Reduce Bounce Rates: Fight for the Second Click

Different traffic sources imply different reasons for why visitors might immediately leave your site. Design to keep deep-link followers engaged through additional pageviews.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2008). Design>Web Design>Usability>User Centered Design

Representations and Perceived Information Architecture (PIA)

This article discusses two key ideas. First, it briefly outlines four ways to represent the same information. Second, it provides a high-level overview of Perceived Information Architecture.

Rhodes, John S. WebWord (2001). Articles>Intellectual Property>User Centered Design

Rethinking User-Centered Information Development  

Often in the computer industry there is a tendency to provide information about the features of a system. However, customers usually purchase the system based on knowledge of its features, when they receive the product they need information on how to accomplish tasks. Developing task-oriented information requires a shift in perspective from what the computer technology can do, to what your customers want to do with the technology. The resulting information must be usercentered rather than feature-driven. These types of customer requirements demand afresh development approach.

Stertzbach, Lori A. STC Proceedings (1995). Articles>Documentation>User Centered Design>Usability

Revising Letters to Veterans    

A discussion of the process of making letters for veterans easier to understand.

Daniel, Reva. Technical Communication Online (1995). Articles>Writing>User Centered Design>Usability

The Rise of the Subsite

Web users need structure to make sense of the many and varied information spaces they navigate. The fundamental nature of the Web does not support any structure beyond the individual page which is the only recognized unit of information. For information spaces that cannot easily be hierarchically structured, the subsite can be used as a helpful additional structuring mechanism. Subsites can also be used in hierarchical information spaces to give particular prominence to a certain level of the hierarchy which is used as the subsite designator.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (1996). Design>Web Design>Usability>User Centered Design

Roles and Skills for Technical Communicators in User-Centered Design  

This paper discusses how technical communicators fit into the over all user-centered design (UCD) process, and how technical communicators can start applying user-centered design principles to their work. UCD principles can help technical communicators add value to the design of information, as well as to the overall design of a product. The paper addresses both the traditional and new skills that technical communicators need to acquire to become effective members of a UCD team.

Fisher, Lori H. STC Proceedings (1996). Articles>User Centered Design>TC

RSS Will Replace E-mail for Marketing Purposes: What You Need to Build Right Now to be Ready

RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication (depending on who you believe). If you don't know what it is, you had best grow a brain about it tout de suite.

Improving Customer Experience (2006). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design>RSS

Scenari d'Uso  

Marco Zappa lavora come visual designer in una web agency. Quando ha iniziato, tre anni fa, la societa' era composta da una trentina di persone, mentre oggi le persone sono quasi settanta. I progetti a cui lavora sono cambiati, e anche i ruoli all'interno della sua azienda si sono modificati e specializzati. Ora le attivita' sui progetti sono divise in maniera piu' rigida e precisa. Per questo motivo, insieme al fatto che i progetti sono piu' complessi e ci sono piu figure professionali coinvolte, non e' raro che si lavori in dieci o quindici persone sullo stesso progetto. Fino a un anno prima tutti i materiali venivano lasciati su un server con accesso pubblico: ogni progetto aveva una sua cartella, strutturata al suo interno in piu' sottocartelle per i documenti di progetto, le proposte grafiche, i materiali forniti dai clienti e tutti gli elementi grafici e contenutistici prodotti. Il sito vero e proprio risiedeva invece su un server di preview, con accesso riservato ad alcuni membri del team.

Caprio, Laura and Beatrice Ghiglione. InformationArchitecture.it (2003). (Italian) Articles>User Centered Design>Methods

"Sell" Your Survey With Direct Marketing Design  

We think about them every day. We try to anticipate their every need, predict their every question. They are our readers, our audience, the users and consumers of our documentation.

Stelmack, Rebecca L. Intercom (1999). Articles>User Centered Design>Methods>Surveys

Semantic Web Based Services for Intelligent Mobile Construction Collaboration

To provide real time, on-demand intelligent mobile collaboration support for their workers, construction enterprises increasingly need to use powerful wireless devices coupled with the availability of improved bandwidth, to tap into different inter and intra-enterprise data resources.

Zeeshan, Aziz, Anumba Chimay, Ruikar Darshan, Carrillo Patricia and Dino Bouchlaghem. ITcon (2004). Articles>Information Design>User Centered Design

Server-Side Usability

Most usability professionals don't have a driver's licence to servers and are not aware of the steps that can be taken to make them behave in a user-friendly way. In this article, we'll take a look at how to avoid that server technology becomes an obstacle to usability.

Olsen, Henrik. GUUUI (2004). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design

Setting Up Business Stakeholder Interviews Part 2

In part one, Michael shared how to navigate company politics to set up great stakeholder interviews. Here he covers his five tips for navigating company politics, avoiding client bias, and eliciting the information you need to inform your design.

Beavers, Michael. Boxes and Arrows (2007). Articles>Interviewing>Project Management>User Centered Design

Setting Up Business Stakeholder Interviews, Part 1

Gathering business requirements from stakeholders is critical to good design, but setting up quality interviews can be tough. Tossing out the org chart may be the best way to figure out who really wields influence over a company's website.

Beavers, Michael. Boxes and Arrows (2007). Articles>Interviewing>User Centered Design

Shortening the Cycle

How do we reduce time and costs and still achieve good results? Thirteen usability professionals joined forces in a workshop to develop answers to this question. The results are presented here in two parts: Four lists of recommendations in areas developed from specific issues. An inventory of techniques that have worked for the workshop participants in the past

Bugental, J.O. 'Joe' and Kristin Travis. Usability Professionals Association (2001). Design>User Interface>User Centered Design

Sign Up Forms Must Die

You load a new web service, eager to dive in and start engaging, and what's the first thing that greets you? A sign-up form. We can do better, says Luke Wroblewski, author of Web Form Design: Filling in the Blanks. Via a technique of "gradual engagment," we can get people using and caring about our web services instead of frustrating them (or sending them to a competitor's site) by forcing them to fill out a sign-up form first.

Wroblewski, Luke. List Apart, A (2008). Articles>Web Design>Forms>User Centered Design

Simple Gifts for the User  

Bush suggests how technical writers can improve the accessibility of their manuals by reducing wordiness, varying syntax, and improving indexes.

Bush, Donald W. Intercom (2000). Design>User Centered Design

Simplicity

Simplicity as a result of a creative process is 'the ultimate sophistication,' as Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) said. Achieving simplicity is a difficult task not only in web-design but in every discipline (art, business, sports, science), yet simplicity for websites is a particular challenge as paper derived graphic design and usability on one side, marketing language and user expectations on the other side are in constant struggle with each-other.

Information Architects Japan (2006). Design>Web Design>User Centered Design>Minimalism

Simplicity Costs Less and Works Better

If ordinary people have to use it, make it simple. You'll be doing your users a favour, and saving money too.

Baker, Adam. Merges.net (2001). Articles>Usability>User Centered Design

Simplicity Is Highly Overrated

I am in favor of good design and attractive products. Easy to use products. But when it comes time to purchase, people tend to go for the more powerful products, and they judge the power by the apparent complexity of the controls. If that is what people use as a purchasing choice, we must provide it for them. While making the actual complexity low, the real simplicity high. That's an exciting design challenge: make it look powerful while also making it easy to use. And attractive. And affordable. And functional. And environmentally appropriate. Accessible to all. That's why I like design: it presents wonderful challenges.

Norman, Donald A. uiGarden (2007). Design>User Interface>User Centered Design>Minimalism

Site Personas and the Dialogue Process

Site Personas are analogous to User Personas. Whereas User Personas represent typical individuals in your target user base, together with goals and motivations, the Site Persona represents the site, embodying its brand and its goals. I often find it helpful to picture my web sites as information flowing both ways between the site and users. The Dialogue Process is a way to optimise your web site interactions by scripting them as conversations between your two types of persona.

Hunt, Ben. Web Design From Scratch (2005). Design>Web Design>User Centered Design>Personas

Six Design Lessons From the Apple Store

There's a lot about the Apple Store experience that we can apply to the design of many other kinds of products.

Garrett, Jesse James. Adaptive Path (2004). Design>User Centered Design

Slashing Subjective Time

Slashing subjective time on your site by 50% is a perfectly reasonable goal. Indolent worker George Costanza once reflected on the time in the shower you wait for the hair conditioner to work as, 'a really tough minute.' A minute waiting for hair conditioner to work while getting ready for a date can feel longer than the three subsequent hours you spend with that very special person. Reducing/eliminating boredom points can make the time spent on your website appear to really fly by.

Tognazzini, Bruce. Nielsen Norman Group (2007). Design>Web Design>User Centered Design>User Experience

So What Is User Requirements Gathering?

More than one reader has pointed out that our recent article 'Alternatives To User Requirement Gathering' spent plenty of time illustrating why certain methods were inappropriate for the task of requirement gathering, without actually detailing the correct way to undertake this type of research. In way of compensation, this week we provide some (brief) advice on this absolutely crucial area to successful application or site development.

Farrell, Tom. Frontend Infocentre (2001). Articles>Usability>User Centered Design

So You Want to Be an Interaction Designer 2006

Five years ago, Robert Reimann wrote a seminal article for the Cooper Newsletter called 'So You Want To Be an Interaction Designer.' Like many people, I read the article and said, yep, that's what I want to be. I took Reimann's (good) advice and found both work and training as an interaction designer.

Saffer, Dan. uiGarden (2007). Careers>Usability>Interaction Design>User Centered Design

Social Intercourse: A Community-Based Design Initiative  

This paper introduces a model for operating in a socially relevant manner within a space that makes design an instigator of activity and response.

Abendroth, Lisa. University of Alberta (2000). Design>User Centered Design>Community Building