10 January 2012
A website is a window into how your organization is run. Users assume that if you cut corners on your website, you also cut corners with your products and services. When users feel smart and sophisticated on your website, they tend to stick around. When users feel stupid, their blood pressure goes up, their heart rate increases, and they get a little hot under the collar. This visceral negative reaction begins to harm trust and brand perception almost immediately.

Print Design vs. Web Design

Everyone knows how to turn pages in a brochure. Clicking links on a website, however, can take nearly any form (depending on the whims of the designer).

While there is a surface similarity between print graphic design and website graphic design, website design is much closer to product or industrial design than print design.

There are many popular websites that are just plain ugly, but highly functional. There are very few popular websites that are beautiful but hard to use. In eCommerce the stakes are particularly high. eCommerce websites that are not highly usable go out of business in a matter of weeks.

For these reasons, usability should not be an afterthought in website design. Testing and fixing a website after it has been built is inefficient and expensive. It is also unlikely to produce the best results.

The benefits of planning usability into your project from the start are:

Increased user satisfaction, which translates directly to trust and brand loyalty
Increased user productivity, success, and completion (and sales)
Reduced long-term development costs (costs incurred from fixing design mistakes)
Reduced training and support costs
Word of mouth, social media, and other free marketing
Positive press coverage
A higher rate of repeat customers, which improves your competitiveness