As a Web Designer turned Information Architect I appreciate good usability, and accessibility. So coming across the ubiquitous ‘click here’ as much as I do does tend to get the heckles up! And think of people who rely on screen readers - hearing those two words time after time must be more than just a mild annoyance?

So, to this end, I thought some opinionated suggestion wouldn’t hurt!

It doesn’t take a particularly seismic shift in content authoring to contextualise link copy. Simply describing what will happen or where the user will end up is an easy habit to adopt. And when you consider that a well designed style sheet will quickly highlight a link at a glance, then why not take advantage with link text that is unique as well as useful. A page full of ‘click here’ does not inspire the reader.

And you don’t have to take my word for it, as Mr. Jakob Nielsen agrees in his Top Ten Web Design Mistakes of 2005 (see section 2).

Further resources:
So, don’t click here, instead…

Find out more about how to use descriptive link text on www.universalusability.com and how this will also lead to Increased usability as shown on www.webcredible.co.uk

The same website also contains more information on Improving usability for screen reader users

I hope this has been useful? If you’ve any comments to add, please use the appropriately described links below..!

Hi guys

I bought my husband the iPod touch for his birthday and this is the most amazing piece of technology I have seen with my own eyes. Most of us here at the agency are Apple fanatics, but this device shows you again how technology can be presented in a beautiful shape and made so easy to use that even a 5 year old could figure out how it works!!

If you are selling something online make sure that you are an expert in that product or service. It is very frustrating and trust destroying to a customer if you discover that the person at the end of a phone line or email conversation knows absolutely nothing about what they are selling.

I recently purchased a 1961 classic Vespa scooter that has been restored to its original glory. I bought it from vespaclassics.com which is a company run by a guy called Sam. Now Sam is a great example of knowing and loving your product. When I first emailed Vespa Classics I got a reply with loads of advice and helpful points including lots of questions I needed to answer.

Several weeks down the line I now have my custom restored 1961 Vespa and I am loving it. Part of the reason is probably down to the whole purchase experience. Every step of the way Sam has comunicated with me to inform me of progress as well as to confirm my exact requirements. To be honest I have no idea which type of “carb” I would like but because of the communication with Sam I am confident to trust his judgement in the more technical decisions.

And this is the key - TRUST. Because Sam has demonstrated his knowledge and passion for his product I have been able to trust a complete stranger with a few thousand pounds of my money and be confident that I will receive something great for it.

I can whole-heartedly recommend Vespa Classics not just because of the end product I received (though that is quite amazing), but because of the level of service you receive from them.

end of lesson 2: be an expert in your product or service.

It is shocking to think that in 2007 there are still online retailers that don’t answer the phone when you call them. About 7 years ago I remember Jakob Nielson getting rather excited about websites not having phone numbers on them and how bad this was.

Well in 2007 people have learnt at least that they need a phone number on the website (although Amazon could still be held guilty of this). The problem is that now they just don’t bother having anyone on the end of the phone.

Case Study 1: Kybotech
Kybotech are what seems to be a logistics company that operate a whole load of online retail stores. These sell everything from garden tools to barbeques to children’s toys to garden furniture.

I ordered a BBQ from one of Kybotech’s websites (Flaming Barbeques). It was a nice looking BBQ and I was well excited about it. However, it arrived damaged in 3 places and so I tried to call them to report it. When I called they were engaged. Not just for a few minutes, but every time I tried for several days. So I also sent emails from the website - 3 in total.

I even tried the trick to call the orderline number and got through to someone very quickly. They couldn’t help me of course - there were just interested in getting money, not giving good service.

Eventually I got through on the phone after 2 weeks and 45 minutes waiting on hold on an 0870 number!!!

I may say more about this purchase experience in the future but for now my points are very simple:
1. Put a phone number on your website
2. Use a phone number that will not cost the customer extra money above what is reasonable (an 0870 number for 45 minutes cost me £4.56 with Virgin Media - I will be claiming it back)
3. Make sure there are enough people around to answer that phone
4. Make sure the orderline is not prioritised over the customer service number unless you want to encourage negative marketing

That’s it for now.

At Digerati Studio we love user centred design. Before drawing anything, we focus on the user and how they will use the website, product etc. Therefore, we need to pay close attention to detail as every user journey needs to be taken into account.

I saw a great example of this from Google today. On Google Maps there are huge potential of possible journeys. One that I thought would not be technically possible to create proved me wrong…….!

See instruction 23!

I read an interesting article today that made me think again about user experience. At Digerati Studio we pride ourselves on user centred design. That means when we design anything before picking up a pencil or clicking a mouse button, we think about the user journeys and the requirements that the user will have.

In contrast alot of shops and companies put a huge emphasis on customer service to maintain a good rappor with customers and a reputable company profile in their industry. However, in my experience I often find one or the other, or neither! Either companies focus on customer service by having a massive call centre available to all their customers 24 hours a day, for example. But neglect the user experience of having to wait half an hour before being able to speak to anyone!

In www.macobserver.com there is a great article that talks of a windows developer coding for the new Apple OS Leopard. This is still in Beta release and the developer experiences some errors. His past experience working with Microsoft Betas has educated him that if you submit your errors found to Microsoft - they disappear into the abyss never to be heard of again!

However, the developer sent his errors to Apple and received a call back explaining where he had gone wrong, what this had highlighted to them about their OS and also sent back his script with some amendments.

This article is a testimony of a company that employ user experience as a whole ethos in their company rather than just simply in their products.

I read a good article in Mac Format this month. Barry Morse wrote in to comment about the new advertising campaign by Apple. You know, “I’m a mac, and I’m a PC”. In the adverts, the Mac is presented as a cool, trendy, “normal” type of guy. Whereas the PC is portrayed as geeky, bumbling and a little confused!

Barry Morse highlights how Apple users are a proud bunch who love their Macs! We agree that Apple is one of the world’s best companies for driving innovation whilst maintaining excellent usability and solid systems. However, the new adverts, though funny, do employ a sense of childish playground taunting. Barry Morse and Mac Format show the need for Apple to “Move on. Become like most people who choose to use an Apple computer - professional.”

Following on from this, I was gracefully reminded that the “world’s best company for innovation” also released some hideous products!

This article contains the Top 10 Apple products which flopped. It’s good to remember that even super-powers such as Apple have some embaressing products they’d rather not associate with their brand!

Anyone who spends any time with us will have often heard us promoting users of your website or printed material. We believe very highly in putting your end users first as without them any solution we produce will fail. With this in mind I got a recent email newsletter from a website I use that sums this whole subject up in a few choice words. Below is an extract from the email (the line in bold is the best bit):

“It’s both easy and hard to believe, but yesterday, February 15, was our first birthday! We’ve learned enough lessons to fill a book, which we might write someday, but the most important one can be shared in just a few words:

Listen to your members because without them a website is just web pages.

It’s one thing to craft a website, hook up some processing rules and a database, put it on some servers and go live. But when people, all kinds of people, show up and start doing their thing, it becomes something very different. It grows, it surprises you in good ways (awesome avatars, brilliant bookmarks!) and bad (spam). It makes you work harder than you ever expected and it pays off in so many unexpected ways. By listening to members, we’ve been able to do a great deal with just 3 to 4 people, depending on when you look. If we tried to think it all up ourselves, we wouldn’t have a chance.

We don’t have aspirations of runaway signup numbers and gajillions in revenue. We find that the words “small and remarkable” go together well when thinking about where Ma.gnolia is going. Ma.gnolia as a website is a shell of technical pieces and good looks, but with our members with us it’s a truly unique experience. Let’s see where the next year takes us.”

As I said, the website is a social bookmarking service so listening to members is very important. However, we can all apply this principle to our websites. When we finished the current Walney website (www.walneyuk.com) we began discussing the next phase of the site. My advise to the great people at Walney was to find out what their customers think of the website and what features they want before we decide what should go into phase 2. We will post further information here on phase 2 as it happens.

So let’s all make an effort to invite comments and suggestions from our users. I will start this off here and ask if any of you readers have a topic you would like us to discuss or something you want our website to do then please let me know by contacting us.

I ’stumbled upon’ this great site today. The simplicity in comparison to You Tube is very different but I like the refreshing design on Stumble and it is a great way of seeing what videos are out there.

StumbleVideo

This is not for the feint-hearted, but I just saw this article on ZDNet. It is remarkable that securing your computer is so difficult in an age when viruses, spyware etc. are so prevalent. In addition surely Microsoft have realised by now that the kind of people buying computers are not all technical support gurus.

» Screen Gallery: When is a firewall not a firewall? When it’s Vista’s built-in firewall | Berlind’s Testbed | ZDNet.com