Archive for the ‘Design’ Category

I submitted a support ticket on behalf of a client today in their e-commerce system. After filling in the fields and submitting the form, I got this message:

At first, I thought I had made a mistake. An exclamation point icon? Bold red text? All of these visual cues tell a completely different story than what the message says.

What do your messages really say in context with visuals? And do you really want for your message to make someone feel undeserved panic, even if it’s just for a couple seconds?

I have a reversible belt that lets me flip it so that it’s either black or brown. Recently, it started squeaking whenever I walk while wearing it. This squeaking is starting to annoy me so much that I wish I would have bought 2 separate belts instead.

This is the kind of trade-off that you need to make when designing a product or service. Do you really focus on a single problem and be the best at it, or do you provide more utility at the cost of adding more complexity?

Ask yourself this. Are you a well-design SUV? Or are you the Homer Simpson car? What kinds of trade-offs can you make to provide a more delightful experience? Is answering every feature request that comes your way destroying your focus?

There’s a balance.

I’ve been focusing a lot on optimization lately.

If you think about it, there are 2 ways that you can increase business results on your website. You can pay more to throw more traffic and more eyeballs at it. Or you can optimize its content so that visitors are more likely to become customers.

One of the key benefits of web content optimization is that it has long-term results. When you pay for an advertising campaign, that only lasts for so long. Optimization efforts produce results long after you’re done.

Here are a few tips in getting started in optimizing your website.

Read the rest of this entry »

Most web designers and web developers ignore accessibility. Now that Target is being sued for not having an accessible web site, the bar is going to be raised for your own site as well. Yes, this is yet another thing to worry about. And no, you should not half-ass it.

If you cater to those with visual impairments, then you will also reap benefits from the world’s most famous blind user: Google. I kid you not.

HTML, the document format of web pages, was designed to be consumed by those with vision impairments, not just by those of us with good eyesight. Once again, everyone has gotten lazy and hasn’t learned how to truly use HTML for this purpose. I’m going to point out a few things that should be done to help improve your site’s accessibility. Read the rest of this entry »

Web registration forms are important. These forms are often an early part of your visitors’ experience on your website. If these forms are too cumbersome, your visitors will remain just visitors, instead of going to the next level in the relationship.

I’ve noticed some cool innovations in registration forms, so I thought I’d be nice and share.

First, I’ll be talking about a pleasant experience that FreshBooks provides during their online registration process. Read the rest of this entry »

I’m working on building an elaborate marketing and e-commerce system. I just don’t feel like anyone has done it right, so I’m taking a stab at it.

Here’s why I think the other software vendors have done such a poor job: lack of design in their process. I intend to make a system that’s pleasant and easy to use, that “gets out of the way” of users’ tasks. And I’m not going to get there without design. Read the rest of this entry »

Now you can provide your graphic designer with your own color palette, using Adobe Labs’s Kuler. Kuler makes creating a color palette easier than you can imagine. Hell, you may even find yourself having fun with it! Read the rest of this entry »

I complained earlier that I had no branding on my blog, which is still true. But the big hold-up was in my getting off my ass and choosing a logo. Guess what… it’s finally done!

I spent a lot of time deciding on which of my doodlings to use for a logo. Let me explain how you should always approach this kind of decision for your company. Read the rest of this entry »

As a website owner, you will eventually have to make an important decision about your site’s layout. Do you want for the layout to be liquid, so that it stretches to take up the entire width of the window? Or do you want for the layout to always be the same width, no matter how wide your browser window is?

You’d think it would be a simple decision, but it will have major impact over your site in the future. Let’s look at the pros and cons of each approach. Read the rest of this entry »