Essay on Web Usability: Krug's 'Don't Make Me Think' Principles

This essay provides an in-depth analysis of Steve Krug's seminal work, "Don't Make Me Think!" which focuses on web usability principles. The student explores key concepts from the book, including the importance of intuitive design, clear navigation, and the need to minimize cognitive load for users. The essay examines Krug's core statements, such as "Don't make me think," "Clarity trumps consistency," and the significance of consistent navigation. By referencing these principles, the essay emphasizes the importance of creating websites that are easily scannable, straightforward, and user-friendly, ultimately contributing to a positive user experience. The student also discusses the application of these principles in real-world web design scenarios, highlighting the significance of user-centered design in achieving effective and engaging online experiences. The essay includes the importance of user psychology and how designers should understand it to make the user feel happy for the product.

Running head: PRINCIPLE OF WEB DESIGN
PRINCIPLE OF WEB DESIGN
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1PRINCIPLE OF WEB DESIGN
The book named “Don’t Make Me Thing” of the writer Steve Krug is considered the
best guidance between the UX designers. This book is important for the user who are in the
field of products design. It is the practical guide to understand the web usability and the
experience of the user. In this book, the writer mentioned some useful principles of guiding
which can help the designers (Giurgiu and Gligorea 2017, p. 3). According to the writer, if
any user looks at any web page, this should be self-explanatory, obvious and self-evident.
Also the writer describes the dissimilarity among how someone think that user use the web
site with how the user really use the web site via three life facts, first one is that user do not
read the pages , they scan the pages. The second one is that user do not create prime choices
rather satisfice. Lastly, user do not discover the process of the things. By this, the writer
highlights the major problem which all the designers also the users face now a days.
The main aim behind the user experience is to create the users feel happy fort the
product, making this easiest for gaining what they are wanted to do also make the total
process valuable to the business of the user (Bader and Hammouri 2016, p. 32). There are
many statements are stated by the writer Krug in which the three most important statements
are discussed in the above.
Chapter 1: “Don’t make me think!”
In the first chapter of this book, the writer Krug give the statement which is also the
name of this book is “Don’t make me think”. In this chapter, the writer is stated the first law
of the usability. The first law of the usability stated not to make the users think that is the user
should not have for thinking regarding anything whenever they are landed on any website for
first time. This is related to all the features of design from the positioning of logo also the
links to the total content and the technique of the writing of it. The design of any web page or
anything which user is designed, should be obvious and self-evident. Users should have the

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ability to get it rapidly after checking the screen. If the user spend maximum time to think
regarding the components and what all these are for, maximum hurdles that the user present
in the procedure of experiencing or the exploring the product also the costs users in their
valuable time.
Figure 1: First law of usability
(Source: Krug 2000, p. 29)
So for this reason, the screens or the web page is made such a way that the user who
has not a brief idea regarding this screen or the product. Also, just with the glance, the user
should be able to get it what can the user do in this web page (Perdomo et al. 2017, p. 12). So
it can be recognized from this above statement of the writer Krug that if someone cannot
create the page self-evident then he or she can make this things self-explanatory, which
stands that this needs the small thought for comprehending. Also the most significant motive
for making these things self-evident is that the users do not expend much more time on the
page they visit.
Chapter 3: “clarity trumps consistency”
Another concept of web design is regarding the convention and the consistency. The
writer of this book Krug is defined the interesting point that the “clarity trumps consistency”.

3PRINCIPLE OF WEB DESIGN
In this chapter three, the writer is described the significance of the consistency also the
conventions, but at the same time period, he is also mentioned that the approvals and the
awards for this great designs that are hardly ever based on the conditions such as the best use
of the conventions (Zimmermann et al. 2018, p. 17). Sometime the designers have a need for
making the new and fresh design to substitute the remaining convention, however they are
stopped themselves for avoiding the problems of the usability.
The writer Krug delivers two very simple guidelines for solving this issue. One is to
make this so perfect also self-explanatory so that there is no curve of leaning can present and
it is as perfect as convention. /the second one is to add a huge value so that this is worth the
small curve of learning (Liu et al. 2018, p. 23). These discussed two concepts can also use for
the consistency. Krug also said that if user can create something expressively clearer by
creating this to some extent unpredictable, select in the support of clarity. So from this
concept, it can be determined that the web designer should not be scared for exploring the
creativity in their designs with the understanding that the experience of the user is given the
maximum priority also their design compliments this.
Chapter 6: “The navigation is over here. Some parts will change a little depending on
where you are, but it will always be here, and it will always work the same way.”
In the chapter six that is the chapter for Street Signs and Breadcrumbs is described
how the principles of usability that are written in this book are applied to most significant part
of the web design, one is the navigation and another is the home page. In the chapter 7 that is
the chapter for The Big Bang Theory of Web Design is also explained this and both the
chapters are equally very important (Yousaf et al. 2018, p. 27). In the chapter six, the writer
Krug is referenced the number of conventions for making the navigation of the logical also
the straightforward. These applications can be acted as the pocket book of the rules for the

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designers whenever they are planned for the navigation of their site. The writer Krug is stated
the above statement when he is describing regarding the navigation and he stated that if this
navigation could speak then they are told this statement which is mentioned in the above.
Figure 1: Navigation and Home page
(Source: Shetty 2018, p. 23)
So from this it is determined that the consistent navigation is the important feature for the
good experience of the user. The consistent navigation is a set of the navigation features
which is appeared on every single page, apart from perhaps the home page and the forms
(Raza, Ghazanfar and Raza 2018, p. 17). They follow certain conventions which are as
follows:
i) The Site ID
ii) Utilities
iii) Sections
iv) Breadcrumbs
v) The name of the page
vi) Navigation that is local

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vi) Footer navigation
vii) Tabs
The most dangerous features of this navigation is the link to the homepage. It is mainly
served by site ID that is the logo of the web page (Almeida and Monteiro 2017, p. 35). To
know that the navigation is did perfectly or not, there is a test available name the trunk test.
So from the above discussion, it can be summarised that the writer Krug’s book “Don’t Make
Me Thing” is very much useful for the UX designers. Constructing a perfect website is not
just regarding the technology or the design, it is also regarding the understanding the human
psychology (Liikkanen 2017, p. 10). This book offers some valued principles also the
guidelines on how to design a great and the usable websites. These comprehensions are not
just applicable for the web designers and the developers, but also anybody who needs to
realize how people act also how anyone can make the things more practical. Most of this user
do not read the whole web page, however they can first noticed that is the web page is
looking good or not. After that they are proceed to click anything in this page (Cazañas and
Parra 2017, p. 23). The user do not attempt the detailed understanding of the web site but they
are preferred for satisfying also making do with what is looked good and preferably good
choices. For that reason, the writer Krug stated some guidelines for design a perfect web page
which are as follows:
i) Design the pages to scan but not read by the user.
ii) Mindless selections are good.
iii) Writing for the web
iv) Use of proper navigation in the web page.
v) Create a good home page which is attracted the user.

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vi) The arguments of the web design are sometime a waste of the time.
vii) The usability testing needs to be simple and also cheapest.
viii) Comment courtesy of the usability.
ix) Accessibility
In this book, the writer Krug is stated three laws which are as follows:
i) The first law is don’t make me think. In this rule it is defined that every time user has to
pause to consider about something, it confuses user from action the designer want this user to
take. The aim is to create the website effortless to use that is to make this self-explanatory or
self-evident.
ii) The second law is make each and every click the obvious choice with no need to think.
iii) The third and last law is that half words on every page, then half them again.

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References:
Almeida, F. and Monteiro, J., 2017. The Role of Responsive Design in Web
Development. Webology, 14(2).
Bader, W.I. and Hammouri, A.I., 2016. Responsive Web Design Techniques. International
Journal of Computer Applications, 975, p.8887.
Cazañas, A. and Parra, E., 2017. Strategies for mobile web design. Enfoque UTE, 7(1),
pp.344-357.
Giurgiu, L. and Gligorea, I., 2017, June. Responsive Web Design Techniques.
In International conference KNOWLEDGE-BASED ORGANIZATION (Vol. 23, No. 3, pp.
37-42). De Gruyter Open.
Krug, S., 2000. Don't make me think!: a common sense approach to Web usability. Pearson
Education India.
Liikkanen, L.A., 2017. The data-driven design era in professional web
design. interactions, 24(5), pp.52-57.
Liu, X., Leung, E.T.M., Toreini, P. and Maedche, A., 2018, June. ServiceDesignKIT: A Web
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TO RESOLUTIONS.

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Shetty, A., 2018. Requirement-driven web design using web content management systems.
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Adaptive and Responsive Design Approaches for World Wide Web. In Future of Information
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