Mon Dec 24 13:03:23 PST 2018

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I drove off to find another gas station. I then realized there were no other close gas
stations. I went back. I almost got into a wreck on my way back to the gas station.
Now I was enraged.
I arrived at the gas station and waited in line again. The car in front of me would
not back up to let the person who just finished pumping, out. I had to wait until
the van on the other side was done. I then had to wait for the guy who would not
move to finish.
Negative Advertising
I was finally ready to pump my gas. I tried to use my credit card, but after about a
minute of processing, a warning flashed up at me: ?Please See Cashier?System
Down.? On the pump it stated ?pump then pay.? So I tried to pump. It did not
work.
I went inside and asked the cashier what was up. While snacking on his food he
said, ?(crunch
Sorry, I had not got around to turning your pump on yet.? Mind
you it said pump THEN pay. I had been trying for a few minutes at this point.
I went back outside and pumped my gas. I left vowing never again to visit that gas
station. It was a Mobile in Mystic, Connecticut (just off the interstate
, and I still
vividly remember the sign in my head as well as the cashier who was snacking while
he should have authorized my pump.
If That Gas Station was a Web site
What was the point of that tangent about a gas station? It took longer to tell the
story than it will take to make my point. I was reading Designing Web Usability by
Jakob Nielsen about the same time I had that bad day, and this nugget of truth
came to me?there is no page that is so important that I cannot go elsewhere. If
that gas station was a website, I would have left.
Many people find your website through search engines. Other sites may link to
your inner pages. There is no way to tell where traffic will come from.
I never see the shopping cart on many sites because they make it a challenge just to
get there. I have abandoned many shopping carts. Most websites have miserable
usability. I must admit some of my sites needs some work in this area too?it is
one of the most neglected aspects of web design.
Web Example
This comes from a usability/design example story found on page 69 of Taking Your
Talent to the Web by Jeffrey Zeldman.
I left my baby daughter in the car while I went to buy dope. Then I drove away. I?d
gone about five blocks when I realized my daughter wasn?t in the car anymore.