User Experience

Good websites are built with users in mind first. You want your website to be clear and easy to use. Your visitors need to find what they’re looking for without getting confused and leaving. That means it’s very important to know a little bit about what types of people will visit your site.

Learning Task

Activity

Take a minute to think about what types of visitors you expect at your site. You won’t get it perfectly right, but try to come up with a general idea. Once your site is live, you’ll be able to use real data for this.

Answer questions like:

  • How tech savvy are your users?
  • Will they use a computer or mobile device?
  • Will they visit the site for quick answers, or take time to peruse? (Remember: think about what they will do, not what you hope they do.)
  • What are their demographics? (e.g. age, gender, race, economic background, etc.)

User Experience Principles

Learning Tasks

Extra Resources

Learn by Observing

One of the best ways to see what works best is to use other websites. You can probably think of a time you got frustrated or impatient while using a poorly designed site. On the other hand, the best web experiences are probably harder to remember, because they make things quick and simple.

Activity

Take some time to look at a few websites, and note their positive and negative features. Look for websites that have similar purposes to yours. For example, if you own a coffee shop, look at other local coffee shops’ sites.

Adopt the mindset of a customer/visitor. Try to find information like business hours, pricing, or a bio. Answer these questions:

  • Did you easily find what you were looking for?
  • Was anything confusing or hard to use?
  • Would you return to this site, or try to accomplish your goal elsewhere (like the business’s social media, or a competitor’s site)?
Example Websites

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