Archive | Usability

05 September 2007 ~ 27 Comments

“Eyetracking, Heatmaps & Gaze Plots!” Oh My…

All you heatmap lovers out there, Uncle Jakob (Nielsen) has a great new post for you. Today’s Alertbox features a topic near and dear to the Grok’s heart: the overuse of fancy words in Web copy. These “dollar words” are truly excellent… at going over your audiences’ heads while keeping them from accomplishing their goals […]

Continue Reading

23 July 2007 ~ 6 Comments

Better “Usability” Isn’t Always the Answer

About a month ago, I had the opportunity to speak to a group of Usability professionals. The theme of my talk was getting them to raise the bar within their industry; to become true advocates for consumers like they should be. Yes, consumers, not “users”. B2B, b2C, self-service, e-commerce, video, web2.0, no matter the focus […]

Continue Reading

14 May 2007 ~ 9 Comments

Jakob Nielsen on Everyone’s Favorite Buzzword: “Web 2.0”

From Today’s BBC, as pointed out by Jakob himself in his newsletter (emphasis mine): Sadly, said Mr Nielsen, the rush to embrace Web 2.0 technology meant that many firms were turning their back on the basics. “They should get the basics right first,” he said. “Sadly most websites do not have those primary things right.“ […]

Continue Reading

25 April 2007 ~ 5 Comments

Speed Test: Which Landing Page Element Should Load First?

Apparently, Verizon Wireless doesn’t always keep up with GrokDotCom. (Bryan recently explained the impact of optimizing your images for a fast load time. ) I’d just logged in to pay my bill, and what did I notice? Kinda hard to pay your bill when the “login” button never shows up, eh?

Continue Reading