Saw an interesting complaint from danidraws on Twitter this morning:
Artist’s website took FOUR clicks before I got to see any artwork. Grrr…
This kind of reminds me of that Tootsie Roll commercial that asked how many licks it took to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop. Mr. Owl took three licks before he gave up and bit into the Tootsie pop.
How many clicks are your customers going to take before they give up and leave?
Sometimes in the interest of keeping things neat and organized on our websites or because of how online store software is built, we end up putting our artwork in numerous categories and sub-categories, and sub-sub categories divided according to medium, style, product line, price, and however else you can categorize something.
The result can be a labrynth of web pages that hopefully leads to your artwork at the end. The question is are your customer going to follow you that far? And if they do, how are they going to find their way back? Add a slow loading site to the mix and your customers probably won’t even make it through three clicks.
Next time you visit your website, do the following:
1. Go through your website and count how many clicks it takes before you can find your artwork or you can buy something. If you get past three, you may have to reconsider your site navigation.
2. Look at your navigation categories. Would they make sense to anyone who’s not familiar with your work? Are there too many? Is the same product showing up in more than one or two different categories? Is there a way to combine some sub-categories in a more streamlined way?
3. Have friend or family member who’s not familiar with your website log on and try to find something specific. Tell them to find a particular item on your website or a particular piece of information. Sit beside them and watch them try to find it and don’t give them any help. If you see them fumbling around or taking a lot longer than they should be, you may have a problem.
4. Watch for useless extra steps. Are you putting information on two or three pages when you could just combine the pages and save people from the extra steps? One of my pet peeves is when you have a list of questions and you have to click through to get the answer…one answer, then click back to read the rest of the question list. If you find one of these extra steps on your website that don’t serve a good purpose, eliminate them.
Thanks to danidraws (aka Dani Jones) for inspiring this post! And if you get a chance, check out her website for some incredible illustrations!
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
These are all great tips that the “big guys” have been using for years.
I’ve had really good success with step 3, watching my parents or someone who isn’t familiar with the web try and navigate the site. You learn pretty quick what works and what doesn’t.
what a great post!
not only do you identify a problem common with many websites, you also offer solutions that are easy to follow and absorb.
i love your newsletter and blog!
melissa