Interface Designs of Social Networks – Part 2

This is the continuation of my blog post on the interface design of social networks. In this part I shall focus on layout and navigation.

The layout of the User Interface Design

A successful user Interface design should be as clean and contain as little “noise” as possible. This is not to say that an interface design of a social network should be featureless but it should be in a layout that doesn’t overwhelm users, in turn making them go elsewhere. Out of the social networks I decided to look at I found MySpace to have the noisiest interface design once logged in. The colors used (bright pink and baby blue flourishes) and the flashing colorful adverts were not just a slight distraction from my purposes compared to, say, Facebook’s more discreet advertisement offerings that fit and blend with the site’s interface design. I found the consistent color scheme of meinVZ’s interface design to be refreshing with the orange color being used in the design elements of the interface design as well as in the color of the fonts. I found Twitter’s interface design to be the most compact but that is understandable considering that, out of all the networks I am looking at, it has fewer features (i.e. pictures, videos etc.) to incorporate into it. Following interface design conventions allows a website to tap into “familiarity” benefits. This is why meinVZ modeled itself after Facebook and it shows how crucial interface design is in gaining and retaining customers.

Navigation of the User Interface design

Navigation is another crucial aspect of an interface design. Many social networks encourage people to upload and share a lot of information as well as use various apps. This naturally increases the complexity of a network, requiring interface designers to work even harder to ensure it is easy for users to navigate the matrix structure of social networks. The search bar is a crucial part of a social network. Users must be able to search and find their friends easily. The most common interface design convention is to have it right at the very top, usually in the middle or the right. meinVZ had it on the left below the logo but this is in keeping with their navigation which can all be found on the left of the page.  I was surprised that the Twitter search bar is not at the very top of the interface design as there is lots of space in between the logo on the left and the utilities on the right. As it is the search bar is on the right and further down but considering that users almost inevitably have to scroll down this might not be such a bad thing. As far as the layout of the interface design goes it is worth noting that users of MySpace can and nearly always change the default interface design which can make navigation problematic for some users. Of all the social networks I looked at, with the exception of meinVZ, the navigation took place at the very top along with utilities which are found at the very right. Facebook proved to be the most sparse with MySpace being the most busy. MySpace’s layout was also the most confusing without clear demarcations of the homepage. Everything was one giant hodgepodge unlike meinVZ which had thin but clear lines to keep sections separate. Another seeming interface design convention in social networks is the use of the left side of the layout for the navigation and other important links, the middle for activity streams and notification etc., and the right for less important notifications and adverts.

User Interface Design is crucial to get right in order for a website to succeed. The best way to ensure you get it right is to conduct usability testing to ensure the practicality, familiarity and ease of use before adding cosmetic flourishes. I speculate all the aforementioned social networks made use of wireframing tools, to create prototypes that were tested on average users to determine what works. Interestingly, they must have arrived at very different conclusions, since the interface designs of these social networks do differ quite a bit.