Design to move your site off the web and into the office

Website design doesn't have to be limited to the screen your viewer is sitting in front of. The increased use of handheld devices with internet access has expanded the way we can look at website design and led us to consider its incorporation into the objects that surround us.

Take this as an example:


QR CODE - Content-rich Resume from Victor petit on Vimeo.

QR codes can be scanned by smart phone users to be taken to a website (too often they are just taken to the companies standard website and not given specific information relating to what they have scanned -- but that's another post).

These codes don't just offer website designers the opportunity to get people to their site, but new ways of designing sites all together. In this case, the website is a YouTube video of the job seeker's mouth and audio of him listing his achievements. Such a video would be an interesting idea on a website showcasing his resume, but he has gone one step further with the design, combining the video with the physical resume every would be employer expects you to hand them. This not only ensures that the employer goes to you website but gives the presentation an immediacy and intimacy that is lost when a web browser gets involved.

Using QR codes and relating them to objects surrounding the people you are training could be revolutionary in e-learning. Why have a written description of how to operate a particular machine when your employee can hold up their hand held device to the QR code pasted on the machinery involved and follow a step-by-step video on how to operate it? Why use Captivate to list a particular process when QR codes can be added into the salient parts of the processes documentation and the trainee can learn how to follow them when they reach them?

Developing websites to work with QR codes and hand held devices also increases learner engagement by linking tactile movements to e-learning. Scanning the appropriate objects, aligning videos in boxes, just placing your handheld device on the right spot of your training desk engages the learner's mind in a way staring at a computer screen never can. Suddenly, what you are learning is actually part of your work environment instead of a distant process glowing in front of you.

Of course, website design for this sort of e-learning course is completely different than for a normal e-learning site. Videos need to become part of the objects they are designed to explain. That doesn't necessarily mean going to the extreme of the video above, but the site needs to fit in with or feel part of the real world environment that surround it.

Handheld devices are also horrible for lots of text, links and series of images. The websites designed for these types of courses need to be simple and direct, no clicking or searching - just the information the user needs.

In their design these websites need to be mindful of the fact that people are using them in the same mindset they use when interacting with their surrounding environment and not a computer screen. Simple touch screen features that use object instead of hyperlinks and audio and voice recognition to move through the site should be included.

Of course, a standard e-learning site linking to everything that is covered in the handheld course can be created as a reference page for once someone has completed their training. But now, when they look at it it will be associated directly with the objects or processes they are using in their job because of the hand held/QR training they have already undergone.