PSA: I tried making my website's buttons bigger for accessibility and my grandma still clicked the text next to them

So last week I redesigned my little Etsy shop page. Made the 'Add to Cart' buttons huge with high contrast colors. Like 60px tall and bright orange. Thought I was being super inclusive. Showed my 78 year old grandma the site and she spent 30 seconds trying to click the product description text next to the button instead of the actual button. I was like 'Grandma, the big orange thing!' and she said 'Oh I thought that was just decoration.' lmao. Learned that if something looks too flashy some people just ignore it as noise. Has anyone else had a family member completely miss an obvious design choice? What'd you do to fix it? I'm thinking of adding a subtle arrow pointing to the button now lol.

2 comments

2 Comments

tara34511d ago

I had this exact thing happen with my mom and the checkout button on my craft blog. I ended up adding a subtle pulsing glow effect to the button that fades in and out, like a soft heartbeat, and that did the trick. She finally said "Oh, that thing is supposed to be pressed." I also put a small icon of a shopping cart right inside the button so it's extra clear what it does. Sometimes old folks just need a little nudge that something is interactive.

leebrown11d ago

Yeah that pulsing glow idea is actually pretty smart, I might try that myself. My grandpa does the same thing where he just ignores anything that looks too fancy or designed. It's wild how we make things "better" and somehow make them harder for the people we're trying to help.

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