[ID Discuss] Access points for context sensitive help

[Mercer, Susan]

Hi all -

In our web application, we've provided 3 types of "help".  All with
slightly different access points.  They've all been requested by our
users and received positive feedback in usability testing on our design
mockups.  We'll see what the real customer response to the live
application is when it goes live later this year.

1)  We provide a standard help system, accessed from a "(?) Help" option
from the top menu.  The (?) is really a graphic of a ? In a circle.
This includes a Table of Contents and Searching capability, and is
arranged around business tasks.

2)  For some trickier pages, we provide a "(?) Help on this page"
option.  It appears at the bottom of the top navigation system, and to
the far right.  It's geared toward the occasional user coming back to a
complex page 1-2 months after training or their last project.  They just
need a quick refresher, and they're ready to go.

3)  Context-sensitive help/definitions.  On some of our pages, we have
some field names that are non-user friendly and a bit "techy".  We have
quite a mix of audiences from novices to experts that have used similar
software for a long time.  We made an attempt to use more user-friendly
language for several options, but on several others, we could not
without confusing our advanced users.  So, we added a small graphic (?)
after the field label, and added a 1-2 sentence definition/explanation
on mouseover.  This received the most positive user feedback in our
usability testing.

I hope this helps.

Regards,
Susan

Susan Mercer
Information Design Team Lead
FreeMarkets, Inc.
FreeMarkets Center
210 Sixth Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15222
Email: smercer at freemarkets.com