Attention is one of the most valuable resources of the digital age. For most of human history, access to information was limited. Centuries ago many people could not read and education was a luxury. Today we have access to information on a massive scale. Facts, literature, and art are available (often for free) to anyone with an internet connection.
We are presented with a wealth of information, but we have the same amount of mental processing power as we have always had. The number of minutes has also stayed exactly the same in every day. Today attention, not information, is the limiting factor.
Dr. Alan Rimm-Kaufman from the Rimm-Kaufman Group recently tracked one million clicks on search ads on Google and Yahoo. These advertising clicks eventually translated into 41,377 conversions on the target websites. Although the clients in question must remain anonymous, they presumably have
The layer-cake scanning pattern consists of fixations placed mostly on the page’s headings and subheadings. There are few other fixations on the text in between — that is, until users locate the heading they are interested in; at that point, they usually read the accompanying body text below
Wishlists are often made available in the page header (next to the cart button) and on product pages (often near the Add to Cart button). These spots make the feature easy to discover and access; however, our study participants tended to add items to their cart first. Our users’ mental model for
Images of Fitbit next smartwatch reveal heart-rate improvements
Fitbit is on schedule, as its boss James Park keeps reminding us, to launch its next smartwatch by the end of the year. We don’t know what the smartwatch will be called, though Blaze 2 seems likely, but thanks to leaks we know its design and some of the hardware improvements. Images obtained by
Stop Focusing on Cryptocurrencies Problems. Consider its Future.
People remembered the big bitcoin crash early in 2018, and they’re now wary of thinly veiled cash grabs hidden behind initial coin offerings (ICOs). Businesses seem to have followed suit. With last year’s market collapse, large companies that previously dipped their toes into the
Freewheeling Freelancers will Dominate the Future Jobs Market
Today, if you need a 2,500 in-depth article about a niche aspect of your industry you only need to look online, and in a matter of clicks, you could be in touch with an individual in possession of all the required knowledge that’s willing to complete your piece. This sort of freelance
Portfolios for UX Researchers: Top 10 Recommendations
If you are changing careers to work in user experience, consider taking on volunteer projects for charities and nonprofits to build your skills. Personal projects can also show research skills: conducting independent research or preparing heuristic analyses of existing products showcase your
the attention economy
Treemaps: Data Visualization of Complex Hierarchies
FinViz Map of the Market uses a treemap corresponding to the tree structure of the S&P 500 dataset depicted above. The items colored in yellow and marked (A), (B), (C), (D) correspond to the items labeled with those letters in the tree diagram above. (A) represents the entire S&P 500 and is
Image-Focused Design: Is Bigger Better?
Comparing the new Southwest Airlines homepage to its previous design clearly illustrates the advantages and disadvantages of this approach. Like many airlines, before it was redesigned, the Southwest homepage had become cluttered with different promotions and programs. The background image was
Tabs, Used Right
Tab-design problems are a common finding when using analytics for a UX health check. Assuming that you’re tracking within-page actions, you may find that users rarely use the tabs on certain pages. Check if you’re violating any of the guidelines in this article. If yes, you probably have the
Top 10 Application-Design Mistakes of 2008
As far as the mutual funds company is concerned, new investments and current investments are treated differently. Reallocating future additions means changing the funds they'll buy when the employer transfers money into the account. Reallocating current investments means selling some of the
Tabs, Used Right
If you follow the design guidelines in this article, users will know how to use your tabs without further exploration or error-prone guessing. This again means that they can devote all their time and brainpower to understanding the content and features that you’re making available under these
WP Engine Raises $30K for Central Texas Food Bank
WP Engine employees are rarely hungry. Our office kitchens are fully stocked with cereal and snacks, and lunch is catered Monday through Thursday, every week, for the entire team. Unlike the 46,000 people who rely on Central Texas Food Bank for food assistance every week, our employees don’t have
the attention economy
Mobile's New Power Couple: PWA and AMP
That’s where PWA (Progressive Web Apps) come in. What AMP does for landing pages, PWAs do for the rest of the website. AMP brings users in, ensuring consumers reach your landing page quickly without bouncing, while PWAs allow for immersive and complex shopping experiences that keep users on your
Bringing Array Themes into the WP Engine Family
At WP Engine, we’ve realized this is just as important as the speed and SEO that helps you show up in search rankings, or the analytics and targeting features that help you cater to narrower sets of demographics. Great-looking websites are the basis of effective digital experiences, and with our
Beware Horizontal Scrolling and Mimicking Swipe on Desktop
Netflix.com: In its regular state, there are no visual cues to indicate that more content is available (top). Arrows appear only on hover (bottom). Additionally, to see more content within a category, users must hover over the arrow. When they do so, the strip starts to move; if users want to see
Variable Fonts and Wide-Screen Layouts: Adopting Data-Driven Progressive Enhancements
Let’s consider a case from the history of the web, at the time when 20% of users were still using slow dial-up modems. You would like to use a nice big hero image that would increase page load time by 1 minute for these dial-up users, even though the delay would be negligible for broadband users
The Most Hated Online Advertising Techniques
Wireframes were presented for both desktop and mobile variants of the same ad, when possible. If there were no common or practical implementations of an advertisement type on mobile, only the desktop variant was shown. We used wireframes instead of screenshots as our stimuli to avoid influencing
How a VPN Can Enhance Your IOT Devices Security
Business, as well as individuals, need to be cautious about the security loopholes that can come with such devices. For companies, there are plenty of recommended business VPN providers that will help ensure more secure operations without compromising on network speed. For everyday consumers, free
These Are The Concerns Slowly Killing Ad-Tech
Black Mirror, recently bought by Netflix, is a hugely popular TV series that is a dark, twisted but spot-on portrayal of the possible ramifications of technology in the future. Advertisements for the show are ironically targeting ad block users, and some argue, are “intentionally creepy.” For
Hackers are Ready to Exploit Zero-Day Flaws; Companies are Slow to Act
Despite this potential impact to their bottom line, businesses often find it challenging to act on these threats promptly. Many smaller operations are ill-equipped to manage their IT effectively. Even those with dedicated IT teams are only able to respond if they are made aware of the threats. For
How Tech Startups Succeed With a Fully Remote Model
Working from home (or from another place of your choosing) gives workers a tremendous amount of flexibility. They can set up and customize a home office of their very own, or work from a local café or coworking space. They can wear a suit if it helps them get in a “work” mindset, or something
the attention economy
4 Unique Growth Tactics for 2020
Once you have scheduled SMS texts in your pipeline, you can start developing other ways to engage prospects for unrivaled growth. Speaking of more engagement tactics, let’s jump into personalized landing page campaigns. 2. Run Personalized Landing Page Campaigns Personalization is and will always
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
The Attention Economy | Anchors OK? Re-Assessing In-Page Links
Anchors OK? Re-Assessing In-Page Links
By contrast, an accordion-based table of contents has the advantage of being more visible to users than some tables of content implemented with in-page links. If in-page links only appear at the top of a page, users must return to the top of the page to navigate to another section. (This is not the
Instilling Confidence in Online Shoppers: I Bought a Sofa Online and Good UX Sealed the Deal
After I had selected a handful of sofa styles I was interested in, I was ready to see how they might look in a real space. Joybird used photos from actual customers posted on social channels to show the versatility of the products and how these different sectional configurations might work in the
Iterative Design and Testing of Icon Usability
We clearly had to get rid of the human in this icon, and for the second color icon, we retained only the lightning and the cogwheels. Users still complained that the thunderbolt looked too much like lightning striking the machinery and destroying it. We finally decided to get rid of the references
