Archive - Edition 3: Portals

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Leading Article

What is a Portal?

What's in a Portal: MiniApps, Generic MiniApps

User-Centered Portal Design

Graphic Design and Branding

"Real" Portal Projects

 

Information Architecture for Web Portals

by Lee Barnard, Knowledge Design & Engineering, SAP AG – May 21, 2001

Disclaimer: Please note that this edition was written in 2001. Therefore, statements in the articles, particularly those regarding SAP's products, product strategy, branding strategy, and organizational structure, may no longer be valid.

Just how much help do users need to understand Web portals? What are the differences between the needs and expectations of users of traditional application software and of Web-based software? What are the different ways of presenting help in a Web environment? Is there a best way? Finding the answers to these questions is not an easy task. The major differences in approach seen in many of today's Web portals and applications show that the design concepts are at various stages of maturity. On the whole, the teams building portals are still experimenting with the various content-related and technical possibilities for presenting information. More research, experimentation, and usability testing needs to be done. This article, therefore, will not try to answer all the questions. It will, however, provide some tips on user orientation for design and development teams and some food for thought based on examples of different users.

 

Users Vary...

The various information approaches in Web portals show that the users of Web portals vary immensely. Whereas the users of traditional software are a fairly homogenous group – well-trained professionals, mainly completing regular tasks of some complexity for an employer – the users of Web portals come from all walks of life, do not all have (or necessarily need) a business background, perform less frequent and more varied tasks. Another main difference, is that the user of traditional application software does not usually have a say in the software he or she uses: employees have to use the software implemented by the employer. The users of Web portals have much more flexibility. Good Web portals have a high level of personalization, so that users can choose from a range of applications and services on offer. If the user doesn't like the application, he or she simply switches to a better one. These differences indicate that each Web portal requires a separate solution depending on the target group.

 

Identify the Target Group

In order for a Web portal to meet the information requirements successfully, the teams building the portals have to know their users. The main factor to consider right at the beginning of a software project is the target group. The development team for any type of software must keep the users in mind at all times. Initial assumptions about the types of user and typical tasks can be developed, for example, in brainstorming sessions. Here, it is important to involve people from different disciplines, such as software engineers with the necessary technical and programming knowledge, consultants with concrete business knowledge, technical writers as specialists in terminology and the formulation of texts, and – of course – usability experts with strong design skills and a practical knowledge of the processes required to design, develop, and test user-oriented software. If the software is to be internationalized, it is also important involve a mix of people with different cultural backgrounds, and ideally a professional technical translator.

 

Personas

When you examine the target group, it helps to imagine real users and to invent "personas" with real names in order to focus design efforts on the main target group (or groups) and on the typical tasks. These initial assumptions about the users can, of course, be completely wrong. The design or development team have to verify them by gathering information from real or potential users before starting on the detailed design and implementation of a new software application. This investment at the beginning of the software engineering phase can be time-consuming, but getting the design right is indispensable in the long run. Imagine spending months working out the details of a software product that nobody will ever use. Don't let this happen to you!

Studies comparing the users of Web applications with the users of traditional application software show that most users have certain things in common. For example, they all want to come up to speed quickly and get their jobs or tasks done with as little effort as possible. The main differences, however, lie in the expectations of a person using traditional software and someone using Web-based software. The different expectations have a drastic effect on the way information and help has to be designed. Let's invent some personas to illustrate the situation. You can draw you own conclusions about what works best for whom.

 

Some Personas...

Alice, 28

Alice, 28 years old, is an accounting clerk at a large shoe manufacturing company. She completed a Business Studies degree and has several years' hands-on experience. One of her main responsibilities is the period-end close which involves executing several complex programs in a predefined sequence at the end of each month. For most of the time, however, she performs routine accounting tasks, such as entering invoice information and preparing reports for the department head. Alice doesn't use a Web-based portal for her job. She knows that it would probably save her some time (especially since she has to log on to different systems), but she is happy with the personalized menu she has created in her software application allowing her quick access at least to the six transactions she regularly uses.

When Alice started her job, she went on a two-week training course and printed herself a copy of the 200-page online manual which she read at home. When she has a question, she refers to her training materials and the online help. At the beginning, she also used the context-sensitive field help to find her way around, but she now knows what the many abbreviations, symbols, and cryptic field labels on her user interface mean. If the user interface had been more self-explanatory, Alice could have mastered the application more quickly, but having too much information on the screen would probably have slowed her down in the long-run. After all, most of her transactions are ones she uses every day. Any explanations directly on the user interface she would probably just ignore after a while. If they got in her way or she had to scroll because of them, she would need some way of hiding them. But that would mean yet another function, and why make things more complicated than they already are?

Hugo, 35

Hugo, 35 years old, is the personal assistant to the manager of a medium-sized advertising agency. He only spends about 30% of his time using software – the rest of the time he is on the phone – but he needs access to a wide range of small-scale applications. For example, his manager (who does not use a computer) constantly wants to know the stock value of her and the competitors' companies. Hugo also takes care of her inbox and organizes all her appointments, which he keeps up-to-date in the Web-based electronic calendar. His boss's frequent visits to clients mean that Hugo needs access to travel information and services for booking train journeys, flights, and hotels. Hugo needs all these functions within easy reach. Switching between screens and applications just takes too long, especially when the boss needs the information quickly. Having direct access to the information, applications, and services he needs in a personalized Web portal makes life much easier for Hugo.

When he was choosing a Web portal from a range of providers, he looked at the online demos and based his decision on level of usability. When he chooses new applications, Hugo wants a brief description of what the application does, but most of all, he wants the user interface to be self-explanatory. Because of his busy schedule and frequent interruptions during his daily work, he doesn't have the time or patience to read separate documentation. If he finds an application confusing, he simply switches to one provided by the competition. After all, in the world of the Internet, as in the world of advertising, first impressions count. As Hugo is often on the move, he uses a laptop. One thing he hates are applications that rely on "mouse-over" texts to explain the symbols and functions on the user interface. The mouse-ball on his laptop just wasn't designed for that sort of navigation! Hugo prefers clear texts for field labels that explain what the field is for. Also, he judges how well an application has been designed from the texts on the pushbuttons. For Hugo, a good text should tell him exactly what the function does and shouldn't keep him guessing. He will never forget the time he applied for a job online and thought for ages about what the "Apply" button would do when he chose it. Luckily, the function didn't actually send the job application, but took him to the form for applying, where he could enter more details about his qualifications.

Incidentally, the advertising agency where Hugo works, recently ran a campaign for advertising washing machines targeted at the untapped market of single working men (who are notorious for not being able to use such gadgets and relying instead on the more personal service provided by their mothers, for example). The main selling point of the washing machine was the self-explanatory "user interface" which uses jargon-free texts and simple instructions on what to do. You didn't need an instructions manual to use this product. The underlying message of the ad was that the washing machine was so simple that even a man could use it!

Alfred, 65

Alfred, 65 years old, has just retired from his career as a retailer. He had never used a computer before in his life, but is always willing to learn and is attending evening classes. He also get lots of tips from his grandchildren who already use the Internet at school. Having the symbols for separate applications on the desktop confuses Alfred and he much prefers to start one application – his portal – and have access to the rest from there. Alfred mainly wants to use the Internet for pleasure. He likes to follow current affairs and has subscribed to a news provider that gives him a weekly update on the main international news. Alfred's other hobby is photography. His grandchildren showed him various powerful applications which would let him store his photos, index them individually, edit the images, and add special effects. But all he wants to do is sort his holiday snaps by year and display them each with the name of the place. Unfortunately there was nothing that basic on the market, so his granddaughter programmed a small application that just included the functions he wanted and no others. She knows he can be forgetful, so she incorporated the brief instructions on what to do on the user interface for him.

Some of the more serious tasks for which Alfred uses his Web portal are online shopping and home banking. He likes his online shopping application, because it offers excellent search functions and because he can see pictures of the products he is buying, the individual prices, and a running total. Also, the application is full of color which makes it just as much fun as going to a shopping mall. The security information was very important to him when he started shopping online, but he only needed to read that once. He likes the banking application, because it takes him through the transactions step by step and doesn't confront him with long forms and hundreds of choices and functions. His favorite feature is the function where he can make his own notes on each payment for future reference.

One thing that Alfred finds frustrating in the shopping and banking applications are error messages. He wishes they could be more helpful. They often just describe the problem using jargon and don't tell him what to do to solve it or how to avoid it in the future. Sometimes he finds the answer he needs in the frequently asked questions section, but that takes a bit of time, because the information is not well structured.

When he started using his Web portal, Alfred had to make some basic settings to configure and personalize the content. What helped him here was the online tutorial with very simple navigation and the friendly voice that read the texts that were printed too small for him. Learning like this takes time and patience, but the advantage for Alfred is that he can go at his own speed and repeat things as often as he likes.

 

Let's Sum Up

Three personas, three totally different sets of information requirements, three varying ways in which information is presented and used. So what's the best way? That's for you to find out – and you can start by getting to know your users!

 

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