Creating Great Website Navigation from Scratch

Have you ever tried baking chocolate chip cookies from memory without a recipe? You know you have to add flour, sugar, eggs, butter, and chocolate chips (and maybe a few other things), but if you can’t remember in what order and what quantity the ingredients should be added, you’re more likely to end up with mushy lumps that taste like soap than you are delectable cookies.

Trying to navigate a website with poor navigation usability is like that. If you know what you’re doing, you may be able to reach your end goal, but if you don’t, and you don’t have a good road map, you’re just going to end up frustrated and covered in flour. Okay, maybe not flour, but you won’t be likely to visit the website again soon.

Creating website navigation for usability is like writing a good recipe. The contents from website to website may differ, but the best websites all follow the rules of the road when it comes to creating effective navigation.

●      Put navigation bars where people expect to see them

People have become accustomed to looking at the top and left side of the page for navigation, so give them what they expect. If you use both global and local navigation, it’s generally best to put the global links across the top and the local links on the left side of the page.

●      Repeat descriptive links on each page

Don’t assume the user knows what you mean when you say “next” or “more.” This can create a real problem for people using assistive reading technology that alphabetizes links.

Instead, craft website navigation for usability and use descriptive text that tells people at a glance where the link will take them. Also, include navigation on every page.

●      Rely on text, not graphical images, for navigation

People can interpret graphical images differently, which will create frustration. What looks like a graphical representation of a TV to you may look like a computer to someone else.

Even images such as buttons with labels incorporated can be a problem for people who have vision problems and need to increase font size for readability. Keep all of your viewers in mind and use text for your links whenever possible.

●      Follow a logical sequence

People should be able to see where they’ve come from and where they’re going at any given point.

You can accomplish this by using breadcrumbs, which show the viewer step by step what links they’ve clicked to get to the current page or by changing the color and/or size of links that have already been clicked.

Changing your website navigation for usability can profoundly affect your viewers’ satisfaction with their experience on your site. And while it may not create the same warm fuzzies as a chocolate chip cookie, it will leave a favorable impression that will be more likely to draw them back in the future.