User Friendly Is Not Always Business Friendly
Peter Merholz and Jeff Lash agree: user friendly web sites don’t always meet the needs of the business, i.e. make money.
In his most recent IAnything Goes, Jeff Flash discusses The myth of User-Centered Information Architecture:
As usability and information architecture started to gain prominence, the scales started to move in the other direction, sometimes too far. The cult(ure) of usability made people disregard the business aspects and throw their full faith in the users. This led to decision paralysis, where no decision could be made—no matter how small—without donning the white lab coat and testing it on the users. What is good for the user, however, is not always good for the business. Users were happy, but businesses failed.
Two weeks ago, Digital Web interviewed Peter Merholz, who had similar thoughts:
The primary problem of user-centered design is that people engage in it at the expense of all else. Oftentimes, what is *most* useful, usable, and meaningful to the end-user is untenable from a business perspective, and the product, while maybe popular, is a financial failure.
Update (October 25, 2002): A great discussion about this topic is going on over at WebWord.
- 24 Oct 02
- balance, business, ecommerce, information architecture, usability
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