Also, use sound to complement your site, not as a primary way to deliver content. In almost all teen homes that we visited, teens didn't have
speakers
attached to the computer or they had them turned off so they could listen to the radio. If you're going to have a demonstration that uses sound, make sure it has a text version as well, so students can follow along without having to depend on the audio.
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Enemies of usability sometimes claim that we are old fogies who don't understand that young people like overblown and fancy Web design. Admittedly, we are in our 40s and 30s, respectively, and our personal taste doesn't run to the latest rap artist. But that's irrelevant. Personal taste has no role in
judging
usability. We conduct
user
research with the target audience and empirically ascertain what works for them. That's how we derive our usability guidelines: by observing real users visiting real Web sites.
We have
tested
plenty of sites with young users, including children from 6 to 12
years
of age who do indeed like their sites flashier than traditional grown-up sites. The problem comes when a B2B site that sells, say, wood pallets uses a design that's more appropriate for kids than for seasoned warehouse managers.
In our testing with teenagers, we found that they like cool graphics and pay more attention to a Web site's visuals than adult users do. Still, the sites that our teen users rated the highest for
subjective
satisfaction were those with relatively modest, clean designs. They typically
marked
down overly glitzy sites as too difficult to use. Teenagers like to
do
stuff on the Web, and sites that are too slow or fancy inhibit that.
It's also a mistake to think that teens are so tech-savvy they can
overcome
any computer glitches. In contrast, we often found teens stumped by the same types of barriers to multimedia that get in the way of adult users.
Here are some quotes from users aged 14 to 17 from our teen study:
"You have to download it. I would go somewhere else because I don't have Acrobat Reader on my computer."
"Why do I need Acrobat Reader to see this page? Any Acrobat program is hard to get and it's expensive. Most people who go on here will not have it."
"For some of these
games
, you have to have Shockwave. My dad doesn't let me download anything. You have to download Shockwave,
especially
if you want to download music. You have to buy Shockwave to get it all."
"Sometimes I get impatient when things take too long to load. I hate the Shockwave player. It's annoying. It takes forever to load. Some [games] have Shockwave, some don't. You have to find the one that doesn't have it so it goes faster."
"I'm thinking this is a game and you have to download the Shockwave player. I'm doing other stuff because I don't want to sit there and watch it download. That's really boring."
As this last quote shows, teens frequently complained about sites that they found boring. Being boring is the kiss of death if you want to
attract
teens. That's one stereotype our research confirmed: Teenagers have a short attention span and want to be stimulated. That's also why they leave sites that are difficult to figure out. Remember that multimedia can be boring if it doesn't engage with users.
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Design for Your Audience's Connection Speed
Statistics show that almost half of Web users still have dial-up Internet access, especially at home. While this proportion is dropping as more and more users get broadband access, it's important to keep in mind that many of your site's users still have slow connection speeds.
Connections may be slow even in broadband situations, such as in wireless connections, or in educational institutions, where response times can be slow due to factors such as bandwidth sharing, servers, and filters. Many media files are big and take a long time to download. Even with broadband connections,
participants
in our studies complained about slow download times and often
abandoned
a site or video because it took too long to load.
Bottom line: Optimize file sizes and minimize loading time. Even if you have designed a useful and intuitive interface, long response times can doom your project.
Optimize file sizes and minimize loading time. Even if you have designed a useful and intuitive interface, long response times can doom your project.
Provide a Simple and Accurate Loading-Status Indicator
You can often minimize people's impatience during long downloads simply by having a status indicator to provide visual feedback. A well-designed indicator
reduces
the perceived loading time because people see the progress and know what to expect. Keep it simple. It's most helpful to show the actual percentage of data transferred (for example, "50% loaded") so that users can assess how much more time the download will take. Impatient users leave sites that don't provide adequate feedback, often
assuming
the site is down because the page appears frozen. If they can see that the site is working, they tend to wait longer.
The Audi site has an appropriate counter that runs quickly and
tells
people the percentage of data loaded.
www.audi.com
The information in this dialog box is vague and there's no animation or status indicator to let people know the system is working. It's
impossible
to tell how long the process will take or if the pictures are actually loading.
www.ebay.com
Travelocity doesn't have a status indicator. It's difficult to tell how long the process will take, but the twinkling stars give people some hope that the system is working. This is not a huge problem if the process is relatively quick. However, for long wait times, having an accurate indicator would minimize the perceived time, and people would be more likely to continue waiting.
www.travelocity.com
Underestimate Your Users' Technical Knowledge
People are much more apprehensive about technology than you might think. Most people veer away from downloading plug-ins and clicking on unknown elements for fear of viruses, and because they dislike the long downloads.
Don't count on people to download new plug-ins. Adults fear viruses, spyware, and spam. Some
schools
actually block students from accessing multimedia content or downloading plug-ins. Parents warn their children against downloading anything on the family computer, for fear of contaminating it. Some users also automatically assume that there is a charge to download plug-ins, even when they're free.
If there's a compelling reason to require a specific plug-in or software, choose one that's common on most machines. It takes time for people to upgrade their system to the latest versions of software. Pick a version that's one iteration behind in order to capture a broad audience. The best solution is to provide non-multimedia content alternatives to people who don't have the proper plug-ins.
Deceptive dialog boxes such as these make it difficult for people to distinguish between a
legitimate
and unscrupulous security message. With virus scares proliferating, it's not surprising that people are fearful of downloading anything from the Web. (Did you notice the subtle word "advertisement" in the lower right? Most users don't.)
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Our studies reveal that people are baffled by system-oriented terms such as
bandwidth, 56K modem, cable modem, HTML,
and
plug-in.
People who work in the computer industry or at design firms may think of these terms as everyday language. They are not. In general, avoid using technical terms in your interface (except when targeting computer professionals), along with design slang (except when targeting professional designers). Also avoid professional marketing expressions such as
opt-in
or
permission email,
or any other terminology that is common on your team but not among your user population.
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People are bewildered by security messages such as these. They're
concerned
about installing anything
harmful
but aren't sure whether the warning pertains to them. Some might install it in the hopes that nothing bad will happen; others might not take the chance and abandon the feature altogether.
http://automobiles.honda.com
(Facing page, bottom) People don't understand what messages like this mean. When people selected Play in the original window, they expected that the video would play automatically, not require them to commit to additional steps. To avoid messages like this getting in the way of your content, it's best to use file formats that are one or two versions behind the newest versions of the popular media players.
www.mtv.com
Detect Users' Bandwidth
Don't require your users to select the bandwidth; many don't know what that means or how to find out, or they're using a borrowed computer and don't know the system's bandwidth. Asked to select the player or bandwidth speed appropriate for the media they want to play, many participants simply guess.
Take the guesswork out of the equation by measuring the user's connection speed in the back end and setting a cookie value
accordingly
. Give people with slow connections functionality geared toward low-bandwidth users. People who have faster load times can better handle the more robust version. Unfortunately, automatic bandwidth detection is still difficult with current technology, so in most cases, you're still best off aiming for a lower common denominator. But in two instanceswhen download delays would pose a major problem for
narrowband
users, or when you'd gain substantial additional benefits from a "fat" version of the application for broadband usersit's worth the additional effort.
Most users don't know the difference between QuickTime and Windows Media Player. Even
worse
, this site abbreviates these terms, making them more obscure. It's better to remove the guesswork from the interface and let people see videos without having to select
mysterious
settings.
www.bellagio.com
The video options on this page are overwhelming and too technical for average users, who don't know what 480p, 720p, and 1080p mean or how those
numbers
pertain to them. The "p" stands for progressive scan video, but this is too technical for people to know. The file
size
indicators might give people a clue, but they still don't tell people which format works best on their system.
www.apple.com
People expect videos to play without them having to choose between options that are meaningless to them. If you offer different video sizes, it's best to identify them with simple words such as "big" and "small" because they refer to a concrete and observable aspect of making the choice. It also helps to tell users that the small version downloads the quickest.
This splash page reminds
viewers
that they must have a specific screen resolution setting and have pop-up blockers disabled in order to access the site. This implementation is
problematic
for several reasons. First, most users won't even notice the message (as the instructions are in tiny
letters
and difficult to read). If they do notice it, they probably won't understand what it means. Then, too, many people don't know how to change their settings. Finally, a majority of people have pop-up blockers installed and won't even be able to access this site. Better to have a flexible design that works on most reasonable settings.
www.miniusa.com
