Working With Blogger is Fun, by Jeffrey Veen

Working With Blogger is Fun

When our friends over at Blogger asked us for help with the user experience of their site, we jumped at the chance. Not only was it an exciting project with a high-profile client, but it was also an opportunity to help millions of users participate in the Web. See, since Blogger was acquired by Google, they've been getting a flood of traffic -- almost entirely consisting of users who have no idea what a blog is. We set out with a series of goals:

How could we explain instantly what a blog was to people who had never encountered the term?
What could we do to convince them they would even want to do this?
Would it be possible to get these new users set up with a site in just three steps and in less than five minutes?
Could the whole site feel a lot friendlier from a visual perspective, and could that design make use of Web standards?

Well, that last issue turned out to be the easiest. I spoke to Doug Bowman of Stopdesign and said, "Hey, wanna do an XHTML+CSS redesign of Blogger?"

His answer was, of course, "Duh."

So off we went to Mountain View, figuring out which metrics to use to measure success, what technical constraints we'd be up against, what sort of research we'd be able to sneak in to the aggressive schedule, and which one of the many, many Jasons we were supposed to be collaborating with (we never did figure that last one out). And then we dove into a blur wireframes, usability tests, competitive analysis, visual directions, and more.

The project was, frankly, a flat-out success. I couldn't be happier with Doug's work -- the site feels so much more accessible and engaging. But I shouldn't be surprised by that, since all his work is amazing. What is really heartening was the willingness to innovate and experiment on the part of the Blogger team. This is a group of people who are extremely invested in their product -- some of them have been there from it's creation. Not only that, but they are also recently acquired, which means a slew of new cultural and business scenarios to fit into. And it's Google, for crying out loud. They're suddenly competing for resources with some of the most brilliant people in the industry, and being subjected to code reviews. Yet they were continuously open to all the new ideas we threw at them.

Nice work, everyone.

This entry was written by Jeffrey Veen and posted 10 May 2004 at 8:06 AM. It was filed under Technology. | View blog reactions

Comments

1. On 10 May 2004 at 9:00 AM Gordon wrote:

Yeah, looks lovely.

But (you knew it was coming).

Some of the functionality has changed for the.. well worse is the wrong word, let's say it's changed for the simpler. Which is fine for the new users, but what about us Blogger (Pro) old hands?

For example: Why can I no longer see a preview of my post within the same window as the editing screen? And what's with all that profile stuff? Are Orkut and Blogger merging per chance?? ;-)

Anyway, overall I think it's good, and a much needed change for the better - congrats to everyone involved, I work in software and know how hard those project deadlines can be!

2. On 10 May 2004 at 10:40 AM Paul Smith wrote:

Jeff,

Great work. It's not just a pretty site, but you did the heavy-lifting to make the all the administrative functions as usable and friendly as the rest of Blogger.com and Blogger-based sites. And with the set of available templates, it's a sort of CSS Zen Garden for the real world.

My question: what were some of those metrics for success? I'm sure there are some closely guarded numbers and targets there, but, broadly, what were they? Was reducing overall bandwidth by going with lighter-weight pages that leverged CSS a concern, for instance? I imagine Google cares a great deal about that considering the number of pages they serve each day.

3. On 10 May 2004 at 10:42 AM Brian wrote:

I think it's a great looking new design, but I'm curious why the shiny new templates are buried inside the app. I didn't see any samples in the new tour or any other part of the site, although some of the designers posted them on their sites.

I think they'd be a nice selling point -- "You mean my site can look like /that/!?!" But I know you guys have pretty good reasons for putting things where they are. Any reason they weren't displayed more predominately?

Just curious...

4. On 10 May 2004 at 2:10 PM Ev. wrote:

> Why can I no longer see a preview of
> my post within the same window as the
> editing screen?

Try the "Preview" link (or ctrl+shift+p) in the posting form (upper right). Not the same, but hopefully as useful.

Thanks for the feedback.

5. On 10 May 2004 at 4:52 PM Alexander Micek wrote:

Thank you for being one of the few in the circle of sites who took part in this to have comments open on this topic. Nothing against them at all, but thank you.

As for the goals: solving all of those problems must have been unbelievably challenging. Thrown into the midst of a company whose very base is changing, and trying to figure out the best way to 'reinvent' them... As we all know from coding, changing many different things at once before testing can create problems that are nearly impossible to track down; but the team seems to have taken this possible stumbling block and made it an asset. That is, everything that was changed was improved. It all really works - the design simultaneously draws you in, feels friendly, and informs. All of this represents a service that is rock solid. And the templates? I could rave about those for hours.

This is the biggest news of the year for many people.

6. On 10 May 2004 at 5:10 PM Matt wrote:

I've said it a few other places, and I'll say it again: great job. The other players in this field now have a lot of catching up to do.

7. On 10 May 2004 at 6:53 PM orcmid wrote:

See http://nfocentrale.net/orcmid/blog/2004/05/stopdesign-new-blogger.asp and its comments too.

Crap, crap. Crap, crap. Not only do I have the disruption of change for change's sake (though some of the operations are smoother when I get the hang of it), selectively turning on comments created unexpected subdirectories that break shortcuts in my template. The permalinks in nearby but untouched entires were also trashed in the recent-entry page and in the archive pages. To add injury to insult, the broken permalinks (with "//nopub/" in the middle) were dropped into my Atom Feed and syndicated to the world.

Crap, crap. Crap, crap.

8. On 10 May 2004 at 8:40 PM Joe Clark wrote:

The tone here does seem a bit gladhanding: "Naturally we're in tight with the Blogger kids, and *when* they *asked* us to *help*, we *jumped* at the chance. Then we *asked* our close personal friend Doug Bowman and he answered 'Duh.'"

I'm sure you all liked each other (I adore Doug), but please, *this was business* and y'all got paid.

9. On 10 May 2004 at 9:18 PM veen wrote:

Well *of course* we got paid -- that's how we stay in business, Joe. The conversation, though, went pretty much like that, except I left out the part where I said to Ev, "Looks like it will cost this much."

Then he said, "OK, sounds about right."

Some times we get to work with our friends - that's why Doug keeps a desk in our offices. Other times, we slog through massive corporate bureaucracy just to change the words in the nav bar. I prefer to write about the former.

And I feel your pain, orcmid, but I'm afraid I had no say in the technical architecture.

10. On 11 May 2004 at 5:34 AM TV wrote:

I was really struck by lightning when I saw the redesign of blogger. Wow!!! I really think Doug and you guys of AP are taking UX design to a higher level and -- off course -- it's nice to have a such a cool client to work for.

But while I was checking out the redsign I wondered: who did what?

I mean could you tell us a little bit more about how you work together in such a project and who was responsible for which deliverable (wireframing, IA, coding, copy, etc.)

Note: I *did* check out Doug's posting about the redesign but couldn't find out what the role of e.g. AP had been in the project.

11. On 11 May 2004 at 7:32 AM veen wrote:

There are a few more detail in the case study I just posted on the Adaptive Path site.

http://adaptivepath.com/services/casestudies/blogger/

12. On 11 May 2004 at 9:52 AM orcmid wrote:

Hmm, well, how can one speak of design, and of a designed user experience, and be surprised when users consider the total experience, not the surface/superficial part in isolation. It strikes me as particularly odd that there is more attention to rounded corners on logos than whether the system works, and what was done to manage the risks around an inherently disruptive act. Thank you for the case study. There is much food for thought and discussion there, especially around how/whether interaction design really can live only in the facade and not be tarred by bad plumbing work.

Meanwhile, I love the Tuscany photos. My wife wept when she stood enthralled beneath the original David in Firenze in January.

13. On 11 May 2004 at 2:04 PM Chris McEvoy wrote:

Best registration ever...

I was lured into setting up a blog on blogger when I looked at the re-design and found the experience just sweet.
http://confusability.blogspot.com/

14. On 11 May 2004 at 6:39 PM Derek wrote:

If you want to see them templates without loggin' in to Blogger, they are available, but you have to find the pages. To simplify things, I've posted them (sorry for the long URL):

http://www.penmachine.com/journal/2004_05_01_news_archive.html#108421771471341189

15. On 12 May 2004 at 6:11 AM kevin barbieux wrote:

Hey, I like the change, and additions. I am certainly a layman of the internet and computers etc., part of the masses you are targeting with the changes. And, I think you did it well.

I am trying out the 897 design. And I would like to use my own background in the title field. But, lo and behold, it doesn't fit cleanly into that box. Ok, so that won't work. At least, I'd like to get rid of that star in the upper left box. Do you have a plain gif, or some way I can change that box to a solid color? Please email me if you can.

16. On 15 May 2004 at 4:27 PM E. L. F. wrote:

Nice job, guys. I was wondering what prompted the Blogger redesign - after all, it wasn't too impossible in the first place - then I hit upon this site. Oh! Concidence, I say. Amazing what jewels are out there on the Internet. Thanks for polishing Blogger's. For all those of you complaining about harder-to-use themes, there's lots of user-posted skins for the editing at www.blogskins.com.

17. On 20 May 2004 at 9:24 AM Bruno Figueiredo wrote:

Overall I really liked the redesign and have just one issue: the Saves as Draft button is in the wrong place.

18. On 26 May 2004 at 7:50 PM Matt wrote:

I signed up to Blogger (a couple of weeks before the redesign) because I was looking for a way setting up a personal site and being able to update it quickly. The new templates are fantastic and it was no surprise to me that Zeldman, Bowman, Cederholm, and Veen were involved. I ended up using one of Doug's template designs (Rounders) and customising it a bit (new header, altered use of sidebar etc). Like E.L.F said, what a jewel...and it's free!

(Pity that Photblogging doesn't work on a Mac...)