Comments on: Navigation versus search

By: Karl Gilis

Karl Gilis — Mon, 31 May 2010 16:29:56 +0000

@Regine

Gerry McGovern’s number is in a totally different context. I quote: “Recently, we did some extensive task testing with a technical audience. 70 percent started the task by clicking on a link, 30 percent used search.”

1. A technical audience
As we said in our article, those people use search more often than ‘normal people’.

2. Task testing
This is a kind of user testing. That’s not at all comparable with the average of all users based on log files.
Among those will also be returning visitors, people coming from Google etc. People that use search less frequently than fresh visitors landing on the homepage, where with a user test the first task almost always starts.

By: Els Aerts

Els Aerts — Mon, 31 May 2010 16:27:14 +0000

@Regine Lambrecht: I’m sure more than 5% of visitors on eBay use the search feature too. The percentage of visitos who use the search feature depends on the nature of the website, as stated in the article.

I’d advise everyone to do as Lou did: check your statistics to find out how many people search on your site and take it from there.

Maybe your search needs improving. Maybe your navigation does. Maybe they both do.

By: Regine Lambrecht

Regine Lambrecht — Mon, 31 May 2010 15:59:33 +0000

Just saw the following statistics of 30% using the search engine : http://www.gerrymcgovern.com/nt/2010/nt-2010-04-26-Navigation-search.htm

By: Browse Versus Search [Organizing Content 9] | I'd Rather Be Writing - Tom Johnson

Wed, 26 May 2010 14:38:09 +0000

[...] Granted, help files and websites aren’t exactly the same thing, but they are similar. AGConsult says, Google might be insanely popular but that doesn’t mean the search feature on your website [...]

By: Lou Storiale

Lou Storiale — Tue, 11 May 2010 05:02:54 +0000

I used to think the opposite – that no one searched. I conducted several usability studies and sat behind the targeted visitor during a few task-oriented questions. I anticipated them using the navigation menu and wouldn’t you know it, about 30% of them went straight to the internal search box.

WoW! How’s that for getting out of your own head. We quickly took care of some of the much needed search fixes.

By: Bas Zurburg

Bas Zurburg — Wed, 05 May 2010 21:28:50 +0000

Good points: Search is OK when the navigation is bad. I like point 5 especially: search is limited because visitors can only pull content (Or ask for content).

In the same perspective: No one asked for iPhones, people didn’t search for it. They were pushed.

By: Eduardo Gimenes

Eduardo Gimenes — Wed, 05 May 2010 18:33:10 +0000

These two issues are distinct components of information architecture, navigation and search systems

They should not be compared, they must be added to the project

By: IntranetLounge

IntranetLounge — Wed, 05 May 2010 08:29:51 +0000

Navigation versus search – The Web Usability Blog…

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