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Ask HN: FAQ Pages useful?

9 pointskineticac14 comments

I just put together a FAQ page for http://browseology.com to help clarify the new technology. We found that people are often times associating real-time collaboration with signups, installs, and such, so that's what they keep looking for on our page, when all they need is to click a link to get the screen sharing ability for the web. Trying to explain how simple something is in a world that's not accustom to it is hard, so we put up a FAQ to see if it would help.

Do you guys think a FAQ is useful for a site?

Should you actually be solving the problem of why a FAQ even exists?

IF you need a FAQ is your product too hard to understand to begin with?

Let's hear your thoughts, and please review my FAQ page as well.

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I always look for a FAQ whenI visit a site that is not instantly obvious.

Your right fixing issues that make a FAQ a necessity are important but you can never make it obvious for every single person. If you can describe whats going on in a few simple paragraphs then

Often, too, I benchmark a site by the FAQ - if there are some similar sites I intend to use and one specifically has a well written FAQ that could tip the balance. It shows care for your users and that you understand that at some point something wont make sense to someone :)

I have to be truthful (because you asked): your whole site is missing the "obvious". I admit when you first linked to it I was a little confused about what was suppsed to happen (it did come to me quite fast but was still counter-intuitive).

On the front page you have one sentence to describe what it's about "Real time collaborative shopping with friends". That's a great tagline but you dont explain it any more than that. I know there is more below but there isnt a simple "dumbed down" pararaph saying "you can browse amazon seeing the same page as your friends, caht and discuss your choices".

Also it occurs to me that your experts thing is the "value" behind the service: if I had a friend who was ace at cooking and were looking for a cook book then obviously I would collaborate with him. But chances are I dont and so your experts are what would sell the idea to me! On the main page you dont really explain that option.

Same applies to the FAQ place: 2 paragraphs of what you are, what it entails and stuff about the experts set at the top of the page would be perfect for anyone a little lost from the start.

Basically: awesome idea, just needs a bit of user interface tweaking :D

Incidentally as a general point the "you can copy this URL to your friends" message whe you start to browse stays on my screen for about 1-2secs. Not easy to read what it says: as that is the main method of collaboration (and that is the only place that explains it) I dunno if you want to make it stay a bit longer :) EDIT: ignore that, I see on my other rig that it DOES stay longer the first time. My bad :)

Thanks for the great feedback.

You're right - Browseology isn't obvious at first glance. That's the biggest area that we're tackling right now, since as kineticac mentioned, it's a new concept to be browsing together without installation.

Experts are a huge part of the value prop. We're emphasizing that we're able to connect you to people who are are interested in what you're looking for.

If you come across more - I'd love to talk about it, joe@browseology.com

ErrantX, awesome feedback! Thank you for giving us your take on the FAQ, but even greater was the feedback you gave for the site. We really appreciate it. I think you have some great points.

Yes, a FAQ is certainly useful. But in the case of the Browseology FAQ and homepage, you have to take a step back and try to look at it through the eyes of a first time visitor.

Above the first input box there's a link with the text "then join". To me that looks like I have to create an account. Rephrase it.

But the number one problem I see is "your URL" and "the URL". Honestly, what does "Copy & paste your URL" mean? Do I have to enter amazon.com? Do you want the URL to my MySpace page? Even in the FAQ it isn't clear what kind of URL you're referring to.

Or maybe I'm just a bit dense ;)

I don't think you're dense, that's a good point.

We're actually thinking of taking out this URL on the homepage. You can copy/paste your URL at any time to invite a friend - still working on making that as clear as possible.

Yeah the wording is definitely a bit weird from someone who has never seen this before. You're not dense at all. I don't think we realized that it might be a bit too simple and not descriptive enough the way it's worded.

"then join" is a really good point too, I feel like it's telling you to signup as well, I didn't even realize that until now!

Thank you for the feedback.

In your case, you don't need a FAQ, you need to improve your homepage and focus the product.

I did a quick mockup of an improved homepage: http://poorbuthappy.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2009/05...

Equally important: you need to decide what the main interaction is, and focus on that, instead of making the user choose between 3 confusing ways of interacting on the homepage.

Thanks for taking the time to show what you had in mind. We're very quickly iterating over new homepage designs and will be sure to highlight the main interaction.

good points, and thanks for taking some time to give us some suggestions with a mock =)

Do you guys think a FAQ is useful for a site?

Yes, it is one of the first things I look for on a site introducing a new technology or new service. It is a clue I use to determine how committed the company is to user-friendliness.

FAQ is not the first thing I look for in a site. To me, in context hints and help links are more useful. Personally, I would focus more on these. I do check the faq, if all else fails to explain.

FAQs are great. I usually read them as one of the first things on a site. They breakdown the most important points in bite-sized chunks. They're also very useful because they're problem oriented (questions), which makes it more likely that you'll find what you're looking for.

http://browseology.com

An FAQ is documentation with a specific format. You don't have to wait for any questions to be asked before starting your FAQ, though it should highlight any questions you get asked regularly.

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