We have a corporate website built on Wordpress and a web based product offering that our users log in to which is built on a different tech stack and hosted separately but all on the same domain.
Our marketing team decided to take the LOGIN/SIGN-IN link off the corporate pages on the home page as well as all other pages stating that the corporate website caters to corporate clients and they would get confused seeing a sign-in link on the website.
Our user base is obviously larger than our client base and hence my argument that we need to have a Sign-in link on the homepage and on all pages on the corporate website which is also what our users are told to go to in our marketing campaigns. Currently the Sign-in link is only on one page on the corporate website which talks about the product we offer and no where else. Getting to that page takes some scrolling and 3 clicks after someone lands on the home page.
But our marketing team is asking me for any metrics or data that says that users are confused doing the above actions to get to the Sign-in link. They believe that our users who need to reach the login page should bookmark the login URL if they need to get to it faster - but the product is offered to everyone on the web so I can’t train them all so easily to do that.
How should I give them metrics they ask for? From where I stand, I feel this is a no-brainer that we need an always visible Sign-In link at the top of the home page but am I asking for too much?
I presume logging in is a top task? You could look at your server logs/analytics to see how many logins you get each day then use that as a guide.
I actually think that’s quite an arrogant approach. Surely it’s they who should be providing a reason to remove the prominent login link. Making it harder for your customers to login is bad usability in my opinion.
Why can’t corporate logins use the same logins as everyone else but they just have access to different pages based on their permissions? I imagine if you don’t have the infrastructure in place already to make that change it would be a harder task for devs.
@resources - Have a read of this book to give you tips on how you can start looking into metrics and win this argument, or possibly the next one. It’s available on SitePoint Premium if you have an account, go check it out. Researching UX: Analytics. If you don’t have an account, you can create one for free and read the book.
Thanks @angelamolina and @bluedreamer for responding. Actually I got an email about that new book on Researching UX: Analytics today and thus came to the forum to post this question before I go over that book. I am struggling to convince a team that owns the gateway to the product I manage and wants me to prove with numbers why that gate needs to be open.
In fact there is no corporate login for us. So there is no work for Devs on that. They just don’t want a Login link on the homepage.
I even took to Google Search Console for search metrics to prove that people are searching for “{company} login” and seeing how many clicks that gets compared to searches for “{company}” and saw that the former has 5 times more search hits (128:26) and an even higher CTR (click ratio) than a search for our company name. But they are dismissing that argument stating it has a fatal flaw.
If there was a way in which I could prove that people are landing on the homepage and then the next thing they are doing is to jump to a google search for “{company} login”, then I might have a more valid case. Does Google Analytics give that kind of data?
I’m just lost on how do I prove that users are getting confused over something that doesn’t exist?
Hey @resources, I can’t give you answers, but I know how you can get them. We’re having an AMA with Luke Hay, the author of the Researching UX: Analytics book. Pop in your question on the page linked below, for Luke and he’ll be available to respond. If you’re there during the event, you’ll be able to have a conversation with him about it.
