I often hear people mention that an operation or action takes “too many clicks”. Clicks themselves are relatively harmless critters. On their own they’re small, innocuous actions that put little burden on the user experience. What can impact the overall user experience is the weight of each click. Ten clicks with little weight will flow effortlessly from the user, but a few heavy clicks can really kill a user’s rhythm. A click’s weight falls into four main categories:
Decision Time
This is the time it takes for a user to decide that they need to click on something.
Suggestions: This greatly depends on your application. If your application will be used frequently then the user’s decision time will decrease as they learn how to use it (this may also apply to second guessing). If your application will not be used frequently then it’s best to make available actions obvious and to appeal to the user’s past experiences by making it familiar.
Seek Time
This is the time it takes a user to visually locate a button (or link) and move the mouse to that location. For keyboard users it’s the time it takes to decipher the appropriate hot key.
Suggestions: Use gestalt theory to drive the layout of your UI. Group similar items and make available actions obvious. Provide gestures that mimic the minipulation of physical objects. Use animation, brightness, and contrast to guide the user’s eye. Make shortcut keys apparent. Keep accessibility in mind (especially color blindness).
Second Guessing
Users guess frequently when using an interface, drawing on past experiences, but second guessing adds weight to a click. What will happen when I click? Will the application act immediately or will I be prompted first? What risk is involved with this operation? Can the operation be undone?
Suggestions: Build on the user’s past experiences. Add an ellipsis when a dialog precedes an action. Properly warn users of the risk. Don’t group actions that can’t be undone with those that can. Experiment with positioning and scale to communicate weight. Use expressive iconography. Provide extended ”helptips” rather than tooltips. Remember that users are less likely to second guess when they trust your application.
Wait Time
This is the time spent waiting after a click is performed.
Suggestions: Never allow the UI to lock or freeze (I cannot emphasize this enough). Provide visual feedback of progress. Provide detailed feedback of long running operations. If an operation can be performed asynchronously then don’t force the user to wait for it to complete. Perceived performance has great deal of influence, time flies when you’re occupied.
When designing an application think about how you can make a click weigh less if you’re unable to remove it completely, or if it wouldn’t make sense to do so.
