Recently they've launched Themes for GMail, the placement of information was prominent on the page, catches the user attention,Usable enough. But, when the user clicks on the 'Hide' and tries to revisit the Themes at a later time he/she has a mental load to figure out from where to access it.After spending a couple of minutes frantically searching for the link on the GMail, realizes that it could be under 'Settings', lands on the 'Settings' page and starts scrolling down the page to look at the term called Themes, doesn't find it.Finally, a smart colleague sitting next to him shows the Themes link on top of the page clubbed alongwith other links. The typical Usability problem here is the Placement, it's obvious to have it as top link,but lacks the prominence hence loses the Users' attention. Users would look for the information bang on page, rather than going through the navigation,because the teaching has not happened yet.Best way to teach users about a new feature is to display a call-out sort of message above/below the link which would improve the prominence to a great extent.
To support the above observation, I have done the User Testing with few colleagues of mine,including myself, we were actually scrolling down the page to look for 'Themes'.
Don't make users think!
Posts
3 comments:
But this is subject to question that Google actually wants to highlight the "themes" functionality. Google has traditionally has been known to keep its focus on the main functionality avoiding any distractions. e.g. google search interface.
so sometimes usability is entirely contextual, does not have to be enforced every time.
I acquiesce, but let's not forget that they made the effort to create the new functionality and also prompting the user to use the feature,then they better follow the Usability.And following Usability will not harm in no way :)
Really nice post... I completely agree with you.... I somewhat agree to the point mentioned by ""Devils" as well.... But at the same time, Google can use your points for a certain period of time when they release any new functionality & then again shift that to any new functionality released.....
Yesterday only I was wondering about the Mute function provide.... You have to break your head to know what the hell this Mute means.... In-fact after Muting it you don't know what to do for unMuting it........
Google could have given a short help on the same..... Anyway.... who knows... sometime they will Mute this feature.... ;-)
Regards
Navrang
Post a Comment