Usability and Design Pitfalls  -  December 9, 2008

Usability plays a very important part when designing. Today I will be highlighting some issues with website design that can affect the usability of the targeted audience. Some of the bellow flaws are simple problems such as, link and header colours but it is surprising to see how many designers forget to incorporate simple ideas that can help aid a user experience.

Bellow are common pitfalls and solutions to these problems.

No Imagery
Take a magazine cover for instance, if a magazine cover does not include any images how would it attract its audience? Images play a vital role within the design and usability stages of any website development. Images can sometimes be used to explain a given problem easily without using paragraphs of text. Imagery can also be used to gain the viewers attention, so images can manipulate the end users experience.
Too Much text
Usability has changed over time, broadband usage is a lot higher since the introduction of wireless devices. With this in mind, bandwidth is much greater so creating a more fulfilled website using multimedia won’t hurt your viewer’s experience. End users can get bored of the same formatted text and may leave as a result. Colour, imagery can help to eliminate this problem.
Colours
Colours play a large role in any website design. Using the wrong colour scheme or choice of colours can affect the website dramatically. For example using a white background with yellow text is not considered good practise. Try to adopt a dark on light approach or visa versa when using colour. Using different coloured links and headings can help to break text based content apart, this will also help usability because end users can quickly find what they are looking for, certain blog posts, external links and so forth.
Interfacing
Interfaces should be clear and incorporate some sort of interactivity; by getting the balance right the end user can find what they wish quickly and enjoy the experience in the process. Roll over images for main menus and JavaScript frameworks can help to add dynamic and modern touches to your design. But compatibility is a massive problem when adopting such approaches.

S.Whiston,  Web Design

daviess at 6:20 pm

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