Gradual Engagement: Build Engagement, Not Barriers

I love A List Apart; it’s certainly one of the best websites out there on website design. We are not talking just web design as in “just cool graphics,” but big picture, user-centered design philosophy kinda stuff, presented in a way you can use in practical every day scenarios.

I especially liked their recent article Sign Up Forms Must Die:

I’ll just come out and say this: sign-up forms must die. In the introduction to this book I described the process of stumbling upon or being recommended to a web service. You arrive eager to dive in and start engaging and what’s the first thing that greets you? A form.

Photo by Tuis

Don’t you hate those in-your-face forms? Don’t you hate barriers? I do.

I strongly believe that engaging a user in your site is the main goal of most websites. Registrations are a nice metric and marketers, accountants and other people that have to show reports and be accountable love to show registration numbers. But it might not be the best strategy to build a strong user base.

Throwing a barrier in front of a potential user before they see the value in your site is a lot like asking a customer in a car showroom to sign a sales contract before he or she has test driven a car. WHY would anybody be interested in committing BEFORE they see the value?

But web architects still continue to throw registration forms in the users face well before the user has had a chance to see the value a website / web service provides. (See my recent rant about Kodak Easyshare.)

Better to lure them in, reveal value a piece at a time and make registration part of the unfolding process. Quid pro quo: I show you some value, you give me a little information, OK? It keeps the users interested and \motivated to take the next gradual step of engagement.

Unless of course, you like registration forms.

I love the article. Well written, excellent examples. If you design websites, do read it, please!

Kodak EasyShare? It Could Be Easier

I just had a friend email me some pictures from a trip we were on together a few weeks ago. She posted the pics to Kodak’s EasyShare gallery. Naturally, I wanted to see the pictures, so I followed the link.

I was stunned: I had to register just to view the photos.

Huh? Register to view photos?

WHY?

My friend wants me to see the photos. She did all the work: she took the photos, she posted them online, she emailed me… There is nothing in the photos that is of a private or sensitive nature, why would she be eager to make me register to see them–unless she was encouraged to as me to register.

I decided to see if that was the case.

Sure enough, it appeared to be a not-so-subltle ploy by Kodak to ask people to get their friends to register.

Kodak: don’t you think your customers are smart enough to see through the artificial barrier you are throwing in their way, barrier that is obviously to your own benefit?”

Kodak has a golden opportunity for viral marketing here and they squandered it by setting up barriers to entry—barriers that are obviously a manipulation that is in Kodak’s own self interest.

But is encouraging people to ask their friends to register really in Kodak’s best interest?

I would assert that Kodak would get FAR MORE BENEFIT from encouraging people to allow their friends immediate access to view photos and then, once they are on the site, Kodak could promote their products and services. Hell, if my friend posted 20, 30, 50 photos, how many opportunities is that to communicate messages and make offers about the products and services that Kodak offers?

Their core business is hardware, accessories and photo printing services–not photo sharing. Open up photo sharing—make it wide open and remove all barriers—go to great lengths to get people to your site—and use that to market your core products. The free users of a photo sharing site ARE EXACTLY THE TARGET MARKET FOR YOUR CORE PRODUCTS!

Why are you encouraging people to create barriers for your potential customers?

If this is the strategy that Kodak uses to market to the Generation Digital, they might as well stick to hawking rolls of film.

ADDENDUM

OK, I broke down and finally registered and took a look at he pictures–it was from a friend after all. The disappointment did not end at the required registration; the site navigation was horrible; a zillion thumbnail images made the page take forever to load and the navigation between images was slower than molasses on a cold winter day. Quite a poor user experience in all.

ADDENDUM 2

And what should I read just days after I posted this? An awesome article called Signup Forms Must Die. Read it–it’s a great article. Too bad the guys at Kodak never read it.

Windows Live Localisation Failure

I find most of Microsoft’s top-down, design-by-committee products to be insufferable and Windows Live is no different. Sign up for Windows Live and they force products, features and most of all “upgrades” that usually function less well than the original product, down your throat.
But reality is, there are a lot of people attached to the MS Live network and sometimes it is the the most functional point of contact for some people in my networks–so I use it when I need to.

What drives me absolutely crazy is that when you go many Windows Live web pages from an IP that is mapped to Thailand, they automatically serve a page in Thai. All in Thai. With no option to change the language unless you can read the menu–in Thai. (I can read a little and it’s not often easy to figure out how to do it–and if you do not read Thai–it’s impossible.)

So if I want to use Windows Live and I want to change a setting, download an app or register a new account, I must do it in Thai–or fly to Australia, England or the USA so I can log in form an English speaking country.

Isn’t there anybody at Microsoft that can see this is a problem? Didn’t a usability person look at Windows Live and say “if you are going to default the language, at least have an option to change it in some other (more common) language so people who are having problems with the default language can take an action?”

I guess not. MS and their arrogant “take what we give you and like it” attitude is all pervasive.