Site Design Approaches

Internet	Intranet
• Curiosity oriented	• Goal oriented
• Used to market and sell a product or service	• Used to manage and publish high volumes of structured content
• Requires a high “wow factor” to capture attention	• Usability and clarity are preferred over flashiness
• Designed to maximize users’ contact with site	• Designed to allow quick retrieval of content
• Must be conducive to casual surfing and exploration	• Always available for reference: “Find it and forget it”

Intranet presentation and layout tips:

1. Keep it clean. The design must be simple and intuitive, focusing on usability rather than glitz.

2. Intranets don’t need splash screens. The only time splash screens are acceptable in intranets is for user login or in multilingual companies for language selection.

3. Avoid designing purely Flash-based sites; they’re not right for most intranet applications. In order for them to work, all content providers would have to be familiar with, and have the tools for, Flash development—highly unlikely. Some intranets, however, can benefit from sections with Flash content—where Flash contributes to usability.

4. Avoid the use of “floating” page designs. The empty borders surrounding them will eat up valuable screen real estate.

5. Minimize the use of animation. Moving objects on the screen have a tendency to draw users’ attention away from what they’re reading.

6. For the sake of users who do lengthy intranet research, steer clear of opposing highcontrast colors—white text on a black background or yellow text on blue background—that cause edge shimmering and color aftereffect.

7. Always offer clean, printable versions of intranet content for portability (when users work from home or are traveling, in meetings, etc.).