Consistent Labeling

There is nothing more disorienting than links labels that don’t match page titles. Imagine clicking a link called “Find Books” and ending up at a page called “Search The Library Catalogue”. After a while, your users might start associating their quest to find books with searching the catalogue, but why force them to make that cognitive leap when you can easily synchronize your link labels with your page titles? If the link says “Find Books”, that’s exactly what they should see (preferably in unapologetically large text) on the resulting page.

So, spend some time clicking around your site. Make sure the link labels you click on match the page titles that come up. If they don’t, change them.

Search

There is a usability theory out there that says that users only search a site when they can’t figure out how the site navigation works or when they lose the “scent” of what they’re looking for. While that might be true, in the strictest human-computer interaction sense, there is a whole subset of users who would rather just search your site to start with instead of clicking on navigation options. Blame Google.

If your library website doesn’t have a site search box, it should. Devote some template space to it so that users get used to seeing that search box in the same place on every page. Make the searchers happy and provide a simple wayfinding option at the same time.

Breadcrumbs

Think of breadcrumbs as the GPS of your website, the “You Are Here” marker that instantly orients users to where they are in your site’s architecture. Breadcrumbs are a perfect wayfinding tool because they provide a reminder to users about what section of the site they are in and how they got there.

If you don’t already have breadcrumbs on your site, there is no quick & dirty way to implement them unfortunately. But if you are using breadcrumbs, do a quick audit to make sure they are meaningful and provide some useful orientation to your users. Remember, your home page is not always the starting point for a lot of users (thank you, search engines), so make sure that every page has breadcrumbs that will also orient those who land on your site as a result of a search engine hit.

Next Up

#3: Online Library Card Application

You can make your website more effective by making it smaller, using less words and by being friendly.

Article

Think of the content on your site in two ways:

• the broad picture of what is on your site
• the narrower scope of how this stuff is presented

Both are important and both need continual attention.

Less is Less (& That’s Good)
We bet that your library’s website has too many pages. You might think that there’s no harm in keeping pages around just in case someone needs the info there. You’re probably wrong. More stuff on your site means that:

• it takes more time to make sure it is still relevant and up to date.
• your patrons are forced to sift through junk to find what they really need.
• your navigation has to be increasingly complicated.

It is better to have a website consisting of 25 effective pages that are well written and answer people’s questions than it is to have 50 sloppy pages that aren’t as useful.

You should look at every page on your website. You might cry a little bit during the process but if you do, let it be a lesson.

Making the Cut
Caution. This is dangerous stuff. People can get territorial about content related to their part of the library. Even if they haven’t updated it in 10 months. With any luck you’re in a situation where you can prune away and deselect pages just like you would a print collection. But you might not be so lucky.

Hopefully you have web analytics to see what people are using and what people aren’t using. If not, install Google Analytics now. It is free and easy. Wait a few months for an accurate report and you’ll have some data to back up your pruning shears. Any pages that people haven’t looked at in a few months need to go. It is really quite liberating!

Pages that are getting hit the most should be priorities for the next step of improving your content.

There are other big picture content issues that are just as important. More questions you can ask yourself or your web team are:

• Who has the final say about content on your site?
• What process is creating the stuff that goes on your site?

Write for the web
People using your site want to accomplish something or have a question answered. Your content is supposed to make these things happen. In other words, your content is the reason people visit your site.

In general, library websites have too many words. If you only do one thing with the content on your library website, do this:

Remove as many words as possible.

Just like superfluous pages get in the way of people finding what they want, so do superfluous words. The information on your site should be grab and go. Provide an apple tree that patrons can pick from rather than forcing them to sit through a 7 course meal. For a visual example, see our post Making Content Shine.

Make it Scannable
Since you got rid of a bunch of useless pages in the previous step you’ll have an easier time going through every page again. This time, though, make your pages scannable by providing plenty of subheadings above relatively short paragraphs. We’re skeptical of paragraphs more than 4 sentences long. If you’re unconvinced of the utility of this, do a five second test on a before and after page.

Also, review every page with your users’ needs in mind. Ask yourself why they would come to each page. Those reasons are their trigger words. Use them. Bold them.

Be Nice
Does the tone of our content reflect how friendly you are face to face? If so, either your content is conversational and welcoming or you need to be more friendly face to face. As you’re rewriting content you should be writing as if you’re answering questions asked by a really good friend.

Additional Resources
The first step in today’s post is just the tip of a content strategy iceberg. Read Kristina Halvorson’s Content Strategy for the Web to learn more about big picture thinking about what is on your website.

For a comprehensive look at writing for the web, check out Letting Go of the Words by Ginny Reddish. It is super good.

Next up

#02 Navigation & Wayfinding

What design researchers can learn from hostage negotiators
“In essence, both parties are attempting to establish a relationship, both are trying to keep the communication flowing, and most importantly, both are trying to extract valuable data.”

Murals for the Library Initiative

And check out the identity for the Library Initiative.

Typekit has gone from invite only to open registration.

What is Typekit? Think of it as YouTube for fonts. With it you can consistently display non-standard fonts on websites. Previous solutions haven’t been as easy to use, nor have they been as respectful of type foundries’ rights. Despite a (currently) somewhat limited amount of fonts from which to choose, Typekit is win-win.

Take a look at “Attention font nerds” above. It isn’t an image. You can copy the characters. They’ll be indexed by search engines and be read by screen readers.

A word of caution

Typekit might let us express ourselves more effectively on the web but it could also lead to some ransom note looking pages. Please be responsible with Typekit. When in doubt, limit your font use to one serif and one sans-serif per page. Use size, color and weight for emphasis.

Question about the presentation? Just ask.