Now that older users are catching up to their younger counterparts in their ability and eagerness to use the Internet, it's poor design, not access, that's limiting the Web's potential to reach older audiences. Older Americans are online, but they don't necessarily like what they see. A lack of service means vast unrealized potential going untapped -- for commerce, social change, community-building, and individual growth.
In the mid-1990s, during the first peak of the Internet boom, many social commentators worried that the rapid proliferation of personal computers and the Web would lead to a Digital Divide, "widening social gaps throughout our society," in the words of the PBS series of that name, creating a world of techno-haves and have-nots. The old, the poor, inner-city children, and disadvantaged minorities would be left behind. ( 1, 2, 3)
A worrying series of reports by the US Commerce Department, "Falling Through the Net: Defining the Digital Divide," heightened the fear the older people would be particularly hard hit, especially when it found that in 1997, a key year for early popularization of the emerging World Wide Web, seniors (defined as people over 55) has the lowest online access of any group studied (8.8%). ( 4)
Adoption by Older Users Defies Predictions
While the Digital Divide is still a serious problem, fears of an all-encompassing "gray" Divide proved to be unfounded. By 1999, older users had become the fastest growing demographic on the Internet. A widely cited 1999 report by Media Metrix focused on that fact that baby boomers and seniors now totaled 20 percent of all online users in the US. AARP's own member studies showed a 300% increase in the reported online access among its members from 1997 to 2001. ( 5, 6)
Older users' rapid movement into the online world has held steady through recent years as the gap has narrowed sharply between older US households and the national average for all ages in reported access to the Internet.
- 59% of AARP members had Internet access in 2001, according to our internal surveys,
- In January 2003, despite a national economic slowdown, AARP's Web site saw a 70% increase in new and renewing memberships processed online and a 44% increase in visits to www.aarp.org compared to January 2002,
- Nielsen/NetRatings also found that in 2002 the fastest growing user population for broadband access in the U.S. was composed of 55- to 64-year-olds, which surged 78 percent, to about 2.9 million. ( 7)
Blurred Vision: Stereotypes Persists
But despite the growth and rich experience of the older online audience, conflicting stereotypes and poor design choices continue to hamper the experience of older users. Common misperceptions that still appear in the media and business world include:
- A belief that there are few older users online or that older people "just don't use" the Web.
- A belief that older users are an audience defined by their limits (limited budgets, limited interests, limited computer skills).
- A belief that there is no need to accommodate the different needs of younger and older audiences.
They Do It All
In fact, older adults have broad interests, extensive curiosity, and a wide range of activities in both their online and offline lives. SeniorNet's research indicates that more than three-quarters (76 percent) of older adults are self-taught Internet users, and almost half (46 percent) have been surfing for more than five years. ( 8)
A December 2002 Yankelovich Monitor ( 9) study found that the older audience going online for many reasons. Among users 40-64, the most frequent uses of the Internet include:
- Email (87%)
- Just surfing (63%)
- Reading news (61%)
- Getting directions/maps (60%)
- Personal research (58%)
- Travel information (54%)
- Accessing health or medical information (46%)
- Purchasing airline tickets (33%)
- Checking bank account transactions (30%)
- Accessing stock quotes (26%)
- Accessing insurance information (19%)
- Making financial transactions (13%)
Eyes Shut to Your Audience
So older adults and the Web are a uniform success story, right? Not quite. Another look at the evidence suggests that the Web could be a much more powerful tool if it were accompanied by less frustration, anxiety, and confusion for people over 50. Last year's study on the usability of the Web for seniors by the Nielsen Norman group found that "current websites are twice as hard to use for seniors as they are for younger users." ( 10)
Is this because older users are just too difficult to serve? There's much to suggest that's not the case. Far more of the problems that frustrate older users are readily identifiable through hands-on testing and customer surveys. Similarly, it is likely that designs that serve older adults well may also improve the experience for other audiences as well.
Web designs that defy and frustrate audience needs remain widespread. Even though reduced vision is the number one factor affecting older users, a vast range of Web sites select small type faces and then freeze the text at that size, overriding browser features that allow users to increase font size. Twitchy mouse-overs and pull downs that require precise hand movements abound. Designers and their clients are entranced by low contrast color schemes and tiny type that look elegant and subtle on the storyboards and leave audience members surfing off to a site they can actually read.
Long download times seem to announce that some sites are prematurely writing off the still-dominant dial-up audience. Despite the widespread consumer rejection of pop-ups, sites seem hesitant to give up what they perceive to be one of their few tools for grabbing audience attention.
And the ideal of organizing sites around ease of use and audience expectations, rather than by internal company divisions, remains all too often unfulfilled, as design firms and Web teams scramble to please constituencies for whom the idea of letting the audience drive site design is an unfamiliar and sometimes unwelcome concept.
Not Just Look-and-Feel
Of course, issues of graphic design are far from the only challenge. Indeed the emphasis on "look-and-feel" as the heart of online design is often a part of the problem. Despite intense marketing of e-commerce over the last five years, older users also show some well-seasoned skepticism about doing business electronically, AARP research suggests. (11) Their worries about privacy and fraud are heightened by the same sorts of usability problems and lack of emphasis on effective, useful design that are hampering the success of the Web across the medium. In one Forrester Research estimate of usability problems across the Internet, web sites on average:
- Lose approximately 50% of potential sales as people can't find what they need
- Lose repeat visits from 40% of the users who do not return to a site when their first visit resulted in a negative experience (12)
Ironically, the powerful marketing concept of branding, which has played a vital role for many organizations in effectively communicating with their customers, has often been misunderstood when applied to Web sites, in ways that hurt the older user and web audiences in general. Branding has been taken to mean an emphasis on proliferating logos and one-shot image splashes, instead of its true aim: strengthening customer experience. As a recent expert notes, with Web sites, "the brand" is not your company tagline or logo:
"Every time a reader succeeds in carrying out a task on the website, the brand's reputation is enhanced. Every time a reader is frustrated by the website, the brand's reputation is diminished . . . On your website, you brand with your words. You brand with accurate, well-written, up-to-date content. You brand with your classification. You brand with your navigation. You brand with your search process. You brand with your purchase process." (13)
Designing Effectively for People Over 50
For older Americans who want more from the Web, for Web sites that serve older people, for businesses and agencies who want to better serve real people, the question becomes: how can we not only identify challenges in serving older audiences, but do a better job meeting them? Can we begin to effect changes in the way the Web is made-by doing more research, by sharing best practices, and by getting the word out about what we want from this powerful medium?
AARP invites you to join us in this endeavor. We welcome your comments, we want to hear about your research, and we want to recognize best practices.
__________________________Notes
- Digital Divide Network
- PBS Digital Divide Series
- U.S. Department of Commerce, National Telecommunications and Information Administration, "Falling Through the Net: Defining the Digital Divide"
- "Falling Through the Net: Access to Online Services by Age" 1997.
- "Baby Boomers and Seniors Fastest Growing Web Groups" 1999.
- Internal AARP customer study (MII 2001), unpublished.
- "Broadband Surges in 2002, But Narrowband Declines"
- SeniorNet Survey on Internet Use
- Yankelovich Monitor December 2002
- Web Usability for Senior Citizens, Nielsen Norman Group
- "AARP National Survey on Consumer Preparedness and E-Commerce: A Survey of Computer Users Age 45 and Older"
- Usability.gov
- Gerry McGovern, Building Successful Online Brands