OKcupid Analysis

Visibility of system status

• At the home screen, new potential matches are displayed
• If there is a message from a user, it is displayed in a different color to highlight the change
• There is a section to let you know who you recently visited, to remind the user of past actions
• On the home screen is a synopsis of recent activities of users
• The system sends emails to the user if someone rated them highly
• The system sends emails to the user if someone messaged them
• Notifications pop up on whatever page the user is on if someone is currently "checking them out"
• There is a companion mobile site that can push notifications to the phone
• As more personal questions are answered, the match percentage of each person is automatically updated
• Customizable search options automatically refresh searches based on specifications
• You can see if a user is online at that moment
• if the user regularly responds to messages or not

Match between system and the real world

• The premium option is called "A-List" which refers to the A-List celebrities, fluffing the users' sense of self-importance
• Potential matches are under a category of "You might like" which makes it seem more familiar
• In order to improve the matching algorithm, common questions are asked and the user is prodded into answering questions with promises of better matches and the ability to see others' answers
• Under messages, the message history is called "IM History" which reflects on the users' supposed past usage of Instant Messaging Services such as AIM.
• When there are error messages, a cute icon of a sad robot pops up
• The star rating system is used in the Quickmatch feature so a user can rate another user
• "Who Likes You" is used to see other users who have rated the user favorably
• On the profile page, instead of profession/occupation, the category is called "What I'm doing with my life"
• On the profile page, instead of physical appearance, the category is called "The first things people usually notice about me"
• On the profile page, instead of a category such as interests, there is one called "I spend a lot of time thinking about"

User control and freedom

• when editing profile, there is a clear "cancel" option
• for the profile pictures, there are clear options to delete any photo at anytime
• for the profile pictures, there is a clear option to drag the pictures in a different order
• when rating people, it shows you who you just rated in case you want to go back and re-rate the person
• There is an exit button for the small add to become an A-List member
• in the messages portion, you can see all past messages that have been sent
• The logout button is displayed in the header of every part of the website
• the browser back button works seamlessly
• A help option is at the footer of every page
• There is a box displaying who the user recently visited so that they can be found again quickly if desired

Consistency and standards

• Messages is the place to view messages and on someone's profile there is a consistent option to "send a message"
• The percentages for Match, Friend, and Enemy remain consistent no matter what screen they are viewed on
• Inconsistency: "Improve Matches" directs the user to the Questions tab
• A viewer that actively visits a profile will spur both a notification and an additional entry in the recently visited portion of the website
• If the user marks that they only want to see a person of a specific orientation, they will only be matched with users of that orientation
• If a user marks on their profile that they only want to be seen  by users of a specific orientation classification, then they will only be seen by those users in searches
• Inconsistency: the 'online for chat' icon is different from the messages icon which is slightly confusing.
• The number of unread messages in the messages portion will also appear as a numerical icon in the sidebar
• Whenever a change has been made to user settings or profile options, there is a notification bar that appears informing the user that the update has been successful
• clicking the okCupid logo will take you to the home screen
• inconsistency: when searching by interest, a lot of the time users will have the interest as their username, and the interest will not be searched, just the username

Error prevention

• There is a "hide from" list that prevents the user from being seen by users they really don't want to be seen by
• Problem: if you make an edit but don't click save and then hit the browser back button, it doesn't prompt the user to save changes
• Problem: if you make an edit, don't click save, and then navigate to a different portion of the site, there isn't a prompt to save changes.
• Problem: If a search is too specific, it just leads you to an error message instead of suggesting how to make it a better search
• Problem: if you already messaged a person, it still shows them in the "You might like" section.
• Problem: even if you already rated a person unfavorably, it still shows them in the "Matches" results
• Problem: it shows the searches by "Special Blend" but doesn't tell you what that means. Shouldn't it be by match percentage and location? Needs to be clearer.
• Problem: there aren't a lot of options to go into a type of incognito mode where other people can't see that you're visiting their page

Recognition rather than recall

• On every page, there are clear icons to get to the messages option
• On every page, there are clear icons to get to the matches option
• On every page, there are clear icons to get to the visitors option
• On every page, there are clear icons to get to the quickmatch option
• On every page, there is the user's profile picture which makes it easy to get to the profile option
• If the user rated another user, then the rating of that user is displayed whenever you see the rated user. This is effective so you don't have to recall what you said about a user
• There is an option to look at answers to past questions that have been answered 
• There are specific search categories in the questions section so that a user can filter questions by importance to them 
• At any time, the user can view what they said on their own profile
• When viewing other people's profiles, the user can compare what they said in their answers to questions to what the other user answered right on top of each other so the user doesn't have to remember what they answered.

Flexibility and efficiency of use

• There are direct links to the messages portion in emails that are sent to a user so the user doesn't have to log in and then navigate to the messages section everytime they receive a new message
• The navigation is fairly simplistic and consistently displayed on every page
• The home page is accessible through the company logo
• Overall, the navigational menu is simplistic in that it only contains 3 relevant tabs
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Aesthetic and minimalist design

• There are advertisements
• There is an hardly used "Promote me" button on every page under the profile picture
• There are icons to get the OKCupid app on the webversion even though it can auto-detect that I am not using a mobile device at this moment.
• Overall, the navigational menu is simplistic in that it only contains 3 relevant tabs
• The logo isn't overly complicated
• The colors in the website reflect the company logo/brand and don't deviate much
• Since the users are the focus, the background is simplistic and is just one color
• The brighter color is used throughout the site to highlight things that interest the user such as a new message
• The cursor uses a standard switch to indicate clickable links
• flat design

Help users recognize, diagnose, and recover from errors

• Anytime there is an error, a cute icon of a robot shows up
• The error is read as a message from the robot
• The error message does not contain any error codes, just plain English
• the 404 doesn't make the user feel like they messed up. It says "It's not you, It's us."
• The 404 also attempts to redirect the user back to the correct page
• There is a help link at the footer of every page

Help and documentation

• The help topics are clearly listed
• There is an "other" option to provide feedback if no help can be found
• Problem: the help topics aren't searchable
• The feedback page took a while to load
• They have an option on the feedback to attach a screenshot which is good