Despite being 2009, one of the biggest complaints I hear from people when describing their online activities is how difficult websites are to use. People get amazingly frustrated when they're trying to do something seemingly simple and the website continuously gets in the way. It's almost as though the people designing or commissioning the website haven't used it themselves. For most consumers this idea seems incredible, but sadly it's largely still the case.
"Silverback":http://silverbackapp.com/ launched just over a month ago and what a roller coaster month that was. We launched towards the end of July and within the first couple of days the app had been downloaded 7,000 times. Thirty days on and well over 20,000 people have grabbed themselves a copy. Crikey! For the first couple of weeks the whole company was hooked on the Twitter feedback. I had a Summize window permanently open and kept refreshing the search every few minutes. Messages were coming thick and fast and I was pretty bowled over by the feedback. The messages were so unbelievably positive I actually started to worry. After all it was just a little usability testing app and wasn't going to cure hunger and bring about world peace. Here is just a small selection of the comments we received...
Since my last post people have been clamouring for more details on "Silverback":http://silverbackapp.com/, so I thought I’d explain where the idea came from, then show you a few screenshots.
A few months ago Clearleft accidentally leaked the fact we were working on our own application, known as Silverback. I say accidentally because we had just bought the domain name silverbackapp.com and thought we’d better post up a holding page. However the combination of a great logo from Jon Hicks and an amazingly inventive parallax technique from Paul meant the page got far more coverage than anticipated. Before the week was out we had over 5,000 people registered for updates and had started to receive comments like “I don’t know what Silverback is, but I know that I want it!? So no pressure there then!
If you’re redesigning an existing site, and especially if the site is a traditional content driven site, then one of the best ways to start is by performing a content audit. The process involves going through every page on the site and noting what the page is about and where it sits within the existing navigational structure. Looking at the content from a macro level allows you to generate a clear picture of how the site is currently structured and whether this structure makes sense.
The thing I like about Jason Fried and 37 Signals is their tight focus on what they do. They are at once their own clients, customers and dev team. This gives them a great deal of freedom when it comes to features, functionality and process. However companies like 37 Signals are definitely in the minority, and most of us have to deal with much wider range of issues and stakeholders.