Nielsens Top Ten Lists Jeff Offutt SWE 432
- Slides: 14
Nielsen’s Top Ten Lists Jeff Offutt SWE 432 Design & Implementation of Software for the Web Nielsen got famous by his “top ten lists” of web usability problems Prioritizing Web Usability, Nielsen & Loranger : Chapter 3 Revisiting Early Web Usability Findings
Top Ten List 1. Bad search 2. PDF files for online reading 3. Not changing the color of visited links 4. Non-scannable text 5. Fixed font size 6. Page titles with low search engine visibility 7. Anything that looks like an advertisement 8. Violating design conventions 9. Opening new browser windows 10. Not answering users’ questions 17 September 2020 © Offutt 2
1. Bad search Search engines need to be flexible Typos, plurals, hyphens, … Humans are not perfect! Results must be prioritized 17 September 2020 © Offutt 3
2. PDF files for online reading PDF is for printing Not for reading online 17 September 2020 © Offutt 4
3. Not changing the color of visited links Users need to know where they’ve been Navigation is the biggest problem in website design 17 September 2020 © Offutt 5
4. Non-scannable text TL; DR You have less than two minutes to convince first time visitors to stay on your web site 17 September 2020 © Offutt 6
5. Fixed font size Let users decide People have a harder time reading small text as we age Specify text in relative terms 17 September 2020 © Offutt 7
6. Page titles with low search engine visibility index Home page https: //www. …. Welcome to my home page New version of home George P. Burdell 17 September 2020 © Offutt 8
7. Anything that looks like an advertisement Users automatically ignore anything that looks like an ad Disguising content as an advertisement is a good way to be ignored 17 September 2020 © Offutt 9
8. Violating design conventions Don’t hide links with non-standard colors or lack of underlining Creative navigation is risky 17 September 2020 © Offutt 10
9. Opening new browser windows New windows break back buttons • Violates user’s expectations • Pollutes user’s work space • Users can’t go back • Obscures current window Let users decide ! 17 September 2020 © Offutt 11
10. Not answering users‘ questions Price How to return Contact information (phone!) Delivery time 17 September 2020 © Offutt 12
Summary Usability on the Web has gotten a lot better But is still far from good … 17 September 2020 © Offutt 13
In-class exercise Web site mistakes Based on Nielsen’s “top ten” lists, find 3 web sites or web apps that exhibit at least one of those problems For each, write down the web site (URL or a unique name) and which problem it exhibits 17 September 2020 © Offutt 14
