Comments on Inconspicuous Consumption: Lessons for Web Design from Mall and Retail Design

satya — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 14:50:39 GMT

Hi Saul,
Its a really interesting reading. I had done one similar comparison to Information Structuring/Clustering and the Singapore Changi Airport. I think a lot can be learnt and adapted from successfull ‘offline’ models.

About your comment – ‘they move forward in the prescribed order’
In my opinion, this would work only with the first time users. It is quite frustrating to move in a prescribed order for a repeat customer/user and for someone who is not really interested in looking around, exploring things.

- Satya

Brendan Hamley — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 14:50:39 GMT

This is really an issue of anticipation. What’s the question in a users mind at a certain point (whether linear or floating) and what’s the logical next step…

“I’ve got the cereal, now where’s the milk?” = “I’ll apply for this mortgage, but what about insurance?” = “I’ve learned business presentation basics, but what tools do I use to put one together?”

Needs are never linear, but processes are. There’s a distinction, and identifying that distinction is part of the discipline behind quality design.

Derek Rogerson — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 14:50:39 GMT

Maybe it needs a permalink ??

Adam Greenfield — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 14:50:39 GMT

...which I think is precisely what accounts for the failure of e-learning as I’ve known it.

Look, Saul, at what you’re saying: we’ve managed to take the process of learning – which can be engaging, sparkling even – and drain it so radically of interest that only externally-imposed carrots or sticks suffice to drag users trudgingly through it.

“Tolerated,” yes. But I would hope we’re all aiming a little higher than that.

(None of the above should be read as implying my disagreement with you on any of your broader points, however, which I think are quite sound.)

Derek R., I’m finding the point you’re attempting to make incoherent.

Saul Carliner — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 14:50:39 GMT

First, thanks for the comments. I appreciate the conversation that you have generated regarding the first installment of “Inconspicuous Consumption.”

I’d like to clarify a point on the supermarket analogy, which has generated a lot of conversation.

My web experience is primarily limited to functional information—technical procedures, training, and post-sales material. And perhaps it’s not clear, but the focus of this article is on that type of content, not content that’s primarily intended for marketing or other types of pre-sales and general information.

Although linking and non-linear structures are widely used in functional content, there are certain instances in which linear structures are used and users tolerate them.

For example, some e-learning uses linear structures and, because learners either must complete the lesson as a job requirement or to get a much-sought-after certification, they move forward in the prescribed order.

In situations like that, learners can be led past the cereal before getting to the milk (in a figurative manner of speaking).

Saul

Prescott Wright — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 14:50:39 GMT

I think one of the most valuable things we can learn from retail, especially supermarkets, is how to target our advertising.

When you walk into a supermarket you don’t see a big sign in the middle of the entrance telling you that Ritz crackers, Heinz Ketchup, and Cod fish are on sale. Don’t necessairly devote your home page to advertising. Display your advertising on specific targeting content pages within the site.

The supermarkets have become very creative at this targeted advertising, and I believe we can learn from this in the online world.

Brendan Hamley — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 14:50:39 GMT

I’ve often used the supermarket analogy to re-enforce design concepts.

It seems to help people to understand a medium or concept not readily within their grasp. Using a comparison to something they really do understand (supermarket/shopping) forges a leap between concept and reality.

Retail is about making sales and moving people efficiently through a planned physical space. Our medium is about making people click (an information sale), and ease of movement through conceptual or anticipated space.

I don’t see ANY difference there.

Users require good value for their clicktime, just as they would want VFM or convenience from their shopping time. Basically, they want stuff, are browsing, comparing, or aspiring. Whatever, they want their stuff cheap, quick and convenient.

The real issue for me, is about understanding (and meeting) human need, deploying some common sense and realising that most human activity remains fairly constant wherever it takes place.

Whether ‘shopping’ happens in the virtual or in the virtu-mall makes no difference, we should aim to meet the underlying behavioural requirements of our users. If this happens, they’ll return time and again.

Derek R — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 14:50:39 GMT

>Are you saying I can attain spiritual enlightenment by clicking a lot?

No. But I am saying spiritual enlightenment does not happen all-by-itself (Rev 3:20). Labor will be required. Nothing is free (birth-right).

*Now* is the time of decision. So that—

....if the milk is at the back of the store the customer has the opportunity to go get it. Of course, convenience-stores have carved out their own niche-market but not everybody (read outside of IA / IT) regards http://amazon.com as their ‘little darling,’ (wearing the rose-colored glasses), just as not everybody wants to always (as an act of conquest) shop at the Wal-Mart.

You say you have milk in here somewhere?

Tim Wilson — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 14:50:39 GMT

Are you saying I can attain spirtual enlightenment by clicking alot? Perhaps we should make hyperlinks triple and quadruple clickable as attonement for others sins.

Saying that I believe that user-commitment is important but making buying difficult runs against the principles of any free market economy

tim.

Tim Wilson — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 14:50:39 GMT

Saul, I found this article very interesting in its application of concepts from one discipline to another.

However, as Adam Greenfield has stated we are dealing with non-linear space: It’s much easier to back out of a site than leave a shopping mall.

In many ways classic site architectures (amazon.com) already go far beyond the revenue-generating strategies adopted by shopping malls and dept. stores: Imagine a store rep following you around shuffling inventory on the shelves to suit your needs, or accurately logging what food you buy and offering recipes based on those choices. The impersoanl nature of best-fit shelf stocking gives way to greater personalisation, greater convenience and therefore more dynamic and selective marketing of products.

Finally “make ‘em walk(click)” runs counter to the most fundamental principles of good web design, especially when one can recommend in the same space: Online you don’t move around the world, the world moves around you….

tim.

Derek R — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 14:50:38 GMT

>”make ‘em walk” is premised on the linearity of physical space [& therefore NOT transferable to Web-space]

Actually, “make ‘em walk” (Exodus) is more than just biology-in-space. Your forgetting a real experience (Gen 3:19) and consequent reward (value of labor) which does ‘pay off’ (Revelation) even in Web or virtual space.

In other words, *to be self-sufficient* provides spiritual benefit—an expression of human accomplishment and mastery over environment—otherwise unattainable in a “no stopping” model.

Without user-commitment (labor)—there can be no heart or identity.

Adam Greenfield — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 14:50:38 GMT

Interesting approach, Saul, and I agree that there are some real nuggets to be gleaned by studying retail design.

IMO, however, “make ‘em walk” is not one of them, because the success of this technique – and other revenue-generating, intentional confoundments of user desire – is premised on the linearity of physical space.

Fine, put the milk at the back of the 7-11; I’m sure time-and-motion studies would indeed trace a path to it, with little clusters around the impulse items displayed along the way to the refrigerator case. But just try that on a website – you’ll see your audience click offsite faster than you can say “Gruen Effect.”

I love and value highly interdisciplinary thinking, I just think it needs to be applied with discretion and care if it is to yield useful results…