engaging experience

Meaningful Titles and Clear Descriptors Drive Traffic

Last Friday I noticed a spike in traffic on my food journal, Maker's Table. A number of visitors had arrived from search engine results for Flaio, an Italian red wine I'd blogged about in March 2008. I'd assumed the wine had recently gotten some press.

That evening, opening our copy of the Wall Street Journal, I got my answer. Dorothy Gaiter and John Brecher had focused their Friday "Tastings" column on Primitivo, the Italian twin of Zinfandel. One of the few wines they really liked was Flaio, and at $10.99, it was also the cheapest. The sidebar showed a photo of the bottle and listed it as "Flaio 2006 (Salento)."

Returning to my site stats, I found at least three search engine referrals for keyword searches of precisely that string. I ran a few of these to recreate the users' search experience—to see what they had seen. My post was on the first page of Google search results for that query, and both the title and search summary gave a good indication the page was a review:

 

I've witnessed similar outcomes when recreating my visitors' searches for turkey burgers, three ingredient meals, and Stella's restaurant in Lyme—three other popular posts whose titles reflect the main point of the story. This underscores that clear titles, good first lines, and detailed particulars in the post body help searchers find your pages.

John Hancock Website: Business Hours Only

A friend logged onto his John Hancock account and requested his transaction history. Unfortunately, the website couldn't comply, because it was Sunday evening:

Search Suggestions Work

Yesterday on the commute home I heard Alan Cheuse's review on NPR of the new book by Paul Auster. When I got to my computer a few hours later, I couldn't recall the book's title, but remembered something about a man in the dark, alone in his room, ruminating. Firing up Amazon, I typed a few likely words into the search box, "man in..." Instantly, down popped a list of suggestions:

I arrowed down to "man in the dark," since that rang a bell, hit return, and got a list that displayed Auster's book at the top:

I hadn't previously noticed this search suggestion feature at Amazon. It might be new to them, but it's not new to mainstream search engines. Ever since Ajax made it possible to send the user a list of possible query completions, search engines have been offering it to help users find their way. Here's Ask.com's search suggestion UI:

And here's Google's, from the browser toolbar:

If search suggestions make the user's work easy, it's only because the taxonomists behind the scenes have done their jobs well. Note that Amazon primarily suggests book or film titles, while Ask.com and Google suggest terms from the broader web. This points to a key element of search suggestion design: it's critical to tune the suggested results to the domain, using real searches done by real people. Avi Rappoport, an expert on enterprise search, offers her set of guidelines for search suggestions.

It worked for me. I was able, knowing only approximately what I was looking for, to find my book in a few short strokes. And I bought it, encouraged and propelled by a good experience.

Crate and Barrel Gets It

I've shopped online at Crate and Barrel a few times, so got added to their email list. My appetite for household stuff is actually pretty small, so when the most recent sale notice arrived, I clicked to unsubscribe. I landed on a web page that let me opt-out in a single click: easy.

A minute or so later, this arrived in my inbox:

It might seem risky for a company to email to a customer after that customer has explicitly removed herself from their list, even if it's just to confirm the opt-out. But I thought Crate and Barrel got a few things really right:

• They confirmed my request. They restated my choices and gave me a link to their privacy policy. This gave me confidence they'd registered my preferences and will act on them.

• They thanked me for my business. In fact, that's the lead, the main story. They acknowledged my business is meaningful to them. My cabinet full of snow white dinnerware was not cheap, thank you very much, so this is gratifying.

• They asked for the next sale. Just because I've opted out of receiving emails doesn't mean I'm no longer their customer. It just means I don't want to receive their emails, at that particular email address. Where other companies might have lead with a "Sorry to see you go," Crate and Barrel assumes I'm not actually gone.

Crate and Barrel understands it's the last experience that sticks in the customer's mind, and is the one they'll judge you by. With this email, they've demonstrated good faith, so my final impression was positive: I'd shop there again. Just not today.

What's So "Social" About LinkedIn?

I recently discovered Beth Kanter's blog on using social media for nonprofit strategy. Since the topic's right up my alley, I clicked through to her LinkedIn profile to check out her professional offerings. Her profile indicates she's open to being contacted for consulting opportunities or expertise requests. Since I'm a LinkedIn member, too, I decided to invite her to join my network, and clicked "Add Beth to your network" on her profile page.

This launched LinkedIn's Add Connections screen, below. Since I'm not sure whether Beth and I know anyone in common or are in any of the same groups, I decided to check the option "I don't know Beth" and type a friendly, personalized message in the note box:

Once I'd finished my note, I pressed Send Invitation. But LinkedIn threw this at me:

Clicking the only option in this lightbox returned me to Beth's LinkedIn profile, discarding the note I'd just composed.

LinkedIn violated a couple key UI rules, here:

• They offered the user an option that's not available. If there was no way that clicking "I don't know Beth" was going to get my message sent, LinkedIn shouldn't have showed me that option. I supposed it's possible this option is sometimes available to some users. In that case, it could be grayed and disabled for all other users, but only if there is a possibility of somehow meeting the criteria. For example, if upgrading my account would permit me to contact people I don't know, the option could be grayed-out but with a small note next to it asking for the sale.

• They threw the user's work away. LinkedIn didn't offer me the option of returning to the screen to edit my selections, or even to copy the note I'd so carefully crafted. What if I really knew Beth, but had checked the wrong radio button?

My uncharitable impression is that the rationale behind these UI choices is simply to reinforce LinkedIn's rules: "Don't contact people you don't know. They don't like it, and neither to we." Isn't there a nicer way to teach users "the rules" without scolding them?

As a social media site, LinkedIn needs to get a little more sociable.

Would you like to Next, or Submit?

Okay, buttons should be verbs. I think we can all agree. But Next and Previous, or even the ugly but more parallel Prev, are well established actions, or implied actions, so they're used a lot. But still, what verb?

At my husband's company, a vendor is developing a UI to collect clinical data about a medical procedure. First draft: a tabbed interface that requires the user to enter data on the first form, move to the next, and so on. Sound okay so far?

Each tabbed form is so long you have to scroll. Uh oh. Scrolling on tabbed interface = bad. We're not off to a strong start.

Then, here are the three buttons at the bottom of the first tab screen:

Previous  |  Next  |  Submit

Please take ten seconds and think about what each of these would do to the data you just entered into this (long, scrolling) form.

Ready?

Previous: Please recall that this is the first form. So why is previous even enabled? It does absolutely nothing.

Next: This takes you to the next tab of info to enter. But it doesn't save your data.

Submit: This runs a validation check on your data. If it passes, your data is saved. If it doesn't pass, your data is discarded. And in any case, it throws you out of the tabbed UI altogether.

Where to begin? This vendor obviously doesn't know thing one about UI design. In ten seconds I bet you came up with better ideas.

Discounting Charitable Gifts

"A survey last fall by American Express Publishing and Harrison Group found that 99% of wealthy consumers shop online, expecting goods to be discounted at least 30% from store prices." — Wall Street Journal, May 1, 2008

Twice in the last year my employer (and alma mater) has run a marketing campaign in which an anonymous donor promises $100,000 for each 1,000 gifts made during the challenge period. The goal is to drive participation by making each new gift, regardless of its value, worth an extra $100. The additional challenge money goes to financial aid, partly because it's an area of need, but also because it's broadly appealing to our constituency; an easy sell.

Challenges are a well-worn tactic of nonprofit fundraising: think public radio. They work because they lift gift value, but also because they create urgency. For us, the strategy works reasonably well. We usually see a few thousand donors fulfilling their pledges during these periods, many giving as little as $1, knowing their gift will amount to much more—up to 100 times more—when the challenge money comes in. But it's also not unusual for major annual fund donors, those who usually give in excess of $2,500, to fulfill their pledges during these campaigns, too. This is probably because we hit all non-donors hard with direct postal and email over a few weeks, and if you market, they will give. But we've always assumed the "extra $100" selling point probably doesn't carry much weight with these major donors.

But the above stat in the Wall Street Journal made me realize even the major donor might view such challenges as essentially a "discount" or "sale" on their charitable gift, because even a $2,500 gift yields a 4% premium if given during the challenge period. The donor doesn't realize a tax advantage of that additional money, but knowing it exists may make the donor feel like the "system" is giving them a better deal for the money.

This makes me wonder whether we could even more consciously leverage other mass-market phenomena like discounting, promotions, time-limited offers, and outlet sales without cheapening the enterprise. We're selling the undergraduate experience, essentially, but that's a pretty broad, generic product, even for an institution that has a strong reputation for excellence. What more specific products would connect with donors? And how can our product/marketing mix get more specific and targeted?

Obama (Mostly) Gets It

This week I donated a modest sum to Obama's candidacy. Earlier this month I started receiving email announcements from his campaign, a consequence of having joined his web community. I had already decided to contribute, so when I received a direct email solicitation, it was natural simply to click through and give.

The hook of this solicitation was the promise of a dollar-for-dollar match by another Obama supporter somewhere in the country, to whom I could subsequently send a personalized note. I entered my gift amount and card details, and learned on the confirmation screen that my matcher was "Norman." Using the form on the screen, I dropped Norman a line of thanks, declining to provide my email address because I wasn't keen to start a conversation with a stranger to whom my only connection was action politics. Once I'd submitted my note to Norman, I landed on another screen asking me to start recruiting other friends into the cause, using the site to reach out for additional support and donations. I decided to skip that step, too. I got an email confirmation of my gift a few minutes later, and left the site believing I'd done some tiny good in the world, and made a tiny connection to boot.

I also left believing the Obama camp gets it. They demonstrated by this experience that they know there's power in the emotional connection between the constituent and the candidate, but also among constituents themselves. They know that technology can facilitate that connection, and permit the constituent to make the connection as personal as she finds comfortable. They know that in marketing, there's always a next ask, and they know that on the web, there's always a next action.

But there's still some room for growth. I don't know, for example, whether my donation was tax-deductible, because neither the UI nor the email mentioned this. I don't know whether I'm going to receive a printed acknowledgment of my gift by postal mail, and whether this would be the official tax document. The net effect of this experience was more emotional than intellectual or programmatic, which is okay only to a point.

What's more, a few days after donating, I got another solicitation asking me to donate $15 or more to receive a groovy Obama car magnet. I'm not sure why I was asked again so soon; whether it was because the campaign has hasn't yet processed my gift, or because there's a policy of continual re-solicitation. (A less charitable donor might wonder whether they're disorganized or greedy.) And as a very recent donor of more than $15, shouldn't I get a car magnet, too? (Again, less charitably: shouldn't I have held my gift until I could get better swag?)

Since in my day job I design online fundraising websites, this experience has taught me a few things about designing a good fundraising web experience:

1. Ask for the sale, and always ask for the next action, but don't ask for the sale again too soon, or you'll risk alienating your loyal customers;
2. Support the donor's pragmatic requirements. Make it easy to find out the tax and financial consequences of their donation. Tell them whether to expect anything further in the mail;
3. If you offer a premium to new donors, send the premium to any new donor who's given in the last month, especially if the new premium is widely marketed;
4. If you offer a premium to new donors, offer one to repeat donors, too, and maybe even a better premium. Fundraisers know that repeat donors are more valuable than gold.

The Smiling Whale

I get the Twitter "over capacity" error screen at least once a day:

Why does this whale look so self-satisfied? And why aren't the birds straining on the ropes?

I would be embarrassed to run a web service that was so under-resourced, even if it were free to users, and I would be scrambling to enable additional capacity. Maybe the tweeting peeps at Twitter are scrambling; I don't know. This error screen sure doesn't tell me so. Maybe it should.

How Are You Feeling Right Now?

I use Basecamp from 37signals for project management. Yesterday, after getting tripped up for the second time on one feature of the app, I decided to submit a support request. Here's the support screen:

Note the last selector. Here it is, opened up:

Note that 37signals did not make the customer classify the error itself (as a bug, feature request, error message, question, etc.). Instead, they asked the customer to classify the impact of the error, which is an easier task for the customer and more meaningful for 37signals.