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Design for your users first

I’m sure we’ve all visited a web site and found it difficult to use and the chances are we gave up on it and went elsewhere to find what we were looking for. You wouldn’t want this to happen to your own site would you?

As a web designer I find that sometimes clients are adament they want that fancy flashing image or fancy page effect, even though it will have a detrimental effect on their sites performance and I’ve advised them against it. Many people fall into the trap of designing sites for their own tastes instead of considering the needs of their sites visitors - this can be potentially fatal for a commercial site and money down the drain.

Web designers are web designers for a reason and the things we suggest or recommend are usually as a result of good practice, standards and current best methods. Integrating client ideas into their site can be a challenge for any web designer, but sometimes ideas are not practical, relevant, or interfere with usability and accessibility. On the other hand some ideas are worthwhile and add real value!

There can be a fine line between what’s useful to help your visitors, and what will confuse or frustrate them, so I’ve prepared a short list of things to consider.

Identity

Upon entering your site users should quickly be able to see where they are and what the site is all about. Typically on your home page this would be a logo and an easily visable message stating what the purpose of the site is and any other information that will be of use to the visitor such as a list of special offers, or news items. Of course the message will vary from site to site depending on the type of content that you want your visitors to see first.

Images and graphics

“A picture paints a thousand words” so they say, and in general on the web they do. Not everyone will see it like that though. Apart from decorative graphics, images should serve a purpose and add value to the page/article being viewed as well as having a useful “ALT” attribute to tell visitors using assistive browsing technologies it’s meaning and context within the peice. Images used out of context are generally pointless, so the next time you add an image to a page ask yourself what value it gives to your visitors.

Images should always be optimised to reduce file size for quicker downloading. Not everyone has a super fast internet connection and if they have to wait for your 2mb oroduct image to download they will give up on your site an go elsewhere.

Flash animations

Some wonderful things have been made with Adobe Flash - games, movies and presentations to name a few - but it’s an often misued medium. “Just because you can it doesn’t mean you should” is the motto here. Used properly Flash can be very effective on your site if used correctly, but for usability and accessibility purposes it should never be used when the same message can be conveyed using plain text. If you’re using it for presenting information (ie your latest company results) you should always provide a text transcript of your message so people who can’t see Flash can read the content.

Navigation

Users should be able to find their way around your site quickly and easily. This normally mean having consistant navigation links on every page of your site in the same location. Users will quickly get used to where it is and find it a lot easier to move around. Plain text links are always best, and they can be flowered up with CSS to look like a menu, but the best advice is to avoid Javascript and Flash based menus for accessibility reasons.

To see some really bad examples watch a video at the Worst web site of 2006

There’s also the “3-click rule” that allows users to locate the information they’re looking for within 3 mouse clicks. For most small sites this isn’t a problem but if you have a lot of pages and categories/sections building an effective navigation system takes some thinking and planning, but will give a better experience for your users.

Information

It’s what your users visit your site for so whay make it difficult for them to find it? Most web site content is plain text with associated media (images, videos etc) yet many sites make you wade through adverts, non essential images, and other blurb before you find what you are looking for. Anything you put in the way is a barrier to your users and will make the site unfriendly and frustrating to use. Make it easy for your visitors to find what they’re looking for, and when they reach the page with the information on it give it to them in a clear and understandable manner.

Big no no’s

Splash pages - very 20th century, why make your visitors click twice to see your site?
Flashing things - distracting, can cause seizures, use with care
Fixed size text - not allowing users to resize text using their web browser settings
Waffle - why use 100 words when 10 will do?
Jargon - not everyone knows corporate slang and buzzwords, it may look impressive to the boss but will confuse your visitors