1. Te a m M e m b e r s :
B. Cha
P. Ejlali
REDDIT
J. Handcock
S. Nikkhah
C. Seong
S. W ilson
REDESIGN PROJECT March 2011

2. WHAT IS REDDIT?
 Reddit is a source for what's new and popular on the web .
 Users like you provide all of the content and decide, through
voting, what's good and what's junk .
 Links that receive community approval bubble up towards
#1, so the front page is constantly in motion and (hopefully)
filled with fresh, interesting links .
 Reddit allows users to create communities called
"subreddits”
 There are two sets of reddit users, registered members and
non members
 Being registered allows you to vote posts up or down and
customize it’s view

3. Because it’s a user
driven site, reddit
gets it’s revenue
from sponsored
links

4. And by sponsored ads
on the side of the page
- homepage and
subreddit/community
pages

5. PAIN POINT
Difficult for users
to locate content
Unless a
registered
member, one
cannot customize
for their
homepage

6. MODIFYING REDDIT
What we want to change?
Improving the navigation on the homepage

7. MODIFYING REDDIT

8. USABILIT Y ACTIVITIES
 Competitive Heuristic Analysis
 Reddit User Interviews
 Subreddit Card Sort Activity

9. COMPETITIVE HEURISTICS ANALYSIS
What we did
 Identified top five of reddit’s competitors as:
digg, Y!buzz, delicious, newsvine, and mixx.
 Used Jakob Nielsen’s Design Guidelines associated with
navigation and graphic design found in Homepage Usability
and mapped it to one of his ten usability heuristics.
 Determined four heuristics and nine guidelines to be
relevant to our research.
 Evaluated reddit and its competitors’ homepage navigations.

10. COMPETITIVE HEURISTICS ANALYSIS
What we found
 Reddit had the second lowest score for navigation design.
 Only one heuristic and five guidelines were met
 It is also the only site violating the guideline that the
location of the navigation should not be horizontal above
graphical treatment.
 It used made up words such as IMA.
 It does not have high contrast between text and the
background.

11. INTERVIEWING REDDIT USERS
What we did:
 Interviewed reddit users to understand how they use
navigation elements
 High-level research questions:
 What are participants’ routines on reddit?
 How important is the content under
each navigation element?
 Is there difficulty in finding
content on reddit?

12. INTERVIEWING REDDIT USERS
What we found:
 Developed insight into navigation habits
 Identified navigation issues:
 No filter for Safe-For-Work content
 Semantically ambiguous category labels

13. CARD SORTING ACTIVIT Y
What we did:
 An online open card-sort with 52 labels and paired
descriptions
 Activity employed to gain an understanding of:
 Navigation organization
 Users’ mental models

14. CARD SORTING ACTIVIT Y
Sub-reddit
descriptions
Default front page
sub-reddits

15. CARD SORTING ACTIVIT Y
What we found:
 The majority of users accepted the creation of themed
categories
 Nine common categories emerged:
Entertainment,
Science,
Lifestyle,
Special Interest,
reddit,
Debate,
Technology,
Politics,
and News.

16. RECOMMENDATIONS
Analyzed findings
6 redesign recommendations

17. Recommendations:
1. Remove the gray navigation bar

18. Recommendations:
1. Remove the gray navigation bar
2. Use contrasting colors for the main navigation for better visibility

19. Recommendations:
1. Remove the gray navigation bar
2. Use contrasting colors for the main navigation for better visibility
3. Add a navigation bar with 9 categories underneath the main navigation

20. Recommendations:
1. Remove the gray navigation bar
2. Use contrasting colors for the main navigation for better visibility
3. Add a navigation bar with 9 categories underneath the main navigation
4. Hovering over each category will show a dropdown menu

21. Recommendations:
1. Remove the gray navigation bar
2. Use contrasting colors for the main navigation for better visibility
3. Add a navigation bar with 9 categories underneath the main navigation
4. Hovering over each category will show a dropdown menu
5. Add a SFW (safe for work) option

22. Recommendations:
1. Remove the gray navigation bar
2. Use contrasting colors for the main navigation for better visibility
3. Add a navigation bar with 9 categories underneath the main navigation
4. Hovering over each category will show a dropdown menu
5. Add a SFW (safe for work) option
6. Allow members to have a “My reddits” menu

23. PARTICIPANT FEEDBACK
 Several participants liked the new design
 One participant said:
“The redesign looks nice. I think the "safe for work" mode is a nice
touch. I really like the new look and the color contrasting is really
nice. The submenus look to be nicely organized as well .”
 Several participant suggested other ideas
 One participant said:
“You have abandoned a flat navigation scheme for a hierarchical scheme.
This sounds nice on paper, but in reality, this has faded (for the better)
from this type of user interface design since the 90s.”

24. USER AND BUSINESS BENEFITS
Recommended
User Benefit Business Benefit Cost
Design Changes
1. High contrast Easier visibility, happier Improved user experience Very low cost
user would result in user loyalty
and referrals
2, 3, and 4. Remove top Better representation Increased exploration of High cost on time
navigation and create of categories of content other sub sites would result and budget
an improved available will decrease in more adds being viewed
navigational categories user confusion with and more profit for reddit
navigational
5. Not safe for work Users will spend more More time spent on Medium cost
filtering time exploring at website means more
activity on the site, more
ads viewed, and more profit
for reddit

25. FINAL ANALYSIS
 Competitive Heuristics Analysis
www.reddit.com www.reddit.com
(BEFORE) (AFTER)
Heuristics Met
1 4
(Total Possible 4)
Design Guidelines Met
5 9
(Total Possible 9)

26. THANK YOU
Questions?

27. 2nd Design:
1. Remove the gray navigation bar
2. Add navigation label “my reddit” to the main navigation
3. Allow members to edit what links (reddits) appear in the dropdown menu