Showing posts tagged cta
Extreme signposting! View high resolution

Extreme signposting!

Ofcom’s website provides us with a simple lesson in getting heading and link styles right, in terms of design, and copy. In the screenshot shown, the main heading is blue, so we automatically assume that the text in blue underneath are sub-headings. In fact, they are links. There is nothing to suggest this to the user at all, but these are your next steps. The randomly bolded words don’t help matters, as some users might assume these are the links. Better spacing would aid the problem - if the blue links felt like they belonged to the paragraph above, rather than neither one or the other as present, they would feel like a ‘next step’ to give the user a clue as to their purpose. But let’s be honest, the single most beneficial thing they could do would be to underline the links. On other pages of their website, they have gone as far as to write instructions into the text - “Please click on the titles in blue to see further details”, which suggests they have had feedback about the problem already. As for the copy, once you work out where the links are, they give little clue as to where they will actually take the user. The tone is inconsistent, with some pure calls-to-action (“Read the Broadcasting Code”) and some written as statements (“I saw/head the programme”). For an organisation that should be an advocate for us, the public, this really is unfortunate usability - I wonder how many people have come here to make a point about a programme and simply drawn a blank. View high resolution

Ofcom’s website provides us with a simple lesson in getting heading and link styles right, in terms of design, and copy.

In the screenshot shown, the main heading is blue, so we automatically assume that the text in blue underneath are sub-headings. In fact, they are links. There is nothing to suggest this to the user at all, but these are your next steps. The randomly bolded words don’t help matters, as some users might assume these are the links.

Better spacing would aid the problem - if the blue links felt like they belonged to the paragraph above, rather than neither one or the other as present, they would feel like a ‘next step’ to give the user a clue as to their purpose. But let’s be honest, the single most beneficial thing they could do would be to underline the links.

On other pages of their website, they have gone as far as to write instructions into the text - “Please click on the titles in blue to see further details”, which suggests they have had feedback about the problem already. As for the copy, once you work out where the links are, they give little clue as to where they will actually take the user. The tone is inconsistent, with some pure calls-to-action (“Read the Broadcasting Code”) and some written as statements (“I saw/head the programme”).

For an organisation that should be an advocate for us, the public, this really is unfortunate usability - I wonder how many people have come here to make a point about a programme and simply drawn a blank.

Now that’s what I call a call-to-action! View high resolution

Now that’s what I call a call-to-action!

Spot the call-to-action at the end of this form. Microsoft Office at its best! View high resolution

Spot the call-to-action at the end of this form. Microsoft Office at its best!