Defeated By a Dialog Box

Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox for July 23 is now online at:
  > http://www.useit.com/alertbox/dialog-box.html
		
Summary:
Interaction techniques that deviate from common GUI standards can create
usability catastrophes that make applications impossible to use.
		
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User Experience 2007 conference

  > Barcelona, November 4-9
  > Las Vegas, December 2-7

31 full-day tutorials
2 keynote presentations: e-commerce, the state of usability

Full program:
  > http://www.nngroup.com/events

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CASE STUDIES WANTED: MEASURABLE IMPACT OF DESIGN CHANGES

I am collecting examples of metrics that quantify the impact of
design changes. If you have data you are willing to share, please
email John Berger at [email protected] 

Any type of user interface is of interest: websites, intranets,
applications, mobile devices, etc. Also, the design changes may refer to a
complete redesign of the total UI or it could just be a single feature,
screen, or design element that was changed.

Measures of interest include anything that measures how usage changed.
That often means an improvement, but data that documents negative results
are just as interesting.

Example metrics:
  * conversion rate 
  * total e-commerce sales in dollars and/or units 
  * size of average "sales basket" for e-commerce 
  * training time needed to learn a feature or system 
  * sign-up rate for newsletters or other desired action
  * lead-generation
  * time on task and other productivity measures 
  * subjective satisfaction scores 
  * average page views and/or duration of visit per user
  * returning visitor traffic
  * frequency of return visits 
  * number of times a feature was used 
  * percentage of users who bail out at a certain step 
  * number of calls to help desks or tech support 
  * learning or comprehension scores 
  * other usage or impact metrics,
    including new ones you have invented yourself 

For whatever metrics you have collected, please send both the "BEFORE" and
the "AFTER" number as well as a short description of the kind of system
you were measuring and the type of change made to the design. If you can
send us before/after screenshots, so much the better (whether or not you
will allow us to publish the screens), but we are also interested in data
where you cannot send screens.

We can keep your contribution TOTALLY ANONYMOUS and purely report your
numbers as statistics that don't include any indication of what company or
design they refer to. Of course, we will give you full credit if you are
willing to be named. Also, if you send us screenshots, please indicate
whether we should treat the screens as confidential info or whether you
will allow us to publish the images. (Feel free to "sanitize" screenshots
by erasing confidential info.)

All contributors will get a free copy of the report with the
full set of metrics.

If you can help in this project to document the range of measurable
effects from user interface redesigns, please contact John Berger
([email protected]).
John can also answer any questions you may have about this project.

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GOOD AMAZON, BAD AMAZON

Amazon.com continues with outstanding use of confirmation email to sustain
customer relationships and long-term loyalty. A week ago, I got an email
from them confirming that they were going to ship the new Harry Potter
book to me with arrival on the publication date.

Considering that many fans pre-ordered the book many months ago, it was
good to remind them that they had it coming from Amazon. Otherwise they
might go out and buy it (again) elsewhere, which would lead to expensive
returns and reduced customer satisfaction.

More on best practices for confirmation email:
  > http://www.nngroup.com/reports/confirmation

Sadly, Amazon is falling behind on page-level usability. Even though web
usability may be less important than email usability for long-term
customer loyalty, it will cost them in the short term.

The latest problem is increasingly long response times that significantly
surpass the guidelines for page download times (ideally below 1 second for
users on broadband connections). It's very slow to browse around Amazon
because of the excessive amount of stuff on their pages. Sluggish pages
again make users less willing to explore and look into additional
purchases.

Response time limits for websites and applications:
  > http://www.useit.com/papers/responsetime.html
	
Amazon can afford to lose incremental and inspirational sales because it's
still the preferred fulfillment channel when people know what they want.
But it would be better for them to speed up their site.
	
Why Amazon is no longer the role model for e-commerce:
  > http://www.useit.com/alertbox/20050725.html

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Celebrating HARRY POTTER WEEK: time for a rerun

"In the Future, We'll All Be Harry Potter"
  > http://www.useit.com/alertbox/20021209.html

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VISITING DENMARK

I am speaking in Copenhagen in October.

More info:

  > http://www.intrateam.dk