Guide the user both across pages and through pages

Earlier I mentioned User Paths – that is set ways that users will tend to traverse a website. Many of these will come about simply by the way people behave, but with planning, you can choose how a user will be guided both through a single page and across multiple pages. Once you know specific paths you can work in visual guides and links to help them move along that path.

For example on FlashDen, when a new user arrives, it is our aim to get them to register, find files, deposit money and then buy those files. So we first give them a summary of the four step process on the homepage, then at each stop there are pointers to direct the user onto the next step. In our next redesign I’m hoping to make this path even more obvious as it’s essential to the site working as it should. Note that the path I’m describing is not 4 pages, but 4 tasks. For example finding files might involve the user looking at dozens of pages, but it’s one discrete task. User paths don’t need to be through set pages, they can just as easily encompass set tasks!

Steve Krug’s very worthwhile book!

7 – Don’t overcomplicate things

It should go without saying that simple is better for users than complicated. Nonetheless it’s all too easy to overcomplicate designs. I know that I often make things seem more complicated so that I have more visual elements on a page to work with (bad Collis, bad Collis!) Another overcomplication sin is using unnecessary words on buttons and calls to action. Steven Krug in his excellent book Don’t Make Me Think gives the example of a hypothetical employment site with a button that reads:

· Jobs

· Employment Opportunities

· Jobs-o-rama

One of these is clear, one is reasonably obvious, and one is – well who knows.

Information can be presented as more than just text!

Дата добавления: 2015-11-16