Is your nonprofit’s website providing a good or bad experience? How do you know?
According to Peter Morville, there are 7 factors that describe the user experience. The user experience honeycomb, as he described it, is a tool for advancing the conversation beyond just whether it's easy to use.
These 7 factors make thinking about user experience more tangible and help make it more modular. It allows you to define your priorities and work on whatever is more important to you. Let’s say you want to improve your site but lack the budget or time for a complete overhaul. Why not try a targeted redesign? You can focus on one of these factors as a way to improve the user experience.
Let's expand on each of these factors:
- Useful - Is the website useful? Is it original and does it fulfil a need?
- Usable - Your site must be easy to use. To have a good user experience, usability is required but it's not the only thing!
- Desirable - Image, identity, brand, and other design elements are used to evoke emotion and appreciation
- Findable - Your site’s design must be easy to navigate so users can find what they need.
- Accessible - Your website should be accessible to people with disabilities.
- Credible - Do your users trust and believe what you tell them?
- Valuable - Your site must deliver value. Your user experience should advance your mission e.g. promotion or receiving donations.
