An Interface for the Masses
In most respects, we are experts at siteMighty functionality, but there are some new territories we are entering as we develop an interface for the masses. We believe that interfaces and software, for the most part, should be dead simple. So, interacting with siteMighty should be easy and intuitive, but the easier we make it for our users, the harder our job becomes. As with most things, though, it all comes down to common sense (or at least our common senses).
Think of siteMighty the same way you think about blogging software (i.e. Wordpress, Blogger, etc.). siteMighty is a platform on which affiliate marketing sites can be built, and because every site can’t look the same, we have to offer templates to meet the differing tastes and needs of our users. The first thing we’ve realized is that although our templates need to be highly designed (look really great), they also need to appeal to a broad range of tastes. At first this seemed like a monumental task, but then we realized that truly attractive templates will appeal to most everyone.
How do we make our templates beautiful?
We start by standardizing design. We like to keep things simple, so each template basically has three elements: a header, navigation menu & body of the page. With siteMighty the only things that change substantially from template to template are the headers. Over the top of the headers, users are able to name their sites and create taglines (slogans) for their sites. This is simple text that is dropped on top of the header, so in standardizing the design, we need to figure out which font will look the most attractive, including the size and color of the font. We also have to decide where the name and slogan should be placed on the header. Should they be centered, or aligned to the left, or to the right for that matter? These are decisions that we are making on behalf of our users. While in most cases limiting choice is a bad thing, we feel that limiting the options for the user helps them get what we’re offering and feel comfortable when first experiencing the interface. This also helps us because an easy system encourages users to keep using our application.
Making sense. Our rules for design.
Offering a rich user experience means that the user is going to face a barrage of options in the application, but there are levels of priority that the user approaches in dealing with things that need to be dealt with right away and over-and-over, and those things that need to be accessed once in a while. What the heck am I talking about? Here an example to help clarify my point:
Cookie crumb navigation: Also called bread crumb navigation, this is a series of links that offer a point of reference for the user when they are in the application. For instance, you navigate from the home page, to the about us page, to the contact us page. The cookie crumbs would look like this: Home > About Us > Contact Us. This is an important element, but not something that needs to scream at the user. Therefore, we make it small, and use light colors (usually gray).
The bottom line is that we don’t need or want bells and whistles and animations to make our interface successful. We just need things to make sense. In siteMighty, you see a link, you know it’s a link and you know where that link will take you before you click it. Also, you know what’s important and what’s less important at a glance.
This still seems like an introduction. I’ll get some screenshots together and post more examples of what we’re talking about here. bk