Make Your Information Easy to Find!

It's funny how one thing can bring something else to mind. Today...it was a customer service experience that reminded me how essential it is to make sure that content and essential information are easy to find. That's why I'm compelled to write this post as I sit here on hold with CompUSA customer service and why I'm compelled to say "make your information easy to find!"

The reason I'm on hold? Well, somehow or other I've managed to break the connection port for my charger on the back of my laptop. You know, that absolutely essential little hole that you plug a cord into in order to give life to the battery within the computer? (If any of you Mac users email me to gloat about your magnetic power plug, I'm going to be forced to link bomb you for the term "meanie pants!")

This means that I've spent the last week playing the "balance the laptop just right so that the juice continues to flow" game and cursing the fact that the extended warranty that I bought from CompUSA (because I destroy laptops) does far less good since all the local CompUSA stores went out of business.

So how does this relate to hiding data from your users? Well, when I called the customer service line to have them send me the Fedex coverage for mailing it in, they needed me to give them the serial number of my laptop. I looked and looked and looked some more.

Turns out it was printed on a sticker. On the bottom of my laptop. You know, my LAPtop...the computer that sits on my lap for 8-10 hours a day, 7 days a week for the last 18 months. Take a moment and think about what the state of that sticker was...

Thankfully, after a few tries, we managed to match the number (or what looked like the numbers) in the code with one in their database. Finally, after quite a bit of frustration, I'm secure in knowing that shipping labels are on the way and my laptop will soon be on its way to being made whole again.

So how does that relate to your web site?

My friend Matt Bailey likes to harp on and on about how essential usability and accessibility are to search marketing. I like to harp on and on about how search engines want to view and judge your site the way that human beings do.

Both of those concepts fit together to make it pretty clear that you need to offer up what people (and search spiders) want, when they want it and in a location that they can easily find.

It may seem like a good idea to bury your useful content behind bells and whistles and fancy designs, just like it seemed like a good idea to put that little serial number sticker in an out-of the way spot. But when it comes time for someone (be it a search spider, a visitor or a customer in a hurry to get what they need...you don't want them to have to hunt and squint to get what they need.