In earlier years, we recommended that links be blue because that was the color people associated with clickability. But today's users have seen links in many other colors. Other colors work just as well as long as they stand out clearly from the body text and change to a different color after the page they link to is visited.
If you don't have a particular reason to prefer another color, we still recommend blue as the safest choice. But going with another color has such tiny potential for causing trouble these days that it is no longer worth even one skull.
Reluctance to scroll persists. It's still fairly common to see users give up on a page too quickly because it doesn't seem relevant to them.
Scrolling
As discussed in Chapter 2, some users still don't scroll Web pages when they navigate a site to determine where to go (or whether to leave). This is not nearly as serious a problem as it was in the early days of the Web, when we saw many users rarely or never scroll. Now people have gotten used to long Web pages and have learned that they sometimes have to scroll. If users decide to dig into a page, they usually know how to scroll.
Yet reluctance to scroll persists. This issue is not endemic to the Internet. Newspaper people put their top stories above the fold on the front page to make sure they're seen on newsstands and doorsteps even before readers unfold their papers to read them. On the Web, it's still fairly
common to see users give up on a page too quickly because it doesn't seem relevant to them when in reality the information they needed was "below the fold" and just not visible during first scan.
(Facing page, top) The graphical design and layout of the Atlantis homepage provides inadequate cues to let people know that there's more information below the viewable browser window. The image of the resort fits perfectly within the window and the "Begin Your Adventure" heading at the bottom looks like it marks the end of the page.
Make sure that design elements don't look like end-page markers. Even experienced Web users need cues to indicate that there is relevant information below the viewable area.
Unfortunately, on this site there are many more interesting areas at the bottom of this page that people won't know about.
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www.atlantis.com
The Atlantis homepage, scrolled down: Look at all the interesting information people can miss. All key information should be visible on the initial screen. Customers often decide whether to do business based on what they see without scrolling. Remember to check your pages on different screen resolutions to make sure that there are sufficient visual cues in the viewable area to pique people's interest and let them know there's more below.
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www.atlantis.com
We still give scrolling two skulls as a usability issue because it continues to hurt sites more than it should. This is probably because of differences in how designers and users judge relevancy. People who work on Web sites know when a given page is the solution to a given problem, and they may assume that users will scroll down to look for the link to that solution. And readers would if they knew that it was waiting for them. But of course, users don't know any such thing. During the initial few seconds when they judge a page, they may make their decision based on what's visible. If this doesn't seem promising enough, some will leave without investing the extra time to scroll.
Registration
In the early days of the Web, registration was a huge barrier, and people didn't know whether to trust sites with their personal information. Now people are more used to entering this information
as long as they trust the site and want the service or products it offers. Today users know how to register on a site if they have decided to do business there.
Also, many e-commerce sites have designed alternate checkout paths where users can complete their purchases without officially having to register. Of course, users must enter most of the same personal information, including their credit card numbers, but to many people that's less intrusive when it's part of a checkout process.
The United States Postal Service requires customers to register before purchasing
products from its site. Allowing people to buy without registering is a better approach for sales because there are fewer opportunities for drop off. For example, it's common for people try to register by creating a new user name and password in the wrong area, even if it's labeled "Existing Users." People are simply drawn to text boxes and immediately fill in information and then are confused when the system returns error messages. Making registration optional at the end of a purchase is less offensive to customers because it doesn't interrupt shopping and gives them a choice.
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www.usps.com
Still, users don't like to register on Web sites, and sites lose a lot of business if they force users to register prematurely or if they ask too many nosy, privacy-invading questions. All in all,
registration is still a cause of lost business, but not nearly as much as it was in the past. One skull.