What Is Controlled Vocabulary?
Controlled vocabulary is a set of terms with pre-defined meanings. A controlled vocabulary is standardised, and its meaning has been agreed upon by contributors.Controlled vocabularies are used in many different fields. In research, they’re often used to ensure that data collected from different sources is consistent when it comes to defining things like diseases or drugs.If you have a controlled vocabulary for your company’s products and services, then you can prevent someone from accidentally using the same name for a different product or service.
But what does this mean for you? If you’re using a controlled vocabulary in your content, it means that your audience will be able to find the information they’re looking for more easily.
Controlled vocabulary can help improve your website’s search engine optimisation (SEO) because you’re more likely to use the same terms as other websites in the industry. This will help improve the relevancy of your site’s content, which is key to gaining organic traffic from search engines.
Benefits Of Using Controlled Vocabulary
1. It improves your business’s search engine ranking by creating more accurate metadata. Using a controlled vocabulary tells search engines what kind of information is on your website. Chances are that if someone searches for a term related to what you’re writing about, they’ll find it on your website. Your site will receive more traffic as a result.
2. By using controlled vocabulary, you’re able to find the most relevant words and phrases for your niche, so that you can make sure the words you use are both consistent and appropriate. Making your content easier to understand can improve people’s experience with your content.
3. Your writers will be able to produce new content more quickly when they use controlled vocabulary as a guide. This is because controlled vocabulary helps you focus on the important information and eliminate the unimportant details. With a controlled vocabulary, you can make sure that all the words in your content are relevant to the topic and there are no duplicates. It makes writing much easier because it eliminates the need to find synonyms and ensure the right words are used.
Types Of Controlled Vocabulary
Controlling the words used in your writing helps ensure consistency and clarity across all documents relating to that topic.
There are three main types of controlled vocabularies:
-Exact controlled vocabulary: Every word in the controlled vocabulary is known to be correct and precise. This type of controlled vocabulary is often used on technical documents and scientific papers, where accuracy is paramount.
-Approximate controlled vocabulary: This type of controlled vocabulary allows for some variation in meaning and usage, but has strict rules for how those variations should occur.
-Uncontrolled vocabulary: In this type of controlled vocabulary, there are no rules or regulations on how words can be used or what they mean.