But if you're responsible for a website at the University of Edinburgh (or maybe you just provide material for a couple of pages), these are the things I really recommend you take a look at.
University content management
- 10 harsh truths about university websites by Paul Boag: Paul works extensively in the UK public sector and both the article and presentation here are insightful and entertaining.
- Gerry McGovern on university web publishing: Gerry is a content management specialist, and here turns his attention to how universities deal with website management.
- Content is critical, delete some - Gerry McGovern: A selection of short articles that should be read by anyone beginning a revamp of their website. The most important aspect - the content - is so often the one that gets least attention.
- Usability is your online brand - Gerry McGovern: "The experience your customers have completing their top tasks has a big influence on what they think of your organization and brand".
- Photos as web content - Jakob Nielsen uses eyetracking evidence to illustrate the kinds of images that add value to your content and the kinds that tend to get ignored.
- Content strategy resources: Advice and resources to help you better understand what you've got online and what you want your website content to do for your organisation.
- Website Owners Manual by Paul Boag: If you manage a university website, you need this book. It gives a great overview of everything you need to know, then tells you to go out and buy Don't Make Me Think.
- Don’t Make Me Think by Steve Krug: If you only ever read one book about improving your website, make it this one. I've posted links to a few free chapters.
- Rocket Surgery Made Easy by Steve Krug: Steve's follow up book is a beginners guide to usability testing. It's an excellent beginners' guide. Free chapters, resources to download and a demo video.
- Letting Go of the Words by Ginny Reddish: If you write web content, you should have this book.
- Research-based usability guidelines - Usability.gov: An excellent (and free) reference manual to download. Before testing yourself, check these guidelines.
- How little do users read?: Jakob Nielsen's findings around how long website visitors spend reading content.
- Users scroll but rarely read: Research highlighting the areas of the page that get read the most.
- Writing great headings, summaries and links: Tips from Jakob Nielsen and Gerry McGovern on getting the most important parts of your web content right.
- Plain English Campaign free guides: How to write in plain English and an A to Z of alternative terms.
- 10 top tips for web and email copy: A quick refresher.
- Steve Krug on the least you can do about usability: A 40 minute presentation. Steve's presentation is as engaging as his writing, and as with his books, makes a great case for prioritising usability.
- Public sector website usability - the return on investment: by Jakob Nielsen: Jakob's articles make a strong case for improving the usability of non-commercial websites.
- Biggest ROI from a usability fix? $300M for Jared Spool: An inspiring case study of when improving usability really paid off.
- Steve Krug's usability test demo: Steve shows exactly how an accompanied surf session should be conducted.
- Usability testing scripts & checklists from Steve Krug: Free downloads to compliment his demo video, produced for his Rocket Surgery book.
- Preparing for usability testing: A couple of great articles on organising usability testing, with lots of useful tips.
- Checking content scannability: Five second tests by Jared Spool: This is so simple. There really is no reason why we shouldn't all be checking the effectiveness of our important content pages.
- User testing done for you - usertesting.com: An excellent service which - if you have experience of testing - may save you time and money.
- Snagit - a great prototyping tool: Cheap, simple, powerful. The best graphics package for knocking up quick prototypes and annotating screenshots, bar none. And you don't really need to know anything about graphics packages to use it.
- Prototyping templates for Visio: If you use Visio, these free templates are excellent.
- Firefox plugin to record user testing sessions: The free Deja Click plugin records the pages visited, links clicked and text typed into a small file that can be emailed, making remote testing possible too.
