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Editor's Note: Garrett French |
 Hello
Readers,
Sometimes it's hard to tell when it's time to redesign your site. Sometimes it's
not. I asked people around the office about sure signs that it's time to redesign
your homepage. When the dust settled, I had the following list.
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You know it's time for a site redesign when:
Bob Villa wants to put you on "This Old Homepage."
Spammers refuse to send you email.
Your reflective water applet freezes over.
Your ping comes up "no way, I'm not going there."
People visit your website only to mysteriously end up missing.
Your "punch the monkey" banner links to Pets.com.
Your experience with Flash is limited to pool parties and Mardi Gras. Your site
has to sneak up on an IP to get hosted.
Your webmaster confesses that he is color blind.
You proudly proclaim in your header: "this site compatible with Netscape 4.0."
You see your 8 yr old's school html project and you know it's better than your
site.
The flames on your .gif have gone out.
Your design team is lovingly referred to as "Grumpy Old Men".
(Special thanks to Ray, John, Scott, Lafe, Brittany, Mike, and Jack.)
I'll be accepting YOUR sure signs for site redesign for the next three days (deadline:
0530). Send them in and make us laugh.
The more we laugh, the higher you'll be in the list I publish.
Now that you've gotten a hearty chuckle, turn your critical gaze to our latest
site for review. It's a non-profit organization's site, and they're just about
to launch a major site redesign. Send them your ideas and make a difference on
the web!
I'm ramping up on these site reviews folks, so I'll need your reviews by 06/10/03.
That's two weeks.
The results of the EntFederal site review are in. Gavin Lew, Managing Director
of User Centric, Inc., is our top reviewer. He actually called and consulted with
EntFederal. His review is today's feature article. The other reviews are listed
below his -- thanks again to all those who submitted reviews!
I hope you find this issue useful, and, as always, write me if you have any questions or
concerns.
Best Wishes,
Garrett + The WebProNews Team
garrett@WebProNews.com
|
New Site For Review: Gaslamp.org |
 New
Site For Review: Gaslamp.org
Visit Gaslamp.org
Send in your review!
The Gaslamp Quarter is a 16 & 1/2 block area in downtown San Diego. We
are a nonprofit charged with marketing the area and bringing business to our merchants.
Our site receives between 30,000 and 40,000 visitors a month seeking information
on Gaslamp Quarter businesses and events.
The areas we'd like input on are:
1. The impression the site makes on visitors. Is it fun, cosmopolitan, hip, exciting
and vibrant or is it outdated, uncreative, ten years ago or whatever, and what
should we do to bring it up to date? Keep in mind we are a tourist destination,
so we need to cater to shopping, dining and nightlife, plus an older crowd who
simply visit the Gaslamp for walking tours to learn about history and the architecture,
as we contain ninety four historically significant buildings. |
»New Site For Review
»Expert
Review of Ent Federal’s Website
»Top Reviews
»Designer's Corner:Design Details: Important Or Not?
»From the Archive
»Meet the Readers
|
When it comes to web development, there is a fine line between worrying too
much about details and not worrying about them enough.
Read
more here |
Name: Lou Speks
Company:
Discovery Computer
Training
Products
Why do you read WebProNews?
We read and enjoy Webpronews to keep in touch with latest and newest internet
information. Great newsletter with up-to-date information relevant to its readers.
Who We are:
Discovery Computer Training Products; Tutorials Free Online Webmaster Resources,
CD-ROM training tutorials, Free Downloads, Free Scripts URL submission Tutorials
Flash MX, Dreamweaver MX, Fireworks MX, A+ Core & OS, Network Training, Win2000,
Computer Basics.
URL: http://www.discoveryvip.com
Introduce Yourself
|
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2. How can we make all the pages on the site more cohesive (design wise), so that
they look like they all belong on the same web site?
3. Is there a better way to organize the business or event information we offer
on the site, or is this way acceptable?
4. Are there any glaring errors in code?
5. What in your opinion would take this web site to the next level.
The items we already know the web site needs work on are:
1. The entry page
-including links to all the web pages
the site contains.
-establish a more cohesive look in relation to the rest of the
site.
2. The location map
-Show the Gaslamp in relation to the greater San Diego area
Thank You
Stephen Silke
gaslamp quarter association
So visit http://www.gaslamp.org and then
send in your reviews! Remember, the deadline
for reviews is coming soon, so review today!
|
Expert Review of Ent Federal’s Website |
 Expert
Review of Ent Federal’s Website
Gavin Lew
Managing Director
User Centric, Inc.
Typically, expert reviews start with an understanding of the typical users and
goals. This perspective, coupled with the application of user interface design
principles (design heuristics), forms the content of this review. Due to time
constraints, the depth of the review is limited to the critical areas that immediately
rise to the surface. Strong emphasis is placed on identification of potential
usability issues.
This abbreviated and tactical review of Ent Federal considers two types of users:
1)The prospective customer who is looking for financial services and needs to
assess whether Ent Federal is the “right” institution for their needs.
2)The existing Ent Federal customer who needs to interact with their financial
institution using the web channel.
The review begins on the home page and extends throughout a number of paths from
the top down. The following key areas of focus:
Overall Structure and Organization
- It does not make it easy to know where to go. For example, consider grouping
departments according to those needed to open an account (e.g., services, rates,
investing) and those needed to service an account (e.g., online banking). This
advocates the adoption of a functional or task organization, rather than a departmental
organization. To users, the need to engage a web channel revolves around their
needs, not how the bank is structured.
Home Page
- Changing the image on a page can be refreshing and provide a nice look and
feel to the site. However, the same look and feel should be extended across the
entire page (and site, for that matter). The Ent Federal marketing at the bottom
of the page creates a "disconnect" from
the rest of the page.
Make links look "clickable"
- The notion of affordance and self-evidency apply to link design. There is
nothing more frustrating than having to move your mouse around the page to determine
what is click. Worse is when the site teaches the user about links and then introduces
other alternative formats. The end result is that users may now miss links that
have been given new formats with the intent of making the link more salient. An
example is under Quick Jump where "More Cars Now" is a link.
Make links easy to scan
- Scanning a list of links is easier if the labels are left justified. Users
will be able to quickly know if their desired link is included if they can recognize
the organizational scheme (e.g., alphabetical) so they can avoid looking at every
link in the list. Click
here for example.
Navigation
- Organization: How is content organized within a section?
If the list of items is large and there is no easily recognizable structure, it
is likely that users will skip and not go through the list or find it extremely
frustrating to use the list. For example, the rates section organizes content
by both price (i.e., Featured Rates) and product (i.e., Loans, Mortgages, Savings
Accounts). It is not clear where featured mortgage rates will be listed.
- Employ card sorting to assist with organization of content.
- Use of drop-downs. This is useful to preserve screen real estate, however
careful attention must be made to ensure that users find drop-downs to be usable.
- Good Practice: Highlighting the text as the mouse moves over
the navigation
- Good Practice: Making the entire highlighted rectangle a
link, as opposed to only the text
- Realize: If your user base includes an older demographic
or disabled, accessibility for drop-downs may be a concern and should be addressed.
- Realize: Where the drop-down is located. Can it be off the
page? Does it overlap other high-level tabs? For example...
- Suppress Visited Links in Navigation: Having the browser
display visited links differently from non-visited links is useful for browsing
within content. However, it should not be used within navigation. Consider public
terminals or a second visit to the site possibly days later. The color differences
may be interpreted to represent priorities instead of visited links.
Click here for an example.
- Secondary Navigation: Ent Federal elected to use the left
side of the page to display 2nd and 3rd level navigation. This is a good use of
real estate, however a number of issues were found.
- Good Practice: It is easy to see where you are in the navigation
based on an item that is not clickable.
- Word wrap: When the item's label extends over two lines.
It is difficult to know where one item ends and another begins. Consider indentation
or spacing to differentiate levels of navigation. Click
here for an example.
- Consistency with whether to expand or collapse navigation:
In some instances, some levels are expanded arbitrarily. It makes it more difficult
to see where you are in the site.
Potential Color Blind Issue
- A common choice of colors on a web site is blue and yellow. The rationale
for these colors is appealing because of the high contrast between the two colors.
The result of yellow text on a blue background is that it "looks" bright and clean
to the typical user. It is used on Ent Federal banners and to some extent on navigation.
However, this color combination is problematic when accessibility considerations
are made. There is a small percentage of the population (mostly male) that has
blue-yellow color blindness (Tritanopia). These individuals will have difficulty
reading the labels. If the banner is a "call to action" it may not be seen! If
it affects navigation, then the problems are more devastating. Government legislation
aside, making your site accessible is a important and should be a consideration
during any redesign.
Overall, the Ent Federal site could use a redesign based on the need to reorganize
the content into more meaningful sections. As always, iteration in design is good
and getting input from the user via usability testing will help ensure that your
site is usable and useful to your customers.
Revisit Ent Federal's Site
| About User Centric, Inc.: Founded in 1999, User Centric, Inc. (http://www.UserCentric.com)
is a consulting firm that focuses on "success through usability." Using their
User Centric Method,TM user needs are identified and incorporated into design
to make products both useful and user-friendly. |
|
Top Reviews |
Top Reviews
1. Redesign
Criteria
A Site Review Of Ent Federal Credit Union by Jonathan Hilgeman of SiteCreative.com
Before I venture into the content portion of this review, let me start with the
design. Put bluntly, you need a re-design. Some people can go without one - yours
could definitely use it.
Read
more here
 2.
Effective
Internal Linking Strategies
A Site Review Of Ent Federal Credit Union By Monique Angelich of Devedia.com
While your navigation allows users to immediately visit any part of the site they
are interested in, the links themselves are spread out and confusing.
Read
more here
3. Continuous
Communication: Making Your Site Speak
A Site Review Of Ent Federal Credit Union By Edward Hadome of EdwardHadome.com.
From what I see the major problem comes from the home page. After reading through
the profile of your business, I automatically created an image in my head of what
a financial institution website would look like. What I pictured in my mind is
that of a site with a feel of the corporate world. But this wasn’t the first impression
I got.
Read
more here
4. The
Flow Of Site Content
A Site Review Of Ent Federal Credit Union By Cooper Grigs of qualityservice.org.
The navigation works for finding things quickly if someone knows exactly what
they want. You may want to try consolidating some functions/pages into similar
groups and allow the user to find what they need that way. Users want to click
more than they want to read. There is something about clicking that gives the
feeling of progress when searching for something.
Read
more here
5. BrainStorms:
10 Reviews To Help You Tweak Your Site
A Site Review Of Ent Federal Credit Union By Ten Readers.
Check out these reviews for design ideas. There's nothing like your peers to tell
you what's wrong with your site.
Read
more here
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