To ensure a visitor returns to a site, the overall user experience needs to be a memorable one.
So says Helga Letowt-Vorbek, director at Mantaray, a usability consultancy in the Internet and mobile space, adding that it's the goal of every Web designer to create a site users enjoy visiting and that delivers a positive viewing experience.
Letowt-Vorbek says many South African Web sites are remembered for the wrong reasons and she has noted five common flaws, gathered from research carried out in conjunction with UXalliance, a global user research and user experience organisation. She says these flaws damage brands by making user interaction unpleasant and user experience incomplete.
The first flaw, she notes, is that many organisations choose the wrong navigation device. She says this is important because tab-based navigation excludes 80% of Web site users, especially those surfing on their mobile phones. Good content categorisation and cross-links are essential when designing mobile sites - which is where the potential lies in the South African market.
The second pitfall is that most organisations assume everyone knows what banners are and how they work, she says. Novice online users see images as content, she explains; they rarely understand, unless given instruction, that an image is 'clickable' and will in fact lead to more content or advertising.
Another mistake is that marketing is thinly disguised as content; the general rule, Letowt-Vorbek says, is that an organisation has less than 10 seconds to grab the attention of a visitor to its site. Eye-catching images that provide context, strong headlines and well-crafted copy will assist in successfully grasping attention. Copying and pasting a corporate portfolio verbatim onto a Web site will likely annoy viewers and they will move on to the next search result, she says.
She also cautions about the use of design-oriented content. She advises that organisations create concise content that gets the message across in 500 characters (not words) for online and 250 characters for mobile Web sites.
Lastly, many organisations fail to understand why people visit and stay on their Web sites. People don't come to Web sites to browse - they want to find information, she says; that information is likely to help them make a decision. If organisations make it easy to find information on their sites, it's likely that organisation will be successful, she says. Sites should have short, concise copy, transparent pricing and bullet points stating key benefits, she adds.
Letowt-Vorbek is a speaker at the UX Masterclass conference, taking place on 30 March, in Johannesburg. For more information, click here.
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