Menu

Mommy, Where Do Trigger Words Come From?

by Jared Spool

During our first Virtual Seminar (big success, by the way!), we received boatloads of questions from participants about the best way to design home pages. While Christine Perfetti, the session moderator, did a great job culling out as many as possible to discuss during the session, the time we allotted for Q&A just wasn’t enough. So, we promised to answer as many questions as we can here on the UIE Brain Sparks blog.

Several people asked about where trigger words come from. One asked, “So, using the appropriate trigger words on the home page very much depends on knowing the user’s intention?”

Absolutely.

Trigger words are the words or phrases on a web page that trigger the user into acting. If you don’t know your users’ trigger words, you might still make an easy-to-use page, but it will be by chance. Knowing your users’ trigger words is the only way to ensure a great page every time.

To discern the trigger words, you need to know why users are coming to the page in the first place. When talking about a site’s home page, that means you need to know why they are coming to the site and what they hope to accomplish.

We learned a long time ago the days of visiting a web site to “see what’s there” are long gone. Nobody says, “I’ve got 15 minutes to kill, I’m going to go check out the GE web site.” If they are going to a site, it’s because there’s something they intend to accomplish. You need to know what that something is.

The only way I know to determine why people visit a web site is to talk to them. Sometimes you can guess, like when Ralph Lauren advertised their new line of furniture in a 2-page spread in the New York Times Sunday Magazine with the only words in the entire ad being “Ralph Lauren Furniture – www.polo.com.” It wouldn’t be hard to guess that many users came to the site to see more about the new furniture. (Interestingly enough, they didn’t bother to include any information about the new line of furniture on the site, confusing users immensely.)

But, mostly, you need to talk with users. Why do people go to a university web site, like Olin College? Are they a high school student, thinking about attending? Are they a parent wondering about tuition and financial aid? Are they an existing student? A faculty member? An alumni? Probably all of the above.

But for each person, you could start to identify their intentions for visiting the site. What does a parent need to know? What words will they use to find that information? “Tuition,” “Costs,” “Scholarships,” and “Financial Aid” are probably some of the trigger words required.

Olin College Home Page, Admission Menu
The ADMISSION menu on the Olin College Home Page uses Costs and Financial Aid as trigger words.

Starting with a good set of Personas and the scenarios that bring those personas to the page in question will tell you a lot about trigger words you need. If you’ve done a good job of creating your personas, you will find it easy to generate a list of trigger words.