on the characteristics of the products themselves. We are building the organization from the bottom (the products) to the top (the categories).

The main advantage of this approach is its strength when dealing with many specific products and the categories are not obvious.

For SEO, the strategy is reversed: you focus on defining the "base entities" first (the products, in this example), and the SEO work begins by connecting these entities to each other, and only then connects them to larger concepts, building your site's authority from the most specific items.

This means your content strategy will likely focus on creating a rich volume of detailed product pages first, building a solid foundation before even finalizing the broader category pages.

Now that we know both options, which one is best for our store? Let me know in the comments!

Let's compare the approaches: Which story should your store tell?

Both strategies are valid, but they reflect different ways of thinking about content and structure. Again, I've created a table to help me summarize the key differences to help you decide:

I hope it's perfectly clear that the choice isn't about right or wrong, but about which strategy best aligns with what you sell, which area of ​​knowledge it's connected to, and what makes sense for your particular business.

Organizing is a strategy, not just tidying up.

The story of how your online store was created teaches us an interesting lesson: website organization is a strategic decision that directly impacts customer experience and how search engines understand your business. It's far from being a simple "tidying up of the house."

There's no single answer or magic formula to help you decide, unfortunately. As we've seen, the choice "will depend a lot on the type of product we have." A store with well-defined categories can benefit from a "top-down" approach, while an e-commerce business with a vast and varied catalog can discover its best structure by coming from a "bottom-up" perspective.

By understanding these two approaches, you're no longer just organizing products. You're making a conscious and strategic decision about how your store will operate, grow, and be discovered. Now you have the knowledge to choose the best path to build the store of your dreams. And if you need help planning and executing this project, give me a call.

Let's rethink your information architecture?

Organizing information is one of the cornerstones of any project that needs to perform well on the web, not just in search results, but across all platforms. However, if it's underestimated, you miss the chance to execute a successful digital

The way we transform a company's internal knowledge into quality information on the web not only affects usability and the user journey, but also sends very clear signals to search engines (even generative ones) about what our website is about and the depth of our expertise.

The Top-Down and Bottom-Up approaches therefore offer two distinct paths to achieving a coherent architecture, each with its own advantages and implications for Semantic SEO.

Think strategically about which of these methodologies best suits your reality; do it calmly and ask for help if you need it. This is a crucial step in building a solid foundation for organic growth and digital authority for your business on the web.

Looking at your own website's structure, can you identify whether its architecture was built from the top down or from the bottom up? And, more importantly, is this approach still the most efficient for your current and future goals?

If you don't know the answers to these questions, call me.

This article was created based on the video called “ Semantic SEO: How to Organize Your Website Information? (Top-Down vs. Bottom-Up) ”, which I recently recorded, and I use the process I created and call agent+Semantic. If you liked the result, contact me so we can discuss how to implement it in your work.