Being an online marketer I see a fair number of clients that have just spent time and money developing a website that looks pretty but is not delivering the content as and when the user needs it. Most sites play on the visual as an attempt to reduce content and excite with cleaver use of the technology. Sadly the truth of the matter is users are really not willing to sit through a couple of minutes of animation to get the information they wanted.
Below I have compiled a few quotes that really bring home the importance of the user within the design
“While I acknowledge that there is a need for art, fun, and a general good time on the web, I believe that the main goal of most web projects should be to make it easy for customers to perform useful tasks.” – Designing Web Usability by Jakob Nielsen
“As designers we must remember that behaviour comes first. Always. The quirky, the obscure, the vain, the annoying, the wonderful. We need to observe human behaviour if we are to support it in design.” – Joshua Porter
“Great design is storytelling at its finest; it is insightful, sincere and evokes emotion and change. Design is at the centre of the user experience and it is the designer’s responsibility to make the experience remarkable for both the client and their audience.” – Jim Antonopoulos
“A design is intuitive when people just know what to do and they don’t have to go through any training to get there… When a design is not intuitive, our attention moves away from what we’re trying to accomplish to how we can get the interface to accomplish what we want.” – Jared Spool
“Identify where conversations are taking place and participate in a non-obtrusive way” – Karl Camenzuli on developing a social media strategy
