The Case Against Thinking: Creating Easy to Use Websites

One of the best books I’ve ever read on website usability was written by Steve Krug, called “Don’t Make Me Think .  I had read it once before the Conversations on Website Conversion Book Club started reading it this July, but I’ve gotten even more out of it the second time through.

In many areas of life, thinking is very important. Thinking before you speak, thinking before you act, thinking through a problem to get to a solution…these are just a few of examples of how thinking helps us.  So why is it so important to design a website so that people don’t have to think?

Because every time you make a visitor think, you’ve interrupted their train of thought. Most people are concentrating hard to solve a problem. When your website confuses or frustrates them, you’re interrupting their mission and forcing them to think. Since no one particularly likes to be forced to do something, you risk losing them to a website that is easier for them to use.

Visitors come to your website to accomplish a mission. They don’t want to be confused, frustrated, or made to think about what something means.  On the web, we all like things to be simple, easy and obvious.

Carl and I made the following video to explain some common website mistakes that we’ve been seeing on the website’s we’re reviewing.