Design is to attract, Usability is to engage- Part 3
Sunday, March 18, 2007
Usability is about making things accessible and easy to use. You like to stay in a place and spend time with someone whom you are comfortable with. One of the main factors that Usability comprises of is the comfort level you provide your visitors. Don’t make them think about they should not and how they can reach what they want without having to think where from. Search boxes and site navigation should not be an issue for the visitors to resolve.
13. State clearly even if you have to repeat things- You get new visitors daily, and which ever post they might be landing on would be presented to them for the first time. Many people think that they should not repeat what they have already written about, without realizing that their first time visitors have not read any piece of their work before. If relevant speak again of the important points, and provide necessary links to the posts where the topic of your post is discussed before. This way even you would decrease the monotony from your posts and still your first time visitors would not feel that you have missed specific points.
14. Bullets and numbered Lists- Like paragraphs, bullets and numbered lists help you to give a clear presentation. It will also help you gain attention of skimmers and jumpers. It removes monotony from the post, giving it an organized look, as well. This will also save time of your users and they will thank you for it.
15. Home page linking and other Links- More often than not, most of the traffic lands on interior pages rather than the home page which makes a link to your homepage an absolute necessity on every page whether you have a blog or a website.
Other Links included in you posts whether internal or outbound should say where they go. Will you Like to Click here and Here without knowing where you’ll go. Providing a brief information where they lead to or a link title will be of help to your visitors and will inform them where they are headed to. This will help you make your visitors click where you want them to click. Have you ever heard about a Fear of unknown. This is it.
16. Make it easy to Subscribe- Essential part of your return traffic should consists of your subscriber traffic. How effective your blog is equally proportional to how many people want to read it on a regular basis. These are who subscribe your feed, and because subscribers are such an important part of blogging success, you need to make it easy for users to sign up. Offer both email and RSS options. Services like Feedburner help make you make your feed compatible to both RSS and Atom Aggregators.
17. Browser Compatibility- One thing that people often forget while personalizing their blog design is to check the appearance on different browsers. What may look right on Firefox may not look the same in Internet Explorer. The placement of widgets specially can cause blunders.
Get into the shoes of your reader and evaluate it. If you want, taking your friend's help is also a good option. Improve your reader's expereince and make your blog sticky.
Happy Blogging,
Divya
Related Posts:-
Design is to Attract, Usability is to Engage-Part 2
Design is to Attract, Usability is to Engage- Part I
Bookmark this article:-
Technorati Tags:- Blog Usability
13. State clearly even if you have to repeat things- You get new visitors daily, and which ever post they might be landing on would be presented to them for the first time. Many people think that they should not repeat what they have already written about, without realizing that their first time visitors have not read any piece of their work before. If relevant speak again of the important points, and provide necessary links to the posts where the topic of your post is discussed before. This way even you would decrease the monotony from your posts and still your first time visitors would not feel that you have missed specific points.
14. Bullets and numbered Lists- Like paragraphs, bullets and numbered lists help you to give a clear presentation. It will also help you gain attention of skimmers and jumpers. It removes monotony from the post, giving it an organized look, as well. This will also save time of your users and they will thank you for it.
15. Home page linking and other Links- More often than not, most of the traffic lands on interior pages rather than the home page which makes a link to your homepage an absolute necessity on every page whether you have a blog or a website.
Other Links included in you posts whether internal or outbound should say where they go. Will you Like to Click here and Here without knowing where you’ll go. Providing a brief information where they lead to or a link title will be of help to your visitors and will inform them where they are headed to. This will help you make your visitors click where you want them to click. Have you ever heard about a Fear of unknown. This is it.
16. Make it easy to Subscribe- Essential part of your return traffic should consists of your subscriber traffic. How effective your blog is equally proportional to how many people want to read it on a regular basis. These are who subscribe your feed, and because subscribers are such an important part of blogging success, you need to make it easy for users to sign up. Offer both email and RSS options. Services like Feedburner help make you make your feed compatible to both RSS and Atom Aggregators.
17. Browser Compatibility- One thing that people often forget while personalizing their blog design is to check the appearance on different browsers. What may look right on Firefox may not look the same in Internet Explorer. The placement of widgets specially can cause blunders.
Get into the shoes of your reader and evaluate it. If you want, taking your friend's help is also a good option. Improve your reader's expereince and make your blog sticky.
Happy Blogging,
Divya
Related Posts:-
Design is to Attract, Usability is to Engage-Part 2
Design is to Attract, Usability is to Engage- Part I
Bookmark this article:-
Technorati Tags:- Blog Usability
Labels: Better Blogging, Blog Optimization, Web Usability
7 Comments:
Hello, I'm back on line. These is a good series. Very nice stuff. You have come very far since the fist time I visited.
Excellent information!
Especially what you wrote here: "More often than not, most of the traffic lands on interior pages rather than the home page ..." because that just told me that it's important to have my Adsense on individual pages also, and not just on the home page!!!
Time well spent reading your blog! Thanks!
(BTW... I just joined your myBlogLog community as well!)
Especially what you wrote here: "More often than not, most of the traffic lands on interior pages rather than the home page ..." because that just told me that it's important to have my Adsense on individual pages also, and not just on the home page!!!
Time well spent reading your blog! Thanks!
(BTW... I just joined your myBlogLog community as well!)
Fantastic series--cuts right to the meat of using what works and refraining from the glitter-widgets which ultimately just waste time for the blogger and their readers.
Kudos!
Kudos!
Divya,
Thank you for such an informative and useful site. I had joined your mybloglog community and definitely come back.
It was a little confusing trying to find where I could participate by commenting though, the other links and ads are so much bigger and more prominently placed.
Tip Number 15 had occurred to me earlier in the day after seeing the technique used on another blog, just another reason I will be returning.
Thank you for such an informative and useful site. I had joined your mybloglog community and definitely come back.
It was a little confusing trying to find where I could participate by commenting though, the other links and ads are so much bigger and more prominently placed.
Tip Number 15 had occurred to me earlier in the day after seeing the technique used on another blog, just another reason I will be returning.
Le design !? Mon point faible ... je recherche quelqu'un pour améliorer justement mon design, alors venez me voir et contactez moi
Merci
Merci
Excellent list! #13 really hits home with me, I often forget that most visitors are first timers.
hey there everybody , im new to this lark .. whats the craic:)
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