Re:Nasa's Visual Universe
by btilly on Wednesday March 06, 2019 @02:59PM
(#19322171)
I am not assuming.
I spent several years working in A/B testing. Based on behavior, none of the artistic branding made any difference to whether users got engaged in sites. Make the site fast. Put your action items in prominent places on the page. Make them big and obvious. Make the site usable. Make it easy for people to get to what they want. Those things mattered again and again. But pretty aesthetics? Never once have I seen it matter.
Want to piss off a designer? Subject the designs to an A/B test. Want to really piss off a designer? Show the resulting null result to the designer afterwards.
As far as I am concerned, anyone focused on the look and feel of webpages serves the purpose of making the people who own and run the site happy. If they talk about what the users want, I have to ask what testing they have done with actual users. If they can't produce tests, then I conclude that they are spouting BS.
If this does not sound possible to you, I would suggest that you explain the enduring popularity of minimalist websites like craigslist, plentyoffish and google.
I spent several years working in A/B testing. Based on behavior, none of the artistic branding made any difference to whether users got engaged in sites. Make the site fast. Put your action items in prominent places on the page. Make them big and obvious. Make the site usable. Make it easy for people to get to what they want. Those things mattered again and again. But pretty aesthetics? Never once have I seen it matter.
Want to piss off a designer? Subject the designs to an A/B test. Want to really piss off a designer? Show the resulting null result to the designer afterwards.
As far as I am concerned, anyone focused on the look and feel of webpages serves the purpose of making the people who own and run the site happy. If they talk about what the users want, I have to ask what testing they have done with actual users. If they can't produce tests, then I conclude that they are spouting BS.
If this does not sound possible to you, I would suggest that you explain the enduring popularity of minimalist websites like craigslist, plentyoffish and google.