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Working Memory
Nike’s shoe size and style options are a great example of smart exploit chunking. The interface uses repetition, and grouping to show the user a grid of buttons with uniform styling. Instead of a dropdown for users to select their size, Nike gives users this easy to follow menu so users can select their size very quickly. They also have similarity of option selections in the show style group above the size grid. Instead of text or color swatches, Nike shows mini thumbnails of the shoe styles so that users can visualize the different options and select the right one. The shoe style and size selection are both presented in uniform visual chunks of buttons as you can see in the screenshot below.
The Nike website fails to include adequate navigation through sequential tasks. There is a breadcrumb trail for certain sections of the site, like when users are browsing shoes, which supports working memory. However, once a user clicks on an individual item, this breadcrumb trail goes away, no longer supporting working memory. The user may forget how they got to this item and has to use the computer’s back buttons to retrace their steps.
In the figure left, Nike includes breadcrumb trails to help customers remember their journey to the Women’s Basketball Shoes section of the site. However, in the screenshot below, the breadcrumb trails disappear, so users are no longer able to see their journey to this product and cannot easily browse similar products.
Long-term memory
Nike’s site relies on recognition rather than recall for its branding. The menu and home page does not actually say the words ‘Nike” anywhere on the screen. The iconic swoosh is what the user recognizes as Nike. Their sleek branding is so recognizable to users, that the interface does not need to further inform the user of where they are. However, for accessibility, the site should include the name of the brand somewhere. Users who are less familiar with Nike’s swoosh or people who struggle with memory loss would benefit from the presence of the brand name on the site.
Nike’s site supports long-term memory through “remembering” what was in a user’s shopping cart. This means that they do not clear a shopping cart after a user has left the site. Instead, the company uses data to keep track of what is put into the shopping cart and can store that information once a user leaves the site. If the user is logged into their nike account, they are able to send the user emails to remind them of their items in their shopping cart. This increases the amount of purchases as it serves as a reminder for users to purchase the items they are interested in.
In our new design, we first added in the Nike logo to the webpage in order to help those who are unfamiliar with Nike’s swoosh or those who struggle with memory loss. Adding in this feature increases the amount of recognition for users as they are able to assimilate the Nike logo with the brand Nike. Our new design increases the accessibility of the website, as screen readers will be able to inform users that they are on the Nike site, as well as help users who may struggle with memory issues.
We added a title above the style customization options to match the shoe size selection title in order for the user to easily recognize both groups through structure similarity. Another feature of our redesign is the addition of breadcrumbs on the product page. This supports working memory, as serves as a reminder to where the user is within the website, as well as their journey to how they got to that page. We believe that this addition is important because it helps users better understand the website layout and serves as a reminder of what previous pages the user had visited.
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