Article

Web Usability Guidelines Remain The Same

Written by David Cradduck

Topic: Internet MarketingPublished October 13, 2013
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You will be surprised to know that most web usability guidelines that are in place today have remained the same and valid for decades. It is an impressive fact that currently the web holds 120 million sites. So you might wonder why guidelines have changed so little. There are three possible ...You will be surprised to know that most web usability guidelines that are in place today have remained the same and valid for decades. It is an impressive fact that currently the web holds 120 million sites. So you might wonder why guidelines have changed so little. There are three possible explanations for this: Designer’s exhibit restraint: This means that a design element may remain an issue in principle; however, web designers tend to avoid the most obnoxious forms. This results in elements that cause fewer problems. Designers tend to stick with what works, while implementing small variations over time. Behavioral adaptations: Since people get accustomed to a particular interaction or technique, they learn to adapt their behavior. This results in users being able to easily learn and use Landing page design. Improvements in technology: Improved browsers and other beefed up technologies along with faster bandwidth make new ideas easier to digest. Once the calculations are done, it can be found that 80 percent of web usability landing page conversion from the 1990s are still potential or current problems today. But 80% of those still result in a fair performance. There have been quite a lot of books and articles written on website usability guidelines. The fact is that when you compare all the books that were based on the usability guidelines of the past, most of the methods or guidelines still seem to be valid today. User interface is actually nothing new, the web is new, and web sites are new, but the basic rules still apply. When you consider current usability guidelines that are written for the web, you can easily come to the conclusion that these guidelines are not likely to change much, even in the future. Computers and user habits are changing at increasingly faster levels but interface design rules seem to remain intact. Some changes will influence usability guidelines, but around 90% of them are likely to remain in place. It is quite remarkable that the usability guidelines have remained stable for decades. The main reason behind this is that most of the guidelines are based on human characteristics which have generally remained unchanged. Usability guidelines have hardly been revised in years. Each time there are new studies the guidelines of the past are usually reconfirmed as being applicable today. Guidelines that are thought to be new discoveries usually turn out to be small adaptations of guidelines that have existed all along.

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About the Author

David Cradduck is a freelancer blogger and working with small and enterprise marketing company.