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Translate this into interface design. First, place features you know they'll use or have asked for on the new interface. Second, give them access to the old interface when they can't find what they want on the new one... even if what they want is right there in front of them on the new interface.
We removed the bold while making it available for those who want it. Another suggestion was to use a different font size. Okay, and ditto.
800, 600, 1024, 768, Hike!
Jan also sent me screen shots of how our site looks at 800x600 and 1024x768. NextStage's original website was designed for 640x480 screens and stayed that way for quite some time. Then our web designer told me that the majority of people visiting our site had 1024x768 screens. "Dang the small screen! Use the space!" I cried. Then our designer let me know that the majority of people coming to our site had 1280x1024 screens. "Get me one!" I cried, shortly followed by "Use the space!"
Prompted by Jan's screen shots, I asked the designer how many visitors we had in the past month that used an 800x600 monitor. The answer was two. Two? How many are using screens less than 1024x768? I'll admit it's more than two but it's still much smaller than a breadbox.
Still, and because Jan's advice is sound and reasonable, I asked our designer if our pages could be made to fit easily into a 1024x768 screen and still do one thing which is extremely important: allow visual separation of screen targets.
Visual separation of screen targets is important from a neuroscience perspective. It gives the mind-eye-brain system a chance to recognize, internalize and memorize what it's just seen before it sees something else. Visual separation is the silence between musical notes, the restful sigh before taking on more yard work, the appreciation for what you’d done in preparation for doing more, and is important.
And yes, the "recognize, internalize and memorize" comes from the 1-3, 4-7 and 7-10 second intervals mentioned in Websites: You've Only Got 3 Seconds.
Simple fixes are the best fixes
NextStage consultants make it a point to start clients with quick to implement, easy to validate, simple fixes. Ninety-nine per cent of the time the simple fixes will go a long way to improving site performance, and this is what Jan did.
Go to the NextStage Evolution site now and you'll see a button, "New Style", on the bottom of each page. Click this button and the page loads a new CSS with no bold, a decreased font size and a comfortable (I hope) fit into a 1024x768 screen. Click it again and you go back to the old CSS with bold, larger font size and a larger screen footprint. Think of this as A/B testing where the participants know what they’re voting on.
Yes, this is a simple fix. Being a simple fix is what makes it:
- An excellent first step to a complete redesign
- An easy step for regular visitors to accept or not while getting use to a new look and feel
- An example of good consulting practice
Don't overwhelm the client the moment you walk in the door. Whelm them, don't overwhelm them.
Jan had several other suggestions and I'll share them and the results of this A/B test on my blog, along with the exchange between Jan and myself.
Additional resources:
Note: I'll be speaking at the San Francisco April ’07 Emetrics Summit on Quantifying and Optimizing the Human Side of Online Marketing on May 7, 2007. Come on by and say hello.
Joseph Carrabis is CRO and founder of NextStage Evolution and NextStage Global, and founder of KnowledgeNH and NH Business Development Network. He is also author of the Biz Media Science blog. Read full bio.
