Interface or Intelligence

Although many of the points I bring up in this post are applicable to any interface, I will focus on online shopping sites. In particular, I will compare Amazon and Target searching for a decent, cheap electric kettle.

The initial effort should focus primarily on the interface and making it easy to navigate. If the public can't find what they are looking for, they won't use site and then even the best "smarts" won't be any good. However, the one "smart" that should be well developed from the beginning is a good search engine. If I don't know exactly what I want is called (for example, I think an electric kettle is called an electric teapot), the search should offer suggestions.

Once a website is well developed, then there should be a balance between smarts and interface. Again, if the interface is lacking, costumers will be annoyed and avoid the site. One of the current, popular bad designs (in my opinion, at least), is menus that pop-up when your mouse passes over them and mostly fill the screen. They block whatever you were looking at and rarely contain detailed enough groupings to be useful. Unfortunately, Target has chosen to use these on their website.

Another very important interface consideration is what the user needs to click to see the detailed product information. Clicking either the picture or the text will bring up the detailed description on most shopping sites, including Amazon and Target.

Not too surprisingly, both Amazon and Target have similar information - features, reviews, additional product information (size, ASIN #, ...). All of this information is considered standard and customers expect the interface to have them. A designer should make sure the interface contains at least the minimum expected information and in any easy to see interface. Any intelligence (for example, the "Customers Who Viewed This Item Also Viewed" section on Amazon) are extras and should only be worked on once a good interface is developed. However, if two interfaces are roughly equal, the customer will probably choose (at least to figure out what they want) the smarter site.

In summary, the initial design effort should be a good interface with a helpful search. Once that is developed, then most of the development should be in developing intelligence.