Why wireframe your copy?

When we think of wireframing, we tend to think of reducing everything down to its most basic, functional parts.

But this article points out an important aspect of wireframing to do with copy: when you wireframe, you need to include real copy, not dummy text.

This is particularly important if the thing (site, app) you're building promotes a new-concept product or service. In those cases, user testing of wireframes can actually help you to identify conceptual language that does and doesn't work to communicate what you need it to.

That, in turn, can help to define the brand language itself.

Last year I saw this first-hand. The designer, a charming and intelligent individual, took the wireframes and added in my copy, which included references to the new-concept product that the site was selling.

The testing showed that some aspects of the language (like some aspects of the layout) were confusing in context, and needed refinement. It also showed us how far visuals would go to communicate the new concept, and where we needed the refined copy to step in.

To find this out at wireframe testing stage was a massive advantage. The refined copy (and I'm talking 4-word phrases here) proved far more successful at communicating the brand's fundamental purpose at the second round of wireframe testing.

Copy does so much to communicate the purpose and function of a site (or brand) at first glance.

I know a picture tells a thousand words, but often, visuals end up being pretty busy. On the other hand, single- or double-word prompts, or even short-phrase prompts, can be absorbed in an instant. Taken together, the dominant copy on your page contributes massively to that initial communication in the new user's "WTF is this?" moment.

The new-brand-defining moment, if you will.

Example? Example. Not an image on the page. Can you tell what this brand does better than any other? In an instant.

Bad example? This. The visual is busy (and boring), and there's zero actual information in view. The first big word I see is "Analytics", which only reminds me of this brand's largest competitor.

Why should I click on anything on this page? No reason is given in this first view. To put that another way, nothing unique is communicated in the user's first glance at the screen. This is just another analytics brand. Any clicking or scrolling I do will be an attempt to try to find a reason to stick around.

I don't know the facts, but I doubt this homepage's wireframe was tested with real copy. In case you're as slow as I am, the USP is real-time data. Real-time data! The benefit? Respond to this minute's site visitors, right now. That's some selling proposition. Don't use the past to try to predict the future: seize the moment, statisticians and site owners!

Is the immediate communication of a brand's unique function "usability"? Yes. Without a function, the brand has no use to the user. Without a unique function, the brand provides no motivation for its own use.

Yeah, I can work out how to sign up to the free trial and log in. I can scratch my way to hovering over that big arrow, clicking, and watching the video. But Jesus, in that first instant, I got nothin'.

Your video, your pretty pictures, and your logical, navigable, clickable interface don't mean beans—unless, together with your copy, the page says something unique in that first moment.