In recent years, there is one website who has mastered the art of attracting users and viewers. This website is no other than 'facebook'. With the arrival of social networking sites like 'Myspace' and 'Bebo' in the early 2000's, a new era of global and national communication begun. Facebook came later the others, but soon became the main social networking site. Facebook began in 2004, and in July 2011 had reached 800 million users. Clearly surpassing any other social networking site out there.
Why is facebook so popular?
well firstly lets look at the webpage itself. For a first time user, arriving at the facebook home page is an interesting experience. Interesting in the fact that it is overly simple, and somewhat dull on first glance. There are only three main colors in the homepage, and two of them are different shades of blue.
I wonder why the reason for this is, could it be the shades of blue give a sense of truth, good will, calm, caring, nurturing and friendship quality’s (Posadas, 2004) ?. Well in my case, when I look at it, I do feel a sense of relaxation, trusting the site, wanting to explore further.
The third main color is white, giving the website an open feeling (Wysocki 2004, pg 143.).I think having it as white shows simplicity. For many people, using websites is still a daunting task. Thousands of websites have a range of colors on the homepage that would make a rainbow seem dull in comparison. The downfall of this is that it scares the user, who automatically thinks they won't be capable of navigating the site. As for the genius of facebook, choosing white as one of the main colors, puts the user at ease, gaining confidence in using the site.
Obviously the coloring is'nt the main reason, but I'm sure it certainly is a big factor. The font is kept simple, and more importantly, kept small. The reason why the font is kept small is so that when accessed by mobile phone (yes another key reason why it's so popular) the small phone screen can fit the whole page and its font. so they have got colors, font, and font size all figured out, but there are many other keys of success to look at in facebook.
As i mentioned before, facebook is accessible via mobile, which is evident as soon as you see the homepage. The left side of the screen has a huge picture of a phone. Then, take note of a neatly dotted wavy green arrow, passing through the phone to a link box stating 'Get Facebook Mobile'. In normal english, it should read 'get facebook on your mobile' or 'facebook is available through your mobile'. Once again they have done this for a reason. Just three words, simple, sharp, impossible to pass by. This increases the user rate of the site, as mobile users can plug in and update their beloved facebook status anytime they want.
Another key thing to notice is the size of the homepage on facebook. It is almost one page, without needing to scroll down to see any more information. Again, many websites have homepages that leave you scrolling down to what feels like a bottomless pit. This creates frustration of not being able to find what you want quickly on the website. As for facebook, I think they realise this and have tried there best to leave out the clutter of unnecessary information. What they are left with is one page, with no other irrelevant information distracting the websites main idea.
On the homepage you will find a lack of images. According to Wysocki "Photographs are often used to bring a sense of immediacy and 'reality' to a layout" (Wysocki, 2004, pg132). On this type of site, creating a sense of immediacy for the user to sign up or use the site makes the user feel uneasy. Hence the lack of images on the homepage. According Wysocki “photographs are often used to bring a sense of immediacy and ‘reality’ to ora layout” (Wysocki, 2004, pg 132).
At the bottom of the page, you find a range of different languages. Another reason why facebook is so successful worldwide. Instead of having to find language options somewhere in a hidden box on the homepage, facebook lays them all out. Laid out in an orderly fashion at the bottom, easily viewable on first glance of the homepage.
In closing, I think that facebook will continue to grow in user numbers. The website homepage is designed simple...yet perfectly. Simplicity is often overlooked in todays world of innovative and everchanging website design. However, facebook clearly shows that simplicity still appeals to the people, I dont think anyone can deny that.
Reference
Wysocki, A.F. (2004). The multiple media of texts: How onscreen and paper texts incorporate words, images and other media. in C. Bazerman, & P. Prior, What writing does and how it does it: An introduction to analysing texts and textual practices (pp. 123-163). Mahwah, NJ, Lawrence Eribaum.
Posadas, S. (2004). The meaning of colours. Retrieved October 27, 2011 from
http://www.sibagraphics.com/colour.php
Posadas, S. (2004). The meaning of colours. Retrieved October 27, 2011 from
http://www.sibagraphics.com/colour.php
