From conducting decades of user research, we know that people dislike popups and modals. I was reminded of this fact during a recent usability study. While attempting to complete a task, a participant tossed his phone across the table after encountering multiple popups, consecutively. Frustrated, he abandoned his task and left the website with a very bad impression of the organization. Several other users shared a similar sentiment, albeit they did not throw their phones.
A popup (also known as an overlay or popover ) is a window or dialog that appears on top of the page content. A popup can be classified according to two dimensions:
B2B transactions tend to have high-price tags and purchase decisions could result in strong repercussions. Relieve any tension people might have about doing business with your organization by offering details about products and services in a meaningful manner. This means being candid about the
Users should be given the option to stop progress updates, like an unsubscribe link. For email progress updates, the user should be provided with a link to change their contact preferences (which could be within the status tracker itself). For SMS, the user should be able to respond with the word
Another noticeable change over our years of research is users’ increasing reliance on external mapping tools such as Google Maps, Apple Maps, or Waze to provide turn-by-turn directions. Companies have reacted to this new state of facts. In Study 4, only two of the 11 sites tested used an on-site
Optimizing Business Decisions With Blockchain Technology
When businesses fail to make better decisions, they are bound to fail. In fact, studies have shown that most firms fail at strategy formulation and execution rather than product development. Simply put, a business may have the best product in the world, but if it fails to make the right
A 60-Second Trailer of the 60-Day Report on Cybersecurity
Finally, Hathaway sees this as a unique opportunity for the United States to work with countries around the world, and with organizations on an extremely local level. “We cannot succeed if our government works in isolation,” she added. It requires “leading from the top” from
Blockchain Beyond Banking
Consider, for instance, SWIFT, a financial messaging services provider: In 2017, SWIFT launched a Proof of Concept designed to streamline cross-border payments. This is important because these payments account for nearly half of global payments. The current protocol is slow-moving, especially
Design Thinking 101
Imagine your goal is to improve an onboarding experience for new users. In this phase, you talk to a range of actual users. Directly observe what they do, how they think, and what they want, asking yourself things like ‘what motivates or discourages users?’ or ‘where do they experience
popups: 10 problematic trends and alternatives
The Impact of Interaction Design on Brand Perception
Tolstrup and Heyer found many relationships between interactivity attributes and the brand and emotional attributes. For the full discussion on the relationships they found, see their paper, referenced at the end of this article. The findings related to labels, expected behavior, and consistency in
Branding an Intranet
Most Intranets are created and owned by IT, HR, Corporate Communications, or a combination of these departments. While these teams have the necessary skills to create and maintain great intranets, they don’t usually include experts in branding. Thus, intranets frequently lack a brand identity. A
Layered Interaction Analysis of Direct Manipulation (Jakob Nielsen)
A user who often wanted a wide bar to appear in the left margin could construct a button (perhaps labelled "Make Change Bar") that would have the same effect as calling up the control in Figure 5 and modifying it as shown. This hypothetical interface would be an immediate command specification. As
Best Application Designs
Wizards don't work for everything. In user testing, Eventbrite developers discovered problems with a wizard for creating new events in the system. Because users' mental models of setting up a new event didn't include all the necessary steps, they often dropped off and didn't complete the wizard
Mobile: Native Apps, Web Apps, and Hybrid Apps
Often, companies build hybrid apps as wrappers for an existing web page; in that way, they hope to get a presence in the app store, without spending significant effort for developing a different app. Hybrid apps are also popular because they allow crossplatform development and thus significantly
A Look Back at the WP Engine London Summit .
At the end of September, we held our 2018 WP Engine Summit in Austin, Texas. Last week, agencies, brands, and digital innovators from EMEA came together in London for the WP Engine EU Summit. Attendees discussed the future of digital experiences, Gen Z’s perception of the Internet, and the
popups: 10 problematic trends and alternatives
WP Engine Culture Recognized at Greater Austin Business Awards
The annual Greater Austin Business Awards competition, presented by The Austin Chamber of Commerce, is designed to honor excellence in all aspects of business. In order to promote awareness and perpetuate good practices, the Awards recognize companies and organization in the Austin region for
Bringing Array Themes into the WP Engine Family
Sifting through the thousands of themes in existence today is a daunting task, and finding the right one for your website is just part of the challenge. No one wants to trust their portfolio, online magazine, or e-commerce site to just any formulaic theme. Making sure it’s well designed, well
UX Stories Communicate Designs
After you’ve collected stories from research, you can use them to prompt innovation. Take the existing stories and begin to alter them to uncover ways to enhance the user’s experience. The primary purpose of stories in this context is to be generative; thus, deferring judgement and embracing
Small Pictures on Big Screens: Scaling Up from Mobile to Desktop
Images that work well on small screens may not be appropriate for big ones. They may become too large in relation to surrounding page elements, force extra scrolling, or lose impact. When you’re designing for multiple page sizes, you need to consider orientation (horizontal or vertical), aspect
Variable Fonts and Wide-Screen Layouts: Adopting Data-Driven Progressive Enhancements
But a cautious approach to trends doesn’t mean rejecting all innovation. We’re picky about which bandwagons we join, choosing only trends that provide true UX value. Less scrolling and more content for large-screen users is a clear winner. And although variable fonts are not yet widely adopted
The Way Forward: Responsibly Deployed Facial Recognition
With the advancement of machine learning and more specifically, pattern recognition, facial recognition technology can be overlayed onto camera feeds to prompt action where appropriate. New use cases for this technology are willfully adopted on a daily basis. You can already unlock your phone and
How a VPN Can Enhance Your IOT Devices Security
A botnet is a network of computers or other internet-connected devices that are infected with malware. The devices are controlled as a group, making it possible for hackers to launch large-scale attacks. These attacks can be conducted not just from computers but from all IoT devices as well
Why Consumers Often Miss Simple Techniques to Resist Cybercrime
People who understand the importance of these basic security measures also run the risk of forgetting them when they’re needed most. For example, they might access their email account on a computer at the library, and leave in a hurry, forgetting to log back out. Or they might not have any
The Role of IT or an IT Consultant Provider for Business Growth
IT services are now an integral part of every business globally. Your IT service person or IT service provider will contribute a lot to your business. Issues such as providing security, upgrades, data monitoring, and reduced costs. A good IT solution provider or IT solutions company increases
popups: 10 problematic trends and alternatives
A 60-Second Trailer of the 60-Day Report on Cybersecurity
Finally, Hathaway sees this as a unique opportunity for the United States to work with countries around the world, and with organizations on an extremely local level. “We cannot succeed if our government works in isolation,” she added. It requires “leading from the top” from
Open Plan Offices Kill Productivity. Here’s What to Do Instead.
For years, the business world lived under the false pretense that open plan offices were a killer idea. I myself even bought into the hype. At Netconcepts, the digital agency I founded (and sold in 2010), only the executives had offices with doors that closed. Open plan offices were a win-win for
Popups: 10 Problematic Trends and Alternatives | The Roots of Minimalism in Web Design
The Roots of Minimalism in Web Design
The portfolio of designer Brian Danaher is a typical example of what many designers would call a minimalist site. When viewed full screen on a 15-inch MacBook Pro, the homepage is almost entirely white space. The site uses a grayscale color palette with a single bold accent color to draw attention
Zigzag Image–Text Layouts Make Scanning Less Efficient
Images with informational value were looked at more than images with no informational value. It didn’t matter if the images with informational value were aligned or alternating: images with a lot of information about the product were studied in detail and referenced multiple times as users’
Encourage people to make note of their passwords, to write them down or put them in a password manager. Janrain research in 2012 found that 90% of people admit they have left a website if they forgot their password or login information instead of going through the password recovery process
