Usability Tip #3: Avoid Banners and Big, Bright, Bold

One of the most basic usability principals on the web is that users quickly learn to avoid banner ads.  I like to think of banner ads as page spam.  The typical rate at which people open spam email message is less than half of 1%.  People realize that the items on the big banners are things that companies are trying to push on them and, most likely, not what they are interested in.  So, they learn to avoid them.  Also, note that slightly large company named Google has built an incredibly lucrative business around simple blue links with a couple lines of text under them…not big image banners that people may ignore.

What you may not have known, though, is that big, bright, bold text can have the same effect.  Check out this article where users were asked to find the population of the US on the Census Bureau’s web site.  Even though the answer was right there in big, bold, bright print on the home page, the great majority of users never saw it.  Sometimes using a simple blue link or a typical sized black header is far more effective approach than overdoing the display of information visually.

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Usability Tip #2: When in Doubt, Don't Assume the User Knows

I recently encountered one of the most entertaining articles/videos I have seen in a long time.  And it can be applied to a couple typical usability questions that come up on every client project: 1) can we assume the user is going to know this piece of information that they need to understand the site; and 2) can we assume they will definitely see and use this part of the interface?  These questions could be about something as simple as expecting that a user knows what an acronym means or something as complex as expecting that most users know how to work data filters.

Well, I’m here to tell you that, most of the time, if you even are asking the question and debating it, then it is probably safer to assume that the user doesn’t know.  The great article/video I am referring to above is the Invisible Gorilla Video and I encourage you to have a look at it and the video and then return to the blog.

…don’t worry…we’re waiting patiently for you  ;-) 

Now, to be honest, the first time I saw that video, I did not notice the key figure that is the subject of the video.  Quite amazing.  Be sure to think about this video the next time you want to assume that a user is going to notice something in your interface that isn’t blatantly obvious.

Now, if that was not enough for you, there are a couple other tidbits from usability guru Jakob Nielsen.  The first was a study where users were asked, quite simply, to run a Google search.  25% of people failed this task.  Many of them completed some kind of search, but 25% did not complete a Google search.  I know…it’s very hard to believe but true.

So, the next time you are asking yourself “well, the users must know X, Y, or Z” be sure to think of gorillas and Google.  Your site will be all the more user-friendly as a result and your users will be happier as well.

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Usability Tip #1: Don't Break Conventions Unless You Have a Very Good Reason

CBSSports.com has a great feature.  It is called Rapid Reports and provides users with numerous brief news snippets about every team in the NFL every day.  However, one element of their design breaks a convention that leads me (and many other users I am sure) to have to think every time I use it.  That element is the "previous" and "next" functionality at the bottom left of the page.  See the image:

Most search results and other lists have Next on the right and Previous on the left just as CBSSports.com does.  However, instead of using the same convention as the great majority of sites on the web, they make users think every time they go to use this seemingly minor interface element.  I am sure the reason they made this change is because, literally, the posts you are going to see next are the "previous" posts as this list is in reverse chronological order with the newest post at the top of the list.  Making users think through the fact that these are "previous" posts every time they go to click the link rather than following the convention of just clicking Next, as users do on most lists is tedious at best and a minor annoyance at worst.  This type of usability issue won't ruin your site, but if you add up a number of them across an entire website, it can easily lead to unhappy customers who will gladly look elsewhere.

Suggested Reading: Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability by Steve Krug

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