'Click Here': Needless Words

The words 'click here for...' and 'click here to...' serve no purpose within links. Unfortunately, many news sites still use them. According to Google, 'click here' is on about 8,970 pages at sptimes.com alone.

Ashby-Kuhlman, Nathan. ashbykuhlman.net (2002). Articles>Web Design>Information Design>Usability

Essential Navigation Checklists for Web Design

These checklists pull together best practice in the disciplines of information design, usability and accessibility, into an easy to apply format. If you are already familiar with those topics, the checklists serve as a handy reminder that is easy to refer to and apply when planning navigation. If unfamiliar it's also a fast-track lesson - providing you with a head-start in getting it right and enables you to make better informed choices / compromises.

Eleniak, Marta. SitePoint (2003). Articles>Web Design>Information Design>Usability

How Google Manages its Home Page

An average person can deal with only 7-10 choices on a web page, according to Google research. That's why it's so hard to get a link on the Google home page.

McGovern, Gerry. New Thinking (2005). Articles>Web Design>Information Design>Usability

How Did You Get Here?

One of the most overlooked aspects of designing a Web site is how users get to it. Separate factions are often devoted to promoting, designing, and maintaining a Web site, and the lack of communication and involvement can lead to apathy or confusion. Too frequently is it assumed that visitors are knowledgeable about the company and Web site, and that they enter through the home page. False assumptions about visitor entry can plague even a well-planned, well-designed site.

Lash, Jeff. Digital Web Magazine (2003). Articles>Web Design>Usability>User Centered Design

When It Comes to Homepages, It is Polite to Stare

That one webpage bears all the promotional burdens that would typically be spread through an entire printed edition of your newspaper. Your homepage begins to look as though a dozen designers from different departments each built their own piece.

Small, Jay. Poynter Online (2004). Articles>Web Design>Usability>Eye Tracking

As the Page Scrolls

Users say they don’t like to scroll. As a result, many designers try to keep their web pages short. But one of the most significant findings of our research on web-site usability is that users are perfectly willing to scroll. However, they’ll only do it if the page gives them strong clues that scrolling will help them find what they’re looking for.

Spool, Jared M. User Interface Engineering (1998). Articles>Web Design>Usability

Using Eye Tracking to Compare Web Page Designs: A Case Study  

A proposed design for the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Web site was evaluated against the original design in terms of the ease with which the right starting points for key tasks were located and processed. This report focuses on the eye tracking methodology that accompanied other conventional usability practices used in the evaluation. Twelve ASCO members were asked to complete several search tasks using each design. Performance measures such as click accuracy and time on task were supplemented with eye movements which allowed for an assessment of the processes that led to both the failures and the successes. The report details three task examples in which eye tracking helped diagnose errors and identify the better of the two designs (and the reasons for its superiority) when both were equally highly successful. Advantages and limitations of the application of eye tracking to design comparison are also discussed.

Bojko, Agnieszka. Journal of Usability Studies (2006). Articles>Web Design>Usability>Eye Tracking

A More Useful 404

When broken links frustrate your site’s visitors, a typical 404 page explains what went wrong and provides links that may relate to the visitor’s quest. That’s good, but now you can do better. With Dean Frickey’s custom 404, when something’s amiss, pertinent information is sent not only to the visitor, but to the developer—so that, in many cases, the problem can be fixed! A better 404 means never having to say you’re sorry.

Frickey, Dean. List Apart, A (2008). Articles>Web Design>Usability

A Comparison of Questionnaires for Assessing Website Usability  

Five questionnaires for assessing the usability of a website were compared in a study with 123 participants. The questionnaires studied were SUS, QUIS, CSUQ, a variant of Microsoft’s Product Reaction Cards, and one that we have used in our Usability Lab for several years. Each participant performed two tasks on each of two websites: finance.yahoo.com and kiplinger.com. All five questionnaires revealed that one site was significantly preferred over the other. The data were analyzed to determine what the results would have been at different sample sizes from 6 to 14. At a sample size of 6, only 30-40% of the samples would have identified that one of the sites was significantly preferred. Most of the data reach an apparent asymptote at a sample size of 12, where two of the questionnaires (SUS and CSUQ) yielded the same conclusion as the full dataset at least 90% of the time.

Tullis, Thomas S. and Jacqueline N. Stetson. Usability Professionals Association (2004). Articles>Web Design>Usability>Surveys

Examining the Role of De Facto Standards on the Web

Just what are the design practices on the web that have the highest frequency? And are there design practices that all (or nearly all) sites employ?

Adkisson, Heidi P. Boxes and Arrows (2003). Articles>Web Design>Usability

Designing a Login Form

Over at Smiley Cat Web Design they’ve put together a showcase of many different login and registration forms. While you’re there, take a look at some of the other showcases listed in the sidebar. They have sets for calendars and date pickers, footers, search boxes, and many more.

CyberText Consulting (2008). Articles>Web Design>Forms>Usability

Usability and Maintainability: Navigable Information

This post is part of a series on usability and maintainability. At first, meeting the needs of content consumers through usability can seem at odds with meeting needs of technical communicators through maintainability. My purpose in these posts is to discuss how technical communication best practices can satisfy both needs. I’ll use Gurak and Lannon’s usability criteria of users being able to “find what they need, understand the language, follow the instructions, and read the graphics.”

Gryphon Mountain (2008). Articles>Web Design>Information Design>Usability

Usability and Maintainability Not So Incompatible

A few days ago, I posted some thoughts I was having about usability and maintainability. On the surface, they seemed to be two ideas that couldn’t exist together. As I’ve thought further on it, I’ve decided that there may be situations (such as an example I gave in the first post) where this is the case. But on the other hand, the two can go together quite comfortably.

Gryphon Mountain (2008). Articles>Web Design>Usability

An Introduction to Persuasive Design

Many users are highly motivated to complete tasks before they begin and before any external motivation is provided. In other words, usability can easily be an umbrella that covers persuasion.

Rhodes, John S. WebWord (2008). Articles>Web Design>Usability>Persuasive Design

Usability wins over Personalisation in Cost Effectiveness

Jupiter Research reports that only 14% of consumers say personalised offers or recommendations on shopping Web sites lead them to buy more often from online stores, and just 8% say that personalisation increases their repeat visits to content, news or entertainment websites. By contrast, the majority of consumers said that basic site improvements would make them buy or visit websites more often - 54% cited faster-loading pages and 52% cited better navigation as greater incentives.

Light, Ann. Usability News (2003). Articles>Web Design>Usability>Personalization

Hyped Web Stories Are Irrelevant

The fads and big deals that get the press coverage are not important for running a workhorse website. To serve your customers, it's far better to emphasize simplicity and quality than to chase buzzwords.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2006). Articles>Web Design>Usability>Minimalism

Aspects of Design Quality

Usability scores for 51 websites show some correlation between navigation, content, and feature quality, but no connections to other usability areas.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2008). Articles>Web Design>Usability>Case Studies

Transactional Email and Confirmation Messages

Automated email can improve customer service, strengthen relationships, and help websites bypass search engines. But most messages fared poorly in user testing and didn't fulfill this potential.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2008). Articles>Web Design>Usability>Email

About Us Information on Websites

We found a 9% improvement in the usability of About Us information on websites over the past 5 years. But companies and organizations still can't explain what they do in one paragraph.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2008). Articles>Web Design>Usability>Writing

Store Finders and Locators

Finding addresses and location information on company websites has gotten dramatically easier, but users increasingly turn to search engines first for this task.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2008). Articles>Web Design>Usability>Geography

Site Map Usability

New user testing of site maps shows that they are still useful as a secondary navigation aide, and that they're much easier to use than they were during our research 7 years ago.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2008). Articles>Web Design>Usability>Sitemaps

Ten Best Intranets of 2009

Intranets are getting more strategic, with increased collaboration support. Team size is growing by 12% per year, and platforms are becoming integrated. Improving usability increased use by 106% on average.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2009). Articles>Web Design>Intranets>Usability

Beyond Usability: Designing Web Sites for Persuasion, Emotion, and Trust

The next wave in Web site design is persuasive design, designing for persuasion, emotion, and trust. While usability is still a fundamental requirement for effective Web site design, it is no longer enough to design sites that are simply easy to navigate and understand so users can complete transactions. As business mandates for Web site design have grown more strategic, complex, and demanding of accountability, good usability has become the price of competitive entry. So, while usability is important, it is no longer the key differentiator it once was.

Schaffer, Eric M. UXmatters (2009). Articles>Web Design>Usability>Emotions

Usability vs Branding? - Usability is Branding

I've been in the following scenario several times. I'm in a meeting room with the web and marketing teams and there is a raging debate about brand guidelines. A proposed improvement to the design contravenes the guidelines. One group think that branding is more important than usability. The other group think the opposite. They are both wrong. Usability is branding. It shapes people's opinions of your product or organisation.

User Vision (2008). Articles>Usability>Branding>Web Design

Website Aesthetics: What Has It Got To Do With Usability?

How we choose what to buy is a key question that should be asked when designing an ecommerce website. Find out the importance of and relationship between aesthetics and usability.

Gray, Alistair. Webcredible (2009). Articles>Web Design>Aesthetics>Usability