Articles

  • 10 Usability Heuristics for User Interface Design

    January 1, 1995 | Article: 2 minutes to read

    Jakob Nielsen's 10 general principles for interaction design. They are called "heuristics" because they are broad rules of thumb and not specific usability guidelines.

    When to Use Which User-Experience Research Methods

    October 12, 2014 | Article: 8 minutes to read

    Modern day UX research methods answer a wide range of questions. To know when to use which method, each of 20 methods is mapped across 3 dimensions and over time within a typical product-development process.

    Usability 101: Introduction to Usability

    January 4, 2012 | Article: 4 minutes to read

    What is usability? How, when, and where to improve it? Why should you care? Overview answers basic questions + how to run fast user tests.

    10 Best Intranets of 2017

    January 7, 2017 | Article: 5 minutes to read

    The winners of our 16th Intranet Design Annual came from diverse industries and relied on a combination of internal resources and external intranet help.

    Open-Ended vs. Closed-Ended Questions in User Research

    May 22, 2016 | Article: 4 minutes to read

    Open-ended questions prompt people to answer with sentences, lists, and stories, giving deeper and new insights. Closed-ended questions limit the answers but give tighter stats.

    Design Thinking 101

    July 31, 2016 | Article: 6 minutes to read

    What is design thinking and why should you care? History and background plus a quick overview and visualization of 6 phases of the design thinking process. Approaching problem solving with a hands-on, user-centric mindset leads to innovation, and innovation can lead to differentiation and a competitive advantage.

    Mobile: Native Apps, Web Apps, and Hybrid Apps

    September 14, 2013 | Article: 6 minutes to read

    Native and hybrid apps are installed in an app store, whereas web apps are mobile-optimized webpages that look like an app. Both hybrid and web apps render HTML web pages, but hybrid apps use app-embedded browsers to do that.

    F-Shaped Pattern For Reading Web Content

    April 17, 2006 | Article: 2 minutes to read

    Eyetracking visualizations show that users often read Web pages in an F-shaped pattern: two horizontal stripes followed by a vertical stripe.

    When and How to Create Customer Journey Maps

    July 31, 2016 | Article: 6 minutes to read

    Journey maps combine two powerful instruments—storytelling and visualization—in order to help teams understand and address customer needs.

    Why You Only Need to Test with 5 Users

    March 19, 2000 | Article: 5 minutes to read

    Elaborate usability tests are a waste of resources. The best results come from testing no more than 5 users and running as many small tests as you can afford.

    Design a Brilliant SharePoint Intranet

    February 21, 2016 | Article: 10 minutes to read

    SharePoint requires install plus in-depth UX design and development. Forge strong relationship with SharePoint UX designers and developers for successful intranets. And take advice from winning teams who have made SharePoint an effective enterprise tool.

    Top 10 Mistakes in Web Design

    January 1, 2011 | Article: 7 minutes to read

    The ten most egregious offenses against users. Web design disasters and HTML horrors are legion, though many usability atrocities are less common than they used to be.

    The Most Hated Online Advertising Techniques

    June 4, 2017 | Article: 9 minutes to read

    Modal ads, ads that reorganize content, and autoplaying video ads were among the most disliked. Ads that are annoying on desktop become intolerable on mobile.

    Website Forms Usability: Top 10 Recommendations

    May 1, 2016 | Article: 6 minutes to read

    Follow these well-established — but frequently ignored — UX design guidelines to ensure users can successfully complete your website forms.

    How Users Read on the Web

    October 1, 1997 | Article: 3 minutes to read

    Users don't read Web pages, they scan. Highlighting and concise writing improved measured usability 47-58%. Marketese imposed a cognitive burden on users and was disliked.

    UX Research Cheat Sheet

    February 12, 2017 | Article: 9 minutes to read

    User research can be done at any point in the design cycle. This list of methods and activities can help you decide which to use when.

    How to Conduct a Heuristic Evaluation

    January 1, 1995 | Article: 12 minutes to read

    Heuristic evaluation involves having a small set of evaluators examine the interface and judge its compliance with recognized usability principles (the "heuristics"). Adherence to specific methods can improve the outcome of an heuristic evaluation.

    Placeholders in Form Fields Are Harmful

    May 11, 2014 | Article: 5 minutes to read

    Labels or sample text inside a form field makes it difficult for people to remember what information belongs in that field once they start data entry.