A/B tests done by Marketo show how costly it is to ask the visitors to enter more information about themselves on a lead generation form.

“I created three different forms, appropriately named “short form” with five fields, “medium form” with seven fields, and “long form” with nine fields, and used these on three different versions of my landing page.

• Short Form: Conversion rate 13.4%, cost per conversion $31.24
• Medium Form: Conversion rate 12.0%, cost per conversion $34.94
• Long Form: Conversion rate 10.0%, cost per conversion $41.90

As much as my sales team and I would like some of that [extra] information, it is not worth paying that much for these extra fields. Instead, we just needed to find a different way to get it. “

Read on: Two Practical Landing Page Tricks That Will Save You Money

“On the average Web page, users have time to read at most 28% of the words during an average visit; 20% is more likely.”

Read on: How Little Do Users Read?

“In publishing, less is nearly always more. Remember, the one word that describes the scan reader is impatient. Here are some guidelines for the length of your content:

• Headings: 8 words or less
• Sentences: 15-20 words
• Paragraphs: 40-70 words
• Documents: 500 words or less

Get rid of all your fancy words. Get rid of your ego. Writing effectively is not about showing off. It’s about communicating. It’s about driving actions. Write simply. Get to the point. Then stop.”

Read on: Writing for the web

Though often neglected, usability tests always prove that by far text is the most important element of UI design. It’s better to have a dumb page structure with quality copy than a nice layout with subpar text.

“Copywriting is interface design. Great interfaces are written. If you think every pixel, every icon, every typeface matters, then you also need to believe every letter matters. When you’re writing your interface, always put yourself in the shoes of the person who’s reading your interface. What do they need to know? How you can explain it succinctly and clearly?”

Read on: Copywriting is Interface Design (37 signals)

Also: Twitter Postings: Iterative Designfrom Jakob Nielsen

“The following is what I believe to be the biggest myth in the graphic and web design industry: “Our job is to design what the client wants.” […]

Let’s assume you’re not a designer anymore. Rather, you’re an accountant. Your client comes to you and says something like “I like what you’re doing with my tax return this year, but I think it would work better to …”. As an accountant, you know this tactic will hurt their business or may even be illegal.

Would you do it anyway just because the client thinks it’s the best option?”

Read on: The biggest myth of graphic and web design

Google Buzz was tested by 20,000 Google employees and still launched with a feature that generated loads of complaints until the feature was dropped.

“One of the features of Buzz was that it would automatically connect you to people whom you have emailed in Gmail. On the surface, a great idea. A slick idea, which worked really well with 20,000 Google employees. […]

Google employees are special. They’re very carefully selected by the company. They have skills, abilities, and lives that are very different from most people outside Google. […]

By not using an outside sample, Google ran into a major interaction design problem. About as big as it gets. […]

Google miscalculated when it assumed that everyone you email is someone you want to share things with, and that you might want those people connected to one another. In a work setting, this might be true. In a closed community like a corporation, this might be true. But the outside world is much messier.”

Read on: You are not your user. No matter how good you think you are

Also: You are not your user

“William Poundstone dissects the marketing tricks built into menus—for example, how something as simple as typography can drive you toward or away from that $39 steak.”

Read on: Menu mind games

Also:

• Using Menu Psychology to Entice Diners and
• Neuro-Menus and Restaurant Psychology

“The heatmaps also show how users don’t fixate within design elements that resemble ads, even if they aren’t ads […].

Even when we did record a fixation within a banner, users typically didn’t engage with the advertisement. Often, users didn’t even see the advertiser’s logo or name, even when they glanced at one or two design elements elsewhere inside an ad.”

“There are 3 design elements that are most effective at attracting eyeballs:

• Plain text
• Faces
• Cleavage and other “private” body parts “

Read on: Jakob Nielsen’ Banner Blindness: Old and New Findings

“It doesn’t matter how amazing the steak is, if it’s served on a cold plate it’s crap. If it’s served with a dull knife it’s crap. If the gravy isn’t piping hot, it’s crap. If you’re eating it on an uncomfortable chair, it’s crap. If it’s served by an ugly waiter who just came in from a smoke break, it’s crap. Because I care about the steak, I have to care about everything around it. […]

We judge humans this way so it shouldn’t be surprising that we judge software the same. That’s what is so clear about Apple. They are what they repeatedly do. They design everything, even the bits that allegedly “don’t matter”.”

Read on: The thickness of napkins

“One of the most misleading arguments used in favour of reducing visual complexity is the rule of 7 +/- 2. The rule states that the human brain can’t handle more than 7 +/- 2 items at a time. […]

The trouble with this rule is that the psychologist George Miller who formulated it was studying the limitations of short-term memory – not limitations of what people can perceive visually at a time. Humans can only retain 7 +/- 2 items in the immediate memory, but have no problem in dealing with great amounts of information in the field of vision. As long as you have information present for continuous reference, immediate memory plays no significant role in your perception.

The rule of 7 +/- 2 can be quite harmful when applied to navigation. On the surface it might seem reasonable that reducing the number of menu items of each web page will make it easier for people to navigate. But this is not true. Reducing the number of menu items will make the site hierarchy deeper and thereby increase structural complexity. Research has shown that users generally find information faster in broad and shallow menu architectures than narrow and deep ones. Roughly 16 top level links leading into 2-3 subsequent menus seems to be the most efficient and least error prone.”

Read on: Balancing visual and structural complexity in interaction design

“Usability is like cooking: everybody needs the results, anybody can do it reasonably well with a bit of training, and yet it takes a master to produce a gourmet outcome. […]

There’s a level of excellence beyond the basics: Going to a fancy restaurant and eating a meal cooked by a master chef is vastly different than eating something you throw together yourself in 20 minutes. Similarly, a usability expert will give you insights into your users’ needs and your possible design directions that are much deeper than advice you’d get from someone whose main job is in a different field.”

Read on: Jakob Nielsen - Anybody can do usability