#33234
Where's the Search? Re-Examining User Expectations of Web Objects
In 2001, Bernard determined that users were able to form a schema for the location of web objects on informational websites. The current study investigates whether users' expectations have changed since the 2001 study. Changes were found in the expected location of the site search engine, internal links, and advertisements.
Shaikh, A. Dawn and Kelsi Lenz. Usability News (2006). Articles>Web Design>Search>User Centered Design
#33437
The Five Issues that Persuade Visitors
Whenever visitors land on your web site, they consciously or subconsciously deal with five issues until they're satisfied, or better yet, delighted. These five issues will either induce the visitor to take the action you want them to take, or a lack of satisfaction may push them to find a competitor. None of these five issues is easy to measure. None has objective factors that are easily influenced. But all are nonetheless key to converting visitors.
Eisenberg, Bryan. ClickZ (2004). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design>Persuasive Design
#33443
The Trouble With Personalization
Personalization has rarely been implemented well. Its failure is usually because of a lack of understanding of customer behavior.
McGovern, Gerry. New Thinking (2006). Articles>Web Design>Personalization>User Centered Design
#33475
Accessing Information: Not Everyone Does it the Same Way
As some in our profession have come to realize, social media and use of the Web in general have changed (and are still changing) the way in which people access and use information.
DMN Communications (2008). Articles>Web Design>Accessibility>User Centered Design
#33665
A good starting point for planning the future of your website is to analyze what you already have. To some extent we are doing this all the time. That is how new projects happen. However, a more formal approach helps to better inform your decision-making throughout the web project. There are two ways to better understand your current website: qualitative and quantitative.
Boag, Paul. Digital Web Magazine (2008). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design>Audience Analysis
#33942
The Elements of Social Architecture
While your designs can never control people, they can encourage good behavior and discourage bad behavior. The psychologist Kurt Lewin developed an equation that explains why people do the crazy things they do. Lewin asserts that behavior is a function of a person and his environment: Bf(P,E). You can’t change a person’s nature, but you can design the environment he moves around in. Let’s explore some of Alexander’s patterns I’ve observed in my work and the design work of my fellow practitioners.
Wodtke, Christina. List Apart, A (2009). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design
#33944
Despite the ubiquity of reading on the web, readers remain a neglected audience. Much of our talk about web design revolves around a sense of movement: users are thought to be finding, searching, skimming, looking. We measure how frequently they click but not how long they stay on the page. We concern ourselves with their travel and participation—how they move from page to page, who they talk to when they get there—but forget the needs of those whose purpose is to be still. Readers flourish when they have space—some distance from the hubbub of the crowds—and as web designers, there is yet much we can do to help them carve out that space.
Brown, Mandy. List Apart, A (2009). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design
#33947
The words we use when we search are not always the words we like to read when we arrive at a website. Over the years, I have discovered that the way we think and the words we use when we search give strong clues as to what we want, but only clues. The words that will help us complete the task we came to the website to complete can be subtly-and sometimes substantially different-to the words we used when searching for it.
McGovern, Gerry. CMSwire (2009). Articles>Web Design>Search>User Centered Design
#33948
Social Media is Here to Stay... Now What?
For users, Web 2.0 was all about reorganizing web-based practices around Friends. For many users, direct communication tools like email and IM were used to communicate with one's closest and dearest while online communities were tools for connecting with strangers around shared interests. Web 2.0 reworked all of that by allowing users to connect in new ways. While many of the tools may have been designed to help people find others, what Web 2.0 showed was that people really wanted a way to connect with those that they already knew in new ways. Even tools like MySpace and Facebook which are typically labeled social networkING sites were never really about networking for most users. They were about socializing inside of pre-existing networks.
Boyd, Danah. Microsoft (2009). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design>Social Networking
#34100
Fluid layouts are an undervalued commodity in web design. They put control of our designs firmly in the hands of our users and their browsing habits. They’ve also utterly failed to seize the imagination of web designers.
Marcotte, Ethan. List Apart, A (2009). Articles>Web Design>Document Design>User Centered Design
#34105
The parallels between the theories of technical communications and those of web design are very similar, the key aim is to keep the audience in mind at all times. The way you structure and present the information is also important, as is a sense of usability of the content itself.
McLean, Gordon. One Man Writes (2009). Articles>Web Design>Technical Writing>User Centered Design
#34178
Investigating Behavioral Variability in Web Search 
Understanding the extent to which people’s search behaviors differ in terms of the interaction flow and information targeted is important in designing interfaces to help World Wide Web users search more effectively. In this paper we describe a longitudinal log-based study that investigated variability in people’s interaction behavior when engaged in search-related activities on the Web. We analyze the search interactions of more than two thousand volunteer users over a five-month period, with the aim of characterizing differences in their interaction styles. The findings of our study suggest that there are dramatic differences in variability in key aspects of the interaction within and between users, and within and between the search queries they submit. Our findings also suggest two classes of extreme user--navigators and explorers--whose search interaction is highly consistent or highly variable. Lessons learned from these users can inform the design of tools to support effective Web-search interactions for everyone.
White, Ryen W. and Steven M. Drucker. WWW 2007 (2007). Articles>Web Design>Search>User Centered Design
#34308
Is Self-Centered Web Copy Hurting Your Websites?
Web developers frequently launch websites with self-absorbed web copy, which turns off visitors and kills conversions. Who’s to blame? Self-absorbed copywriters and business owners. To engage prospects and turn them into customers, web copy needs to appeal to the visitor’s self-interest.
Webdesigner Depot (2009). Articles>Web Design>Writing>User Centered Design
#34466
Could a charter of rights for the user of web applications lead to the design of user-centred interfaces, better user experience and avoid causing frustration, irritation and consequently lost business? The following is an attempt to outline a charter of rights for the user of web applications.
Frontend Infocentre (2009). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design
#34959
The purpose of this paper is first to highlight some of the social phenomena that are driving the design of people-centred information solutions; second, to develop a broad ontology of information behaviour research that serves to identify factors that should be taken into account when designing such solutions. Finally, the author illustrates how this knowledge is being applied in the design of people-centred inclusive information products and services.
Hepworth, Mark. Journal of Documentation (2007). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design
#34964
The purpose of this research is to explore a method for the determination of users' representations of search engines, formed during their interaction with these systems. Determines the extent to which these elicited "mental models" indicate the system aspects of importance to the user and from this their evaluative view of these tools.
Johnson, Frances C. and Sarah E. Crudge. Journal of Documentation (2007). Articles>Web Design>Search>User Centered Design
#35705
Strategies on How To Motivate Users to Sign Up Through Design
Be it web-based applications or online services, they are taking the Internet by storm. Many websites introducing these services are created and launched to get users to sign up and use the software (hopefully for a long-term). The question is: How do we get users from the unfamiliar zone into the interested zone and subsequently becoming a first time use?
Onextrapixel (2009). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design>Forms
#35822
Changing Terminology: "User" versus "Customer" 
The term "user" has also been critiqued because it obscures the fact that people use software and web sites in different ways. Sometimes the "user" is a customer, sometimes a contributor, sometimes an employee, sometimes a learner. In many cases, one of these words would be more accurate than the catch-all "user."
Ruby, Jennie. I Came, I Saw, I Learned (2009). Articles>Web Design>Social Networking>User Centered Design
