Zhang Dio: A preliminary study on Web Interactive design of web-based educational institutions

Zhang Dio (CEO of net)

This is an article, online network in the implementation of product design, the study of the domestic network of educational institutions of many models, at the same time with the end user exchanges a lot, accumulated some design experience. Today, the importance of web-based education product design has become the consensus of the industry, as the operator of the third party platform, I hope to share some feelings with the industry to discuss with people.

In particular, this article deals only with online education sites that exist as web-based educational institutions, and those that are based on a single point of breakthrough in web learning sites (such as memorizing words, curriculum, exercises).

NET Home Design

　　Seeking innovation in the absence of innovation

Presumably a lot of friends reading this article, will look at the Nets made what it looks like, because the experience of this article from the Nets design summary, so I really have to explain the pattern of the net. A few days ago a writer friend interviewed me. He mentioned a problem: "School network positioning is to solve the network learning Autism Learning community, but why from the home page can not see." ”

It was really a very informative question, and then the friend wrote a manuscript, the name is "from the creative creativity", in fact, this is what I would like to share the biggest experience, that is, "some product design can be completely subversive innovation, some industries due to user habits, but also really have to comply with the existing user groups to use the habit of starting, Even if it looks more earthy. "

China's education and training industry is such a special field, as a service product, education, the standardization of a low degree of discipline involving a wide range of sales process of high pre-sales dependence, entry threshold low, so the education and training industry is still difficult to standardize. In the ten years of industry development, the game between institutions and users, the continuous adjustment within the industry, has formed a deep-rooted user awareness, that is, "perhaps users believe that only such a model is educational institutions."

It is precisely because of this reason, although the current traditional network education institutions seemingly "page is very soil", but still business is booming. Also because of this reason, the net after many revisions adapt, still return to the current home page style. Although this design "does not look anything special", but the home page bounce rate is only 20%.

As an entrepreneur in the online education industry, my biggest experience is: We do not have the ability to educate users, in the risk of subversive innovation is greater, it is better to start from the existing mode of micro-innovation. And professionals can see that the existing Web page of educational institutions still have a lot of "micro-innovation" to improve the scope. I think this is an important way of thinking when it comes to sharing interactive design experiences. Otherwise make the product is likely to be applauded by the media, but users can not necessarily be recognized.

　　Second world model, positive guarantee mode and learning mode

In many online education discussions, we rarely see the mention of existing web-based educational institutions, and we are very interested in innovative models, which is indeed an interesting phenomenon. In fact, the traditional network education institutions can be a foothold in the market for many years, each year for millions of students to provide web-based courses, the current network of education in the field of the main income in their generation, which is certainly reasonable. And even if the traditional design of educational institutions to be upgraded, but they have been in the market for many years to promote the use of user habits, this power is not to be underestimated. Therefore, throughout the school's UE law is very important, macro-induction, the existing educational institutions of the Web site structure can be summed up in three categories:

Global Home Design

　　1. Global model

"Global vocational Education online" operation for many years, is a comprehensive network training institutions oriented to vocational education. It is characterized by the teaching of a number of subjects, the site provides more information content. If we watch a lot of school pages, we can see that a lot of online education institutions are imitating the global web site structure, this pattern is characterized by:

1-1 The first page has a large subject catalogue, and navigation also lists a large number of disciplines.

1-2 First page is not the user's reading focus, the user's focus is on the two-level channel of each subject.

1-3 subjects of the two-level channel to display a large number of learning materials, test dynamics, text clouds, promotional ads and enrollment of the timetable embedded therein.

The 1-4-ring net School model forms a class timetable standard, namely, the curriculum according to the longitudinal arrangement, according to the commodity information horizontal arrangement, forms the two-dimensional timetable. Users need to further understand and then select the class.

1-5 of schools ' promotional information is embedded under the timetable, almost all of which are text descriptions.

1-6 Click on the course and go directly to the pay page.

China accounting net of distance education home

　　2. The positive guarantee mode

Long-distance education, is the New York Stock exchange of listed companies, is the only one to distance education in the overseas listing agencies, which deserves the industry's pride. The distance education is based on the Chinese accounting school, at the same time provides more than 10 different directions of the campus model, such as primary and secondary education network, construction Engineering Education Network and so on. Therefore, the Orthodox distance education itself is also a multi-disciplinary comprehensive school, and the different from the global schools, is the different disciplines by the major categories of division into a branch, and each branch of the content of relative focus. is the Chinese accounting net of the structure of the industry is a strong direction of the schools common pattern.

2-1 the number of subjects involved in each branch is greatly reduced, so the subject catalogue is no longer the main content of the paging page.

2-2 Branch of the structure of the model, the subject directory and information classification information in the navigation, the entire site is still in the form of information-type Web site presentation.

2-3 courses are still presented in a timetable style, and after clicking the course, go directly to the pay page.

Learn and think Home

　　3. Learning and thinking mode

The subject scale characteristic of learning and thinking mode is similar to the branch station of the Orthodox school, that is, the subject direction is relatively concentrated. And the positive mode is different, learning and thinking school using the course Information page live, this model is K12 or English class to use more.

3-1 learning the curriculum of the school is a list, rather than a global security of the timetable, that is, the course by line, each line of information is larger,

3-2 with the global model, the positive mode, learning and thinking mode of the site has product information details page.

3-3 automatically play the listening content in the Product Information details page.

The above is from the website structure view of three kinds of common patterns, believe that these different models are the results of many years of exploration, this for the entrepreneur has a strong reference value. However, it is worth mentioning that, in the UI perspective, traditional schools do have great room for improvement, which is just the opportunity of the latest entrepreneur.

　　Three courses chopped up

Talking about here, I think the industry who knows how to teach is sure to smile, this should not be a secret. The reason why I mentioned this in the article is that we should look at this problem not only from the angle of teaching but from the UE.

The so-called cut the course, that is, a complete teaching video, according to the knowledge and teaching objectives broken into a number of small segments, and to arrange the combination. For example, the teacher told an English text, video recording for 2 hours, the current more professional practice is, the 2-hour course in accordance with the content of the teaching into the text section, exercise section, Vocabulary parts, review part and so on. As a result, we've got more than n videos, and there are multiple combinations of video for these different courses. That is, all the exercises in the text of the integration, the formation of the exercise class, the vocabulary of all the text to integrate, forming a vocabulary class ... So we have a number of classes, suitable for different learners taste.

To do this is a teaching and research effort, but also the idea of interactive design. That is, cutting the course to provide users with a large number of standardized, personalized courses self-service choice of space. This idea is indeed the start-up of the network education enterprises can not ignore.

　　Four to the electric dealer closer, and have to have the education taste

Regardless of any subject of learners, they are the first ordinary Internet users, their lives in the most contact is certainly Taobao, Jingdong, Fank, such as the electric business platform. Therefore, as a paying person, the user's thinking mode of using the website is strengthened by the electric quotient platform first. Therefore, in the network education institutions of product design, must not and the electrical quotient of the UE difference too far, otherwise it will lead to user confusion. For example, the timetable-style display, though more intuitive, but users will spend some of their mind to understand the meaning of the timetable, if the course from the curriculum to find no product information page, if the timetable embedded in a large number of text links, this way is easy to let the user's eyes pain, presumably this to the user's patience is a big test. Other such as promotional information display, copy design, button design, and so on.

But if simply using the electric business template, this also has the question, may let the user feel loses the education feeling, to the page professional experience raises the question. How to take a proper balance between the two this is really a kung fu, is the need for UE expert to participate in the work. In fact, this is the article in the previous mentioned "Innovation from No innovation", the so-called "no innovation", refers to the site's educational flavor can not be changed, the so-called "innovation", in fact, is the user common success of the UE model introduced.

Pinterest Waterfall Streaming web design

　　Five waterfall streams, pictures and text

The waterfall stream site is really tempting because a lot of picture shows will attract the attention of the user. However, for the network education institutions, waterfall flow design will encounter the problem, that is, waterfall flow way is difficult to adapt to all subjects of the content needs of learners. If a class-one builder's learner is sure to want to see a cascade of Class one builder's courses, you will lose a lot of other subjects unless you are a dedicated school. But if we put all the subjects of the curriculum evenly waterfall, it will make users feel less professional. And as an education site, can be used for waterfall streaming picture content is relatively single, therefore, personal experience is, unless the professional education institutions, should be careful to use waterfall flow. By the way, I have seen the waterfall streaming course Information page, the feeling is that even as a professional, I can not understand.

The online education organization can show the picture is afraid of only teacher photos and promotional ads, then work this. It is important to make the picture a little bit more precise, because it is a sharp tool to break the boring nature of the page.

When it comes to page boring, educational websites also encounter an unavoidable problem, that is, if we do not display text information, then users will feel that the Web page is lack of professionalism. If we show the text, then a lot of text will dazzle the user. This is a dilemma, in addition, a large number of text links to help SEO, this is also the need for network promotion, so many schools would rather embody the professional arrangement of a large number of text, but also to sacrifice the readability of the page. Therefore, the current situation on the UE designers is a challenge, if the solution to this problem, your site must be invincible.

　　Six UI design, you can do better

UI design is so sensitive that even though we have more than n "have to do" in the UE, UI design can certainly mitigate the "have to do" flaw. Here, I really don't understand why educational institutions (including offline agencies) also adopt gradient buttons and metal-sensing navigation, gaudy theme colors, complex line segmentation, heavy color embellishment, and small spacing. This really has to spit, I can understand now is that perhaps the user mentality has adapted to this art design, that this is the characteristics of educational institutions. But the user is ultimately guided by the eye comfort, now users like Microsoft's elegant black font, concise color block, functional area segmentation, Web2.0 icon, hand-painted banner. From the network's users feel that this really can be, and this is exactly the creative space of online education institutions. Therefore, as long as the user to grasp the traditional heart and the Internet design trend of the scale, can greatly enhance the network education institutions of the product experience.

　　Seven what else does the user need?

Besides this, what else does the user need? In the network and the user's contact to feel that, in addition to the teaching, the user also needs to teach organization and after-school services. Users do not want to buy after class on the page to ask questions, do not want to call customer service telephone attitude cold. Users want to have a sense of management, such as leaving a job for the user, and periodically reminding the user: "It's time for you to go to class." Even in the long time users do not have classes, give users a 2 points, this is the user's psychological needs, and these are just outside the education, but also the start-up of the network education institutions can work hard place.

The above is on the online education product interaction design some observation and thinking of the experience, the net is the network education industry's third party community and elective platform, from its own, the most want to see is the network education industry development and expansion. So as the CEO of the network, the first line of their own work to share the superficial experience to you, in order to be able to play a role, such as biased points of view, also hope not to laughable it.