It Was a Very Good Year (or maybe not)…

Why is it so easy to find web forms that just don’t work well? Particularly when it comes to what should be simple workflows users are used completing over and over again. There really is no excuse. Here is another example of a simple form gone wrong…

I am submitting a request so the first thing I am being asked for is my contact information:

Scanning the form quickly I see date is already filled in and I am asked to leave it in the field. The rest of the fields are expected information to be asked, and I know this stuff like the back of my hand, so fine with me. Following the instructions, I skip over the date field; enter the rest of the required fields, then hit Submit:

Okie dokie… Why the heck am I getting an error on the one field I was explicitly asked not to edit? Of course, I can no longer see that field since the pop is hiding it, so I am unable to immediately figure why. I decide to move the pop-up window out of the way so I can see what went wrong here:

Nice! The one field I was not responsible for entering already has an error! The year says 110! So, even though I completed all my data entry correctly, I hit a roadblock. If they wanted me to leave the field untouched, the least they could have done was make sure the pre-entered data was correct!

My Recommendation:

Since they obviously do not want the date changed from today’s date, there is no reason to have the date be a data entry field at all. When a user accesses this screen, the date of request could simply appear (correctly) as uneditable data on the screen. Or better yet, why show it all? Do I need to be reminded that the date of my request is today? I think I know that. If the underlying workflow needs this information it can be added outside of the user’s interaction.

A simple step that could have been removed is instead going to lead to an error for each and every user who doesn’t realize they need to correct the field they were asked to leave alone.

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A ‘Contact Us’ Form that Works

I know I typically share user experiences that I feel are lacking in the whole ‘understanding your users’ department, but today I actually have an interaction that I think goes above and beyond from the UX perspective. A collective round of applause please!

I was checking out a site that offers wire framing and prototyping products:

This is a nice intuitive, streamlined UI. But the thing that really caught my eye was the little ‘Give Feedback’ image in the upper right hand column.

Curiosity killed that cat, so I had to click on it, and I was presented with one of the most well designed Contact forms I have ever encountered:

What makes this so special you say? Well the first thing I noticed is that they seem genuinely interested in my feedback as opposed to who I am and what my contact information is. Instead of immediately asking me for that type of information, their first question is ‘what kind of feedback might that be’ – and rather than presenting it via a sterile dropdown as so often is the case, they instead make it a little more fun by putting the most common types of feedback right out in the open as buttons where I can simply click the one I want. None of the specific categories match? That’s okay too; there is an Other Feedback option. I also want to point out that the entire interaction is keyboard accessible.

I pick the type of feedback I’d like to give and:

A text box appears, highlighted and focus is already in the text box for me. All I need to do is to start typing my comments. And all of the other feedback categories are still front and center in case I decide that a different subject would be more appropriate. I type in my comments and hit Send…

The only piece of personal information being asked for from me is my email address, and I only need to give it if I want to ensure someone follows up with me. How awesome is that?!

It’s funny, but when I blog about my negative user experiences I feel it necessary to protect the offenders and blur out identifying information. But when I encounter an experience as positive as this, I want to yell the site/company names from the mountaintop! This interaction shows that Kampyle has made good use of their time and energy to ensure that the product they were creating was going to meet the needs of both the sites that purchase it and the users who would actually be sending the feedback. Kudos to Kampyle!

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Where for art thy Error?

I was reading an article about ways to increase traffic to your blog, because who doesn’t want more folks coming their site and realizing the wisdom in their words. 🙂

Anyway, the article mentioned submitting your site to a multitude of free blog directories, so I figured I’d give it try. Site after site asked for the same basic information. Here I am on about the fourth site:

Piece of cake, I’d already filled out this same basic stuff 3 times before. The one thing I didn’t want to do was put reciprocal links on my blog, which according to the terms was fine, so I just left that field blank each time. I finished filling out this form, hit submit, and got this:

Hmmmm….did it submit? My guess is no…but if not why didn’t it? I start inspecting the screen, field by field, until notice this:

Suddenly the reciprocal link field has become required (yes, scroll up to the first screenshot if you don’t believe me!) – or maybe they are using the exact same image for their error notation?! I have no clue. And even more interesting the error message (in the exact same font color and size as everything else on the screen) states that I entered an Invalid URL – can the lack of a URL actually make it invalid?

I was basically stuck at this point, I wasn’t going to go down the whole reciprocal link path, so I abandoned the task. I guess this is one blog directory you won’t find LiveUX in…

My Recommendation:

If a user makes an error in a workflow you want to direct them right to the source of the error so they can fix it quickly and easily.

• The error message itself can appear either at the top of screen (indicating the specific field that is in error) or placing it in close proximity to the field itself (usually to the right or below the field).
• Use an indicator to highlight the invalid field (for example a red X to the right of the field). Do not use an image that has more than one meaning.
• The error message should by styled to stand out from the rest of the text on the screen. The norm is to use red text.
• The error message should accurately describe the error that was made. It is also best to include the step(s) a user can take to correct it.

Okay, that’s about it for me today…I’m going to register LiveUX with a few more directories…wish me luck!

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Hint, hint…

Entry hints in web forms and text entry fields are handy little things. They give a user more context about what they might want to enter in a text field. For example, if I was filling out a registration form where I need to enter my date of birth, an entry hint of mm/dd/yyyy gives me the valid format I should enter it in. In giving me this simple hint, I have been saved from wasting my valuable time trying to guess what the appropriate format might be. I like not having my time wasted. 🙂

So how could one go wrong using entry hints? Let’s take look…

I am browsing a particular site’s blog directory and notice the Search capability. It’s even telling me (with an entry hint) that this search is specifically for finding registered blogs. Great! I want to know if my blog is registered, so I’ll simply type in ‘LiveUX’, hit search, and see if my blog shows up in the search results…

Huh? All I typed in was LiveUX! How did I get this mishmash of words in my search? Well, it turns out that maybe this entry hint wasn’t as helpful as it could have been. When I retrace my steps, here is what I discover:

When I put focus on the field (by clicking within it) to begin typing my search criteria, the entry hint does not disappear. It is up to me as the user to clear out all of the entry hint text before I am able to enter my search criteria. So much for not having my time wasted…

My Recommendation:

Entry hints area great tool that can make a site more user friendly when it comes to completing forms. However, when incorporating an entry hint, it needs to be done correctly. When a user puts focus on the field, the entry hint should disappear, making way for the true data to be entered.

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