Earlier this week the Department of Energy (DOE) launched its new web site and I have to say, I’m very impressed!

In comparison to the online presence of the majority of government agencies, Energy has taken the best of Web 2.0 and successfully applied that philosophy to the way they present themselves to the public.  The end result is an open and intuitive web site that clearly and powerfully communicates DOE’s mission and the diverse range of vitally important energy projects the agency oversees. Additionally, the use of several social media platforms to connect and engage with DOE, and their urging of the public at large to actively participate, is what truly gives the site its Web 2.0 ethos.

Clear navigation, transparent headings for their sub-pages, plenty of white space and clearly defined information areas (via layout and design) all contribute to the openness and clarity of the site.

The prominent positioning of the blog entry on the Home page and the various social media pathways open to the public to engage with the Department of Energy, especially via Energy Secretary Steven Chu’s Facebook Page, as well as Twitter, You Tube and Flickr accounts, speaks to their willingness to connect with the American public.

Finally, the use of localization and segmentation tools via their “More From Energy” and “I Am” sections, gives any visitor the ability to quickly get to the information they want to access.

All in all, a fantastic site.

You can tell from the comments around this Government Executive article that some folks find it laughable that a Fed agency is trying to make something more usable. But I say kudos for the effort and the approach. From the article:

Nicole Burton, user experience evangelist at the GSA Office of Customer Service Excellence who helps manage the program, says although the tests aren’t statistically significant, the most serious problems are fixed, and the technique improves customer service. Burton and her team did not have to purchase any new technology or equipment to launch the program. She says usability testing can be carried out with the technology available in most modern offices.

So it’s not a full blown usability survey or user experience design undertaking; they’re not saying it is. It can still be useful, as Ms. Burton explains. With no acquisition process or contractor expense, GSA is helping other agencies tackle big usability issues and improving customer service. How can you make fun of that?

Not every website tweak needs huge time, effort, or expense. Grab a copy of Don’t Make Me Think and see what you can do to improve user experience on your site. Or, if you’re swamped, give me a call.

Usability expert Steve Krug just rolled through DC to conduct his one-day website usability testing seminar. I attended along with about 35 other folks who love to discuss the placement and colors of buttons. We’re a rare breed perhaps. Most of our discussion and the shared examples centered around e-commerce and marketing websites, which I guess is to be expected. The folks that get really hyper about creating a very usable website are those who make money with that website. Better bring in the usability experts before you lose a sale, right?

Do owners of other types of sites give usability some, if not equal, attention? Do government agencies worry about the usability of their sites? They don’t sell, but they do have a mission to meet. They provide information or push an agenda for the public good. And they serve the government itself. Take USAJobs.gov as an example. The big story these days is the retiring government work force and the challenge associated with hiring the new breed. Well if USAJobs is a pain to use (and I’m not saying it is), then there go your applicants. Want to fight rising health care costs? Then let’s make sure Health.gov is easy to use.

The mission for government agency websites is to make information easily available, or to persuade viewers to take a certain action. So purchases may not be on the line, but usability should still be a concern. Why make the effort, and spend the money, to stand up a site that your audience can’t easily use? No matter the scope of your web effort, focus on usability from the early stages of design and information architecture, and then conduct usability testing during the production process. As Steve showed us, it doesn’t have to be expensive or derail the time line; on the contrary, usability testing can both save money and keep a web design project on track.

Oh, the humble hyperlink, oft scrapped for the reflective button or chiseled folder tag. Once bright and blue, and underlined just for good measure, the text link has become a victim of design. And it’s hurting usability. I admit I’m a victim, but I’m trying hard to fight the power. Here’s what we designers say:

“That gaudy blue hyperlink color doesn’t work in this design! I have dust blue tabs and a buoyant green reflective button here…man, let’s make the hyperlink fit in with this.”

And before you know it, the hyperlink is so meshed with the page design that you can’t find it—and guess what? It’s not useable, clickable, actionable if I can’t find it! Check out this page from AT&T (note, a big-shot company, not some teenager’s MySpace page).

Now tell me, when you are ready to drop the five large for that smartphone, what do you do? I swear, despite the big “Buy it Now!” message, I scrolled to the bottom of the page looking for the link that would let me make the purchase. That color-themed “Buy it Now”? That’s no link, people, that’s a heading. Sure, I realized that after a second, but why make is tricky like that? Now I feel foolish and blog with scorn!

Listen, AT&T isn’t the only culprit. In fact, our company, Mind & Media, is prepping to launch a redesigned website that, among other things, addresses that same problem. We are (were) pretty much a two-color company, as is AT&T. They’re blue and orange, and we’re purple and teal. It’s tough to agree on a hyperlink color in a rigid style guide like that.

Like AT&T’s main page, M&M’s uses one company color for headings and one for links. But then you have subpages and subheadings, and here come the design issues faster than handcuffs after curfew. The choice is either stick with standard bright blue for links, which I just can’t do (I DID say I’m a designer), or inject something new. We went with option two, and you’ll see it soon enough. So c’mon, AT&T, companies, and designers everywhere, make an effort to create usable sites. Make those links easy to find. You might get more folks buying and fewer sweating the hyperlink.

For further reading on usable sites and even the humble hyperlink, check out Coding Horror. I read his much-dugg post from yesterday, and I’m sure that’s what got me churning. Cheers.

NextStage Evolution/Global founder Joseph Carrabis blogs a lot about website usability and design. In his latest post he drops the lowdown about how our brains are wired to point our eyes wherever other folks are pointing theirs. Here’s the explanation why:

The reason this little game works is because human beings started off as herd and prey animals. Not only that, we were secretive little creatures for several million years of evolutionary history and all of this makes itself known in how our brains are wired to respond to, internalize and use information in our environment.

Our ancestors had to be constantly on guard for lions, tigers and bears. If Og the caveman was talking with me and suddenly looked over my shoulder, he might be seeing a predator. That was extremely useful information to our ancestors, so following Og’s gaze and looking where he looked was a good survival skill.

The point of his article was to explain how selection and placement of photos on a webpage (or in any media) can affect the user’s experience and actions. If you include a photo of people on your site, our eyes follow theirs! So where are they looking? I think good designers are aware of that, whether they know it or not. They can just feel the way the page is working.

Now that Mind & Media is setting up content management systems (CMS) for clients, I couldn’t help but draw a connection between Joseph’s article and the ease of editing a CMS. Certainly a huge advantage of a CMS is that any layperson, with almost zero training, can add or edit website content. It’s a tremendous way to speed site development!

However, while that may be great for dissemination of information, it could be detrimental to promoting message or inspiring action. What you see as snapshots of the latest networking event could actually be steering users away from your “Join Now!” button. The ability to easily edit a page does not equate to the ability to effectively design a page. So think about your purpose.

If your purpose is to quickly spread information, particularly to an audience that is eager to get to it, then a blog or other CMS may be great for you. If your purpose is to convince, persuade, sell, or motivate, then a properly composed page, or precisly cropped and placed photo, could be the difference between your audience’s eyes being drawn to your call to action or away from your site entirely.

I recently read about the legal action taken by the National Federation of the Blind against Target for having an inaccessible website. Web accessibility refers to the practice of making webpages understandable to people with disabilities. They have to use a wide range of user agent devices instead of standard Web browsers. This case has been with the California District Court for more than a year, and was recently granted class-action status.

The World Wide Web revolutionized how people get information—but it doesn’t always work well for everyone. As Communication Architects, we need to be sensitive to the needs of those with disabilities—and respond with various techniques that make our websites more accessible.

With our government clients, Web accessibility isn’t just an option—it’s the law.

In 1973, Congress passed the Rehabilitation Act, which guarantees:

No qualified individual with a disability in the United States…shall, solely by reason of her or his disability, be excluded from the participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance or under any program or activity conducted by any Executive agency or by the United States Postal Service.

Section 508 is a 1998 amendment to the Workforce Rehabilitation Act of 1973 requiring electronic and information technology developed or purchased by the federal government be accessible by people with disabilities. This amendment created binding, enforceable standards that were incorporated into the Federal Procurement procedures complete with compliancy procedure and reporting requirements.

While accessibility tends to get attention in the government world—via Section 508—it should be on every organization’s mind.

The ruling by the California District Court has made it painfully obvious for Target! Making sites accessible takes more time and effort, effort that is often not seen in the final site, but is still important for all audiences.

What remains to be seen is how this case will affect the future of Web accessibility. Will accessibility get the attention it deserves in the corporate world, or will it go into settlement without a final court decision?

Let me know where you think this will go and what you think needs to be done to bring more attention to the world of Web accessibility and 508 compliancy.

Friday I spent most of the day at User Focus, the UPA DC metro chapter’s second annual conference. In their words, the conference was:

A one day exchange of ideas and experiences that demonstrate the value of usability in successful design.

It was that indeed. I really liked it. Small, close to home, and full of attendees working in the area. Understandably, it was good for networking, but it was also notable for the focus of the presentations.

Unlike national events in which you might hear top-tier media firms brag about pushing the limits of Web design and interactivity, the attendees and presenters were talking about issues facing organizations in this area, namely federal government and nonprofits.

How, for example, do you make the two-million-page Census.gov site easy to navigate? Can nonprofits better serve their members via well-designed online social networks? Topics maybe not have been sexy, but they are real and applicable to the folks I work with and the clients we serve.

I also have to give a shout to Ovo Studios, one of the few vendors set up at User Focus. Their usability testing suite was cool for sure. What impressed me is that they offer their software on a lease-to-own basis, Ovo by the Pound. That means small Web design/development companies can offer some pretty high-end usability testing and reporting without having to drop huge dollars up front on software and training. For those of us working fee-for-service, that’s awesome. We can write those services into our proposals and afford to execute them no matter how infrequently they’re purchased.

Yesterday Smashing magazine dropped a long post titled 30 Usability Issues to Be Aware Of. It seemed to go on and on, honestly, but there were a couple terms that jumped out at me. Here they are with their definitions:

User-centered design (UCD)
User-centered design is a design philosophy in which users, their needs, interests and behavior define the foundation of web-site in terms of site structure, navigation and obtaining the information. UCD is considered as a standard approach for modern web-applications, particularly due to the rise of user generated content. In Web 2.0 visitors have to be motivated to participate and therefore need conditions optimized for their needs.

Walk-Up-And-Use Design
A Walk-up-and-use design is self-explanatory and intuitive, so that first-time or one-time users can use it effectively without any prior introduction or training.

Is it just me, or shouldn’t those two definitions simply fall under the heading “website design”? Why must those ideas be singled out like alternatives or options? Why not have an entry called Crap Design? Crap Design is creating a site without regarding site visitors intent on accomplishing something. Try to avoid crap design. The site you’re creating is not for you, it’s for your users. Build it for them.

Here’s a usability challenge for you:

Build a site for an audience who can’t read. My five-year-old can recognize just a few words, but damn if she can’t find her way around a couple of kid game sites (noggin and pbskids) with little to no difficulty! It’s amazing to me. No directions, no instructions, just intuitive design. Sometimes I just sit and watch her and try to learn from the site layouts.

They got it right for sure. She showed up to play games and they made it easy for her. We could learn some lesson there, eh? No matter what you call it.