* A follow-up test unveils a problem with Socializr
In the last issue of the Web Applications Newsletter I wrote about a service called Socializr, which is designed for inviting people to events and coordinating their responses.
After I had tested the service for the newsletter, I tried another test by inviting my family over for Sunday dinner. By Sunday I realized that there are some issues with the design of Socializr that make it less effective than it could be.
The big problem was that most of the invitees didn’t notice the RSVP box on the page that the link in the invite message took them to. This is a relatively simple interface design problem but one that is all too common online: Too much window dressing that distracts from the part of the content that is the real call to action.
There’s also the issue that many sites expect too much of the user. If the user is a computer science graduate then they will probably be able to navigate their way around pretty much any reasonably sensible user interface you throw at them. But what of the less computer savvy user?
My mother-in-law, Patsy, can send and receive e-mail and browse the Web but there’s way too much content on the Internet that just isn’t part of her world and simply puts her off. When I asked her (by e-mail) about why she didn’t accept the Socializr invitation through the Web site she replied:
“It was because your mother-in-law is in the weeds. I liked the invitation, pushed a random button and when it seemed I was signing up for their services, I got scared and fled. Remember I grew up before TV, didn’t have a telephone until I was out on my own and when I was a kid, we stood in empty fields to watch small airplanes take people up for a ride…a precursor to Disneyland. You might say expecting me to respond appropriately is like attempting to saddle a brontosaurus.”
My sister-in-law who is in her twenties and very competent online commented “I clicked view and didn’t have the option to respond. That is why I e-mailed you instead. If there was an option, I couldn’t find it.”
I still think that Socializr has huge potential, but whether the Socializr people didn’t bother to do user acceptability testing or whether they asked the wrong people when they did they obviously have a problem. And as I said earlier, they aren’t alone.
The audience for your Web application is probably broader in computer skills and age than you assume. Whenever you make assumptions about how users will respond to your service rather than conducting real world tests you will make mistakes that will cause you to loose traction and you won’t know why. In this case, Socializr may not know that they have a problem unless they read this newsletter.
