Web design tips: Usability and User Experience (unrequested sound effects or music)

This video shows how an otherwise competent website gets things badly wrong by adding a totally unnecessary, distracting and unpleasant sound effect. On every page.

The quick lesson: visitors will find it much easier to navigate away from your site than to turn their sound down.

Unless your website is based around sound or music, there is rarely any need to offer any kind of audio effects. And you should certainly never force noise on your visitors with no explanation or without providing a simple way to switch it off.

This usability lesson was produced by Smashing Content Ltd.

We provide affordable website design, hosting, usability and digital copywriting services.

Visit us at: http://www.smashing-content.com

We thank the Brookside Guest House Bed & Breakfast for this example.

Visit them at: http://www.brooksidebrixham.co.uk/

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• website
• design
• usability
• user
• experience
• digital
• copywriting
• smashing
• content
• how-to
• guide
• sound
• effects
• noise
• samples