Web Usability - 5 Essentials

Published in Website Design on Sunday, 28 June 2009  |   Subscribe to rss feed for Web Usability - 5 Essentials (rss logo graphic) Post RSS

A website design that fails basic usability guidelines is like a car without a steering wheel. Almost useless.

WebFertile have put together 5 website usability essentials to solve common web usability issues and dramatically increase usability of small business website designs. 

1.  Keep The User Informed

Jakob Nielsen calls this 'visibility of system status' and recommends 'informing users about what is going on through appropriate feedback'.

For example, if an image is being uploaded (which can take some time even on a broadband connection), the user should get a progress bar or message saying 'your image is being uploaded... please wait.... ' 

Lack of feedback can create undesirable feelings in your customers -

If a new registree to your website must respond to an email in order to validate their membership, let them know.  And if they try to login to their membership before validating, offer a message to this effect. Don't simply direct them to the 'login failed' page. This can be annoying at best, confusing at worst.  'Did I use the wrong email / password?.. I'm sure I didn't....'

 2.  Speak The Users' Language

Website error messages may make sense to website designers. But not always to users.

The best way to discourage, bamboozle or otherwise scare off visitors is to provide them with a message like this one:

"Sorry. Your access has been permanently terminated due to XXX restrictions on zmdll.php. Additionally you do not have permissions to access this file. Your computer will now.... (insert suitably dramatic term) ... in 30 seconds"

Better may be: "It appears that your browser doesn't  support cookies, and they are needed to view this website.  The following websites provide information that may be helpful:  

Messages - and error messages in particular - should be expressed in simple language, precisely explain the problem and suggest routes to solve the problem.

 3.  Consistency & Web Standards

Following web conventions is a good thing.

Understandably many companies want to appear different and stand out from the crowd.  Isn't filling your website with pages such as 'contact us' and 'about us' just boring?

If your aim is simply to be interesting and unusual, go ahead and fill your website with obscure terms and 'brand-ese'.  But if your aim is to increase sales, enquiries and other profitiability factors, you'd be better to follow the 'dull' route. Your website is a tool as much as an expression of your individuality.

Immediate understanding of your website is essential.  Don't make me think.  Your website design should be easy to grasp. Users normally don't have the patience to work things out.

 4.  Design For Advanced and Novice Users

Make the most frequently used actions on your website easy and self explanatory to use. Design mainly for first time users.

Even better, provide experienced users with handy shortcuts that can save them time and effort, and that require minimal learning.

 5.  Help and Documentation

The most usable website designs tend to be self explanatory and require little help, support or documentation. However, there may come a time when help is required. This documentation should follow 3 guidelines:

  • Not too large - easy to search and browse
  • Focused on the user's task
  • Provide concrete steps / actions to be performed by the user

 

Sources:

http://www.useit.com/papers/heuristic/heuristic_list.html  (Jakob Nielsen)

The Design of Everyday Things   (Donald A. Norman, MIT Press, 1998)
http://www.amazon.com/Design-Everyday-Things-Donald-Norman/dp/0385267746 

All resources written by The WebFertile Team.

Whatever your business needs, one of our highly trained small business development experts is sure to be able to help.