The University of Western Australia's website http://www.uwa.edu.au is constantly complained about. In the last user survey, 43% of staff expressed some dissatisfaction with the site. But the site does have lots of good parts to it and has been improving over the past few years as more people become aware of the importance of their web presence. And when compared to other university websites, is it really that different?
So what is it about the site that doesn't work for its users? Were the issues simply a reflection of a problem at a given point in time that has now been addressed as there are improvements of parts of the website occurring constantly? Probably not. The problems with the UWA website are systemic even though there are numbers of exemplars of good design, content, architecture and usefulness.
University websites exemplify a type of website that supports multiple "personas" or "role types" in its users. 15 year old school kids will rub shoulders with undergraduates and professors (both UWA and non-UWA) all utilising the website for different purposes. The most common way that websites have dealt with this is either to offer different navigation paths through the same content with or without superficial text around the links giving "user-appropriate" guidance. But it ends up being the same content that they end up with and that may, or may not, be appropriate.
Looking at the problems of the UWA website and abstracting those to guiding principles for good website design, some general characteristics of good website design has emerged. Although these have resulted in a review of a University website, the principles are general. Applied to a great site like the BBC, all of the principles apply.
A good website is one that is...
[1] COHERENT
Different areas of a website serving the same function to look function in the same way i.e. if you visit the School of Plant Biology's website, it should be structurally similar to the School of Humanities' website. Staff lists should be in the same place with the same details.
[2] CURRENT
There is no point in putting information on the web if it is out-of-date or inaccurate. Maintaining the web is a daily activity.
[3] USEFUL
The content serves some purpose. It is useful, consistent, discoverable, well written, customised to the reader's persona and meet some need even if this is simply entertainment.
[4] PERSONALISED
The experience of the website is tailored to the individual visiting it. The BBC website for example configures the news based on whether you want an International, UK or other perspective. External visitors to the site shouldn't have to navigate or see pages or links that they have no interest or access to.
[5] DATA-DRIVEN
Wherever possible, content on the web should be driven out of structured data stored in databases rather than "hard-coded" into web pages. Examples of data-driven web content would be staff lists, research profiles (publications, grants, and research interests), unit, and course information.
[6] INTERACTIVE
People interact with a website – the model should be push as well as pull. The website should allow comments, blogs, feeds.
[7] ATTRACTIVE
The design should be coherent, attractive, customised, accessible, and follow best-practice design guidelines. Current design stresses simplicity with a content focus.
[8] RESPONSIVE
The website should be responsive and make allowance for users with different data access speeds (this can be built into the personalised aspects of the site).