Perspectives on Web Marketing: The End User Still Steers the Ship — Part 2

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Web Page Design: Keeping it Simple
“Web site design is about information design. Don’t think so much about the colors or pictures. Think about information organization.” So says Joe Ligouri, formerly of Riger Advertising.

“Most people—especially your customers—view the Web as a library, not a source of entertainment. They hate to be kept waiting.” That means, says Ligouri, that the keys to effective Web page design are clean structures that help people find content quickly, and simple, strong layouts that allow them to absorb information easily.

Ligouri noted that taking a tip from the pros can help. He recommended examining how mega-sites like Amazon.com and eBay design for user-friendliness; both are notoriously successful at organizing a large amount of content that’s easy to search through.

Modern Web page design has settled on common usability elements such as footer links at the bottom of every page, slim mastheads that allow for more page content, and dark text on a light background.

But what about all the ‘extras’ people add to their pages? When customer usability is at stake, says Ligouri, ‘no tricks’ is a safer strategy. “Swirling logos, animated e-mail postboxes… even page counters… are signs of an amateur Web site.” (More tips from Joe can be found here.)

Ligouri noted that second- and third-generation Web sites always seem to evolve in ways that make the site more useful and easier for the end-user to navigate. “Today’s most successful Web sites,” he says, “are designed from a consumer’s point of view.”

The Role of Multimedia
How do you decide whether to include multimedia on your Web site, or in your CD? According to Pete Yeager, of JL Video and Multimedia, the secret is to step back to the end user’s perspective. What does the user get from it?

Multimedia, says Yeager, isn’t just using different media in a presentation of content. It’s using the medium best suited to convey information. “Video has certain uses, where it’s absolutely critical to use video with. Other times, it’s better to use a text document, and more useful.” Whether it’s video, a Flash animation, or simply audio, the real value lies in how the content is integrated into the presentation to enhance the understanding of the viewer.

Yeager illustrated his points with a presentation JL did for United Health services, which incorporated video integrated into a Flash presentation. The advantage of using Flash as the “master format” of a presentation, says Yeager, is that the final product could be played on a computer, and then ported to the Web—“theoretically.” The roadblock to a seamless translation? Bandwidth, which may require a “dumbing down” of the presentation to accommodate the speed limits of the Internet. Videos may be shortened, further compressed, or even used as a series of stills. Effects may be trimmed. So once again, he noted, the end user’s experience guides how the different media are used.

A key potential in integrating multimedia into content presentation, says Yeager is that—when skillfully applied—it can increase the user’s options to create an “information path.” Always keeping the expectations of the user in mind, a designer can provide a system of menus, audio/video segments, and animations that free the user to see and absorb information in the way most convenient or meaningful to them.

“Always step back, and really think about what you need to communicate, and what the user is going to get from this information, ” Yeager says. “Do you need pictures, or video, or animation? Because once you start with that approach, you can weed out unnecessary stuff and end up with a slimmer, more useful tool.”

(Continue to Part 3...)

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