Portals often have highly complex information architectures. A design pattern that has become popular in the past couple of years to deal with this complexity is the “mega menu”. A mega menu is a large, often two-dimensional drop-down panel that is displayed for one of more global navigation items, in which options are grouped into categories and typography, icons, and other imagery are used to help identify choices. ESPN.com is an example of a site that uses mega menus extensively.
Leading user experience voices Jakob Nielsen and Jared Spool have both published differing findings on the efficacy of mega menus. While Nielsen finds them to be effective, Spool says they are problematic and has described clients experiencing lower revenues and KPIs after mega menu redesigns. I address Spool’s points in a recent blog post on our neighboring Spark Blog; see Mega Menus: Spool vs. Nielsen.
What do you think? Have you experienced any reduction in effectiveness as a result of a mega menu redesign?
