Usability Means Designing for the User Experience

This blog entry was posted on June 13, 2009.

A great website is one that is simple, intuitive to use and gives you the information you want quickly and easily. These websites don’t happen by accident, they happen by design. The user experience is carefully considered and usability is engineered in. A great website is an elegant solution.

Getting visitors to your website is very important, but once they arrive, will they understand the site? Will they buy, sign-up or call your office? Traffic is important, but conversion is critical. Website usability builds in trust and encourages your visitor stay and consider what you have to offer.

So how can you enhance your visitor experience using website usability principles?

1. Site wide navigation: Navigation should be user friendly, in a logical flow, clearly understandable and visitor should find what they expect when they click on any link.
2. Content: Well written and user focused content allows your visitors to “find out” more about what you have to offer. Help your website visitor solve a need, answer an important question or solve a problem they have.
3. Use active words: The goal is to engage your reader and move your reader from being a passive observer to being an active participant.
4. Understand at a glance: Scannable content uses headlines, sub-headings, bullet points and short paragraphs. In 1-2 seconds a visitor should understand what it is you offer.
5. Home page: This is the most crucial page on your entire website. Visual impression, organization, content and call to action as a whole are all important.
6. About Us page: This is the second most visited page on the typical site. It builds trust and where your visitor gets to know your company. Tell your story, your values, your mission and about your key people.
7. Contact Us page: Provide multiple options to reach your company. Always include a phone number. This builds trust because they know they can reach you if they ever have a problem.
8. Site search: An easy to use search function helps visitors find information on larger websites.
9. Engage your visitor: Get their attention and keep it. Anticipate their questions and needs. Make buying easy and have convenient links to any pages that will help them make their buying decision.
10. Build trust: Convince your visitors that you have a trustworthy business. This includes guarantees, refund policies, privacy policies, multiple delivery methods, complete information and easy ways to contact you.

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Related posts:

1. 20 Tips for Designing Landing Pages that Convert
2. User Persona: A tool to increase Conversion
3. User Persona: Developing a Website Visitor Profile
4. Mega Drop Downs: Designing for the Future
5. Designing a Website for the Mobile Web

Filed under: Internet Marketing,Web Usability

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 13th, 2009 at 6:12 am and is filed under Internet Marketing, Web Usability. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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1. Good tips. My favorite is to not rely on the designers ideas, though they may be good. Testing your site out with a just a few strangers can offer a wealth of information.

   Comment by Rob — June 26, 2009 @ 5:55 pm

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