Galette des rois is delicious, but...
French websites really unhinge me!
January 2022, Paris
Galette des rois? I love it! For those unfamiliar, I suggest a quick Google search. If you happen to visit France in January - the only time of the year when you can find this delicacy filled with frangipane - do not miss the opportunity to savor it!
Be careful though, as each galette conceals a surprise, a small trinket known as a fève (or, bean) baked within. You can turn these small figurines into an unique collection.
Fast forward to the moment when I indulged in a slice of this delicious pastry, while doing some research on one of the most known French websites on real estate projects: www.seloger.fr . And, there was the surprise - not the fève, unfortunately:
Une erreur est survenue, merci de réessayer ultérieurement
The error message occurred during the initial step that any visitor would undergo when interacting with this
website: creating an account.
Although the search function stands out as the most important feature of this particular website, creating an account
offers the convenience of saving your search criteria for later and revisiting some of the results.
I can safely assume that account creation is the second most crucial feature for this particular website.
However, not only does it fail to execute gracefully, but the error message is bewildering.
There are no indications about the nature of the error — especially when the password requirements are entirely met,
as indicated by the presence of four green check marks. Moreover, the recommended remediation proves to be utterly useless.
Despite multiple attempts, at different time intervals and using different browsers, the account creation
consistently resulted in the same error message.
The onboarding experience for most websites or applications typically starts with the sign-up process. When this process fails, it robs users of their aha moment!
Note:
A similar experience, different website. This time, it concerned the online calculator the immobilier.notaires.fr website provides to its users, enabling them to roughly estimate the costs associated with a house purchase (i.e. notary fees).
The error message translates: An unknown error occurred. Try again later.
Funny enough, they admit the error returned by the application is unknown.
This demonstrates a total disregard for its users by employing vague and generic error messages that lack meaningful information. Such error message could be the last straw, especially for a user whose motivation is already fragile, leading them to abandon the process and never return to your website.
A useful and effective error message should fulfil 3 goals (taken from Microcopy: A complete guide book):
1. Explain simply and clearly that there is a problem and what that problem is.
2. Provide a solution so that users can return and complete the process immediately.
3. Turn the delay into an experience that is as pleasant as possible.
How to improve?
⌘
◉ Craft detailed and specific error messages that clearly communicates the nature of the error and potential causes (i.e. it is user-friendly)
◉ Include guidance on how users can resolve the issue or provide additional information to support troubleshooting. Avoid messages such as Please contact the site administrator. Regular users are unaware of the identity or contact information of the site administrator.
◉ Conduct thorough testing on key site functionalities, including scenarios where users access the website while using a VPN.
◉ Avoid conflicting messages, such as correctly filling out a form field according to requirements but experiencing field validation failures.