Web Usability

Say

Monday, August 13, 2007

Mission Driven Navigation

Most of the designers and developers design websites with the option to give users the option to:
1) Move anywhere from everywhere
2) Highlighting main sections of the websites
making each page a traffic junction to move anywhere using the navigation signs.

When user goes into a particular website,they browse the website having a specific goal or mission in mind.
According to Jakob Nielsen
"For almost seven years, my studies have shown the same user behavior: users look straight at the content and ignore the navigation areas when they scan a new page."

"if a page does not appear relevant to the user's current goals, then the user will ruthlessly click the Back button…"

This tells that every page has some purpose to serve and its goal driven.
User comes on it with a goal in mind and this goal drives the kind of navigation they prefer.Either they click on link or click back button to take another option.

In Mark Hurst's opinion designers put too much effort into content organisation and design of navigation systems. Organising a site into sections and subsections does not by itself create a good user experience. What matters is whether users can quickly and easily advance to the next step in the pursuit for their goal.
He suggests a three step strategy to design for the click-link-or-hit-back-button behaviour:

a) Identify users' goals on each page
b) De-emphasize or remove any page elements (or areas of a site) that don't help to accomplish the goal
c) Emphasize (or insert) those links, forms, or other elements that either take users closer to their goal, or finally accomplish it.

Mark Hurst also strikes a blow against consistency. In his opinion, it's silly to add navigation elements to a page just because it's consistent with the rest of the site. Consistency should not be the ruling principle. He encourages designers to instead focus on the users' goals and the flow they go through to get there.