Heavily formatted content dismissed as ads

The U.S. Census Bureau’s website was recently used to demonstrate that areas of a webpage that are heavily formatted are often overlooked by visitors.

by Helen Leggatt

Jakob Nielsen, the usability expert that recently wrote about “banner-blindness”, has posted further informative and revealing details of another eye-tracking study.

When using the U.S. Census Bureau’s website as an example, just 14 percent of visitors managed to find the site’s Population Clock despite it being displayed in big red text in the top right hand corner of the webpage.

Many of the 86 percent who couldn’t “see” the Population Clock even went on to search via Google or other sources instead.

So why wasn’t the prominently placed statistic instantly visible to the majority of site visitors?

According to Nielsen, “Beyond banner blindness, the major reason this homepage failed is that it used made-up terms or branded descriptions rather than plain-spoken words. Terms like "Population Clock," "Population Finder," and "QuickFacts" are not as descriptive as a simple line of text that says: Current population of the United States: 302,740,627.”

So, to minimize the dismissal of website content as advertising, ensure it’s written in copy that matches the website’s tone, steer clear of marketing-speak and don't go heavy on the formatting.