404 error pages, news sites and user experience
How should a website handle errors? What kind of information and messages should be presented to the user? And will a one-size fits all approach do the job?
Our own 404 page is pretty lame, so we’ve been thinking about the various ways in which we can improve things, as part of our year-long project to provide you with a glorious new E-consultancy website (due in early-2009).
I have also analysed the 404 pages of 10 of the most popular news sites, to see how other publishers are faring.
Mobile app review: eBay for iPhone
Updated a few months ago, the eBay on iPhone app lets you keep up with your buying and selling activity, as well as looking for new items, while on the move.
I've been testing out the app to see how effectively it works for mobile..
20 ways to delight your customers in 2009
In 2009 many companies will struggle against a tide of negative consumer sentiment, driven by the economic downturn. It’s looking like the days of free and easy spending are over, for now.
In startupland the losers will most likely be those with low reserves of cash, but what about the established e-commerce heavyweights? Which e-commerce companies will fare better than others, and which ones will be hardest hit? And what can they do about it?
Add search to your website - 10 hosted site search tools
If your website has a lot of content, offering your users search functionality that makes it easier for them to find the content they're looking for is a usability must.
It can also enable you to track which content is most popular.
Site review: Fish4.co.uk redesign
Fish4 launched a revamped version of its classifieds website last week, aiming to provide more useful advice to searchers alongside its jobs, car, homes and holiday listings.
As well as the new section, Fish4 says it has also improved functionality and added a new search tool.
I've been taking a look at the site to see how it measures up...
Halfords improves e-commerce offering
A few months ago, I looked at Halfords' e-commerce site from a user experience perspective, and found it lacking in some areas.
A bit of tweaking has happened since, so it's only fair to comment on the improvements that have been made...
Q&A: Lou Rosenfeld on site search analytics
Lou Rosenfeld is the founder of Rosenfeld Media, a publishing house focused on user experience design, and the co-author of Information Architecture for the World Wide Web (O’Reilly & Associates; 3rd edition, 2006).
He also co-founded the Information Architecture Institute and UXnet, the User Experience Network, and as an information architecture consultant, has helped numerous Fortune 500s and other large, messy, political enterprises make their information easier to find.
Here, we asked Lou a few questions about site search analytics (SSA) – it’s importance in site design and development, and how it is being used by different types of businesses online.
Used car search tools... suck!
I have been looking for a used car recently across a selection of manufacturer and third party sites, and it seems there is plenty of room for improvement in the way their search tools work.
Ideally, a search tool should be easy to use, but still allow users to choose between complex features and sort the results effectively.
So how do some of the major car manufacturers perform?
Site review: Mothercare
Mothercare's online sales have risen dramatically over the past financial year. They reached a total of £85.5m, an increase of 78% on the previous year.With this kind of performance, the company must be doing something right online, so we have decided to take a look at its website...
Q&A: Thomas Busch of Careerjet
Careerjet is a job search engine that began as a bet by its founders, Thomas Busch and Jean-Benoit Andrieu.
It appears they have won - it now aggregates content from over 59,000 sites daily, and currently displays upwards of 21m vacancies.
We talked to Busch about the site's development and the semantic technology behind its search functions.
Social media: the best and worst of 2009
Email marketing: six steps to improving customer engagement in 2010
Web 2.0
Graham Charlton
Strategy & Planning
