15  Navigation

Menus and navigation bars are like the table of contents in a book, and so provide a basic way of getting to major parts of a site.

Top-down navigation needs to be able to be used very quickly, so that the reader does not get distracted from what they were trying to find. That is facilitated by making the text of each option as short as possible. Being short enables almost subconscious reading of the options in one go, rather than sequentially reading each. To verify, think of a subtopic, and try the glimpse test. The required option should be quickly recognised.

However, the text should not be so short that it is no longer indicative of what a reader can expect to find when they click on it. Navigation is still communication, and the words should not be obscure, which means that if shortening, retain the words that most people recognise, rather than what you may prefer.

A couple of quick selections from two levels of a few options each may be a lot faster than selecting from one large menu/bar. Looking at too many options at once may mean a reader will have to think too much about the differences between then all, rather than make a quick selection from a few, two times in a row.

Not all people make choices based solely upon words, and so navigation alternatives like cards have been developed.

Cards are a modern navigation device better suited to those who are more visually driven. The picture needs to be truly suggestive of the content, rather than decoration. Put the picture as an aside on the target page to help the reader know they are at the right page.

However, cards still require concise text to help people make quick decisions, so provide a short heading, rather than rely upon them reading any text below the image, which should only be considered as an option for people to read if they need further evidence of where selecting the card will take them.

A variant of cards is having a mini-glossary-like listing with the same information. The advantage is that it is less bulky in appearance so it allows more entries in the same space.

Many sites provide a gallery of images for those who might want to see what a person or topic is about. However, a gallery can be a useful navigation device if each image is linked to an article that provides depth or background. Consider a gallery an alternative visual index into a site's content, complimenting the site's main top-down logical navigation.

Cross referencing is linking between pages and encourages readers to continue with their journey through a site or similar external pages.

While we can put links inline, there is a risk that a reader will follow the link and abandon the rest of the article. If that link is for an external site, they are then lost to the current site. The better alternative is to provide links to related articles and sites at the end of the article, allowing the reader to finish reading the article without disruption. Inline links then become only for going to material directly related to that particular paragraph or element if really warranted.

Search is like an index at the back of a reference book, providing access to content at a more granular level than a book's main table of contents, which is like a site's main menu or navigation bar.

Of course, we now rely upon search providers like Google to take care of searching the internet as a whole. This has resulted in search engine optimisation (SEO) being heavily promoted as a means of gaining site visibility. However, search providers do not list all pages in a site, even if the pages have been available for years. Google is poor by only covering less than 5% of less popular sites, and any search engines using their results fare worse. As of August 2023, Bing lists 100% of all sites' pages. DuckDuckGo searches Bing anonymously, while also allowing use in a web form.

We can help our pages' rankings by ensuring that we cross-link between as many of our pages as possible, as that indicates that our sites are well-integrated, and that all pages are important. However, if all content must be available from the search, a dedicated search facility might be needed, which also has the advantage of no advertising that might take visitors away from the site.