I'm on a page here to fill out a help ticket because my land line isn't working. They've asked me a question:

What is your preferred method of contact?

As far as I can tell, that question only has one answer. Yet Verizon offers three:

So I checked all three, only to find out which they will try first (I'm user testing Verizon!)

What's the point of this question if all answers can be selected? Certainly some people will omit one, or even two, but that still leave the customer service representative with a decision to make. As psychologists will tell you, we subconciously hate making decisions, especially when presented with too many options. (See chapter 5)

Having at least one of these choices selected by default would also be very effective. The UX designer should use metrics to see what method is most popular, and have that one selected by default. Or perhaps there is a business requirement than unless a customer really wants to be called (expensive), opt them in for e-mail or text first. But pick something.

If Verizon tries to contact you with your preference and it fails, they can fall back to the others. Else, you'll call someone who prefers to be texted first, and e-mail someone who wants to be called first.

People would certainly appreciate this e-mail message from Verizon:

We know you prefer to be contacted via text message, but we were unable to reach you. Please reply back so we can assist you.  

or this phone call:

Hi is this Shawn? Hi Shawn. This is Verizon calling about the ticket you submitted. I know you indicated you wanted to be contacted via e-mail, but we never heard back from you so we're reaching out to you now. Is this a good time to talk?

That at least shows intelligence and caring on the part of Verizon.

Here's a screenshot of the entire page.

Check out this fantastic article and accompanying transcript of a speech by Dieter Rams in 1976. If you don't know Dieter, you should. He designed much of Braun's products. These products have inspired generation after generation of designer, including Apple.

Here's the ten principles of good design. Sound familar?

Updated! The bees have been moved to Avenue B. I kid you not!

]]> http://shawnchittle.com/2012/me/happy-mothers-day/feed/ 0 http://shawnchittle.com/2012/usability-design/when-the-ux-is-so-annoying-they-dont-even-bother-to-listen/ http://shawnchittle.com/2012/usability-design/when-the-ux-is-so-annoying-they-dont-even-bother-to-listen/#comments Thu, 10 May 2012 00:55:55 +0000 Shawn Chittle http://shawnchittle.com/?p=3564

Music is something that is in all of us. An old guitar player friend of mine once said "Music isn't an invention, it's a discovery." I always liked that expression.

But our love of music is still not enough to get over bad UX. Take a look at this article on Detroit Techno (a personal favorite).

The comments are not about the music or article, but how annoying and hard it is to go from page to page.

"No next button."

"Why are you making me click this tiny number?"

And comment after comment continues. The point of the article is completely missed.

It appears to me that more and more, if you're not going to do it right, you might as well not even bother.

I owe Adam and the Beastie Boys a lot. As a white kid growing up in a predominately black school in Flint Michigan, I discovered rap at its very early stages. In 1980 my buddy gave me a mix tape of what was no doubt an early South Bronx rap pause tape with someone rhyming over the top. I was hooked. I was breakdancing and DJing and having the time of my life!

Fast forward to Fall of 1986. I was sent to a wealthy school district where my father worked. This was an almost all-white school, and they were into Depeche Mode, The Cure, INXS, and stuff like that. Alternative rock music, with a little Michael Jackson and Bobby Brown thrown in for good measure. My hip-hop aesthetic was largely shunned and making friends was almost impossible.

Then the Beastie Boys License to Ill dropped that November, and the rest is history. I was giving DJ and breakdance lessons to everyone I knew. Suddenly, it was cool to wear Adidas warm up pants when you weren't at the gym, and people quit calling me names.

Upon hearing of Adam's death, I was crushed. So I went downstairs and put out an old photo of the Beastie Boys from the early 80's along with a little historical note about 171A and a few candles. It was picked up by E.V. Grieve and The New York Times. I also got word that the Beastie Boys longtime publicist, Steve Martin, was notified. I hope Adam's family realizes he will never be forgotten, and even obscure events in his life are obsessed over.

A lot of people never knew the Beastie Boys recorded their first album here, although its a shame that Adam's death has to be a reminder to the public of their roots here on the Lower East Side.

My heart goes out to Adam's family and friends. He changed the world. He and the Beastie Boys certainly made my life easier.

Rest in peace, Adam.

CSS media queries are about the coolest thing to come along in a long time. What are they? Simple, really. Snippets of CSS code that sniff the browser width and adjust what's presented in real-time. If you have a huge browser window, the site is displayed as it was originally designed. As you resize your browser and make it smaller, or you are using an iPad or even an iPhone, the existing content re-arranges.

Take a look at the set of images above. On the far right is the site as it was originally designed. As the browser gets smaller (left) on all the way down to the very narrow mobile version (far left) you'll see some of the content has dropped off. This is not a bad thing! This just respects the smaller browser window and optimizes the experience. Great stuff!

In other words, you really don't have to create a "mobile-friendly" site per se, you can just present what you have in a mobile-optimized way.

Frankly it's quite fun to resize these sites down and see what they think are important, and what is getting dropped off.

Try it on hundreds of examples which can be found at the Media Queries showcase site.

Why do Denmark, Netherlands, the UK and Germany have such small organ donor rates? It turns out it has to do with the organ donor form. For the countries with low donor rates, the form says this:

This requires an active decision to join the program. You  have to opt-in. By doing nothing, you opt-out. Even though you are dead, and don't need your body anymore or your organs, very few people ever check that box. The only reason the Netherlands got 28% was the government sent a letter to every single driver, begging them to donate their organs.

Now, how about Austria, Belgium, France, Hungary, etc? How come they have nearly 100% donor rates? Take a look at what their organ donor form says:

See that? If you take no action, you are enrolled in the program! You opt-in by doing nothing. Sneaky and clever? Probably not. It's just human behavior. By taking no action - making no decision - we've made one. And that's less complicated, taxing, and mentally straining.

People don't check either box.

So as a result, try changing your forms so that by taking no action, that's the action you want them to take.

Source: Dan Ariely, 2008