4 ms·

Does this apply to country drop downs as well? Pretty much every checkout form uses a massive list of countries. What should we use instead?

by naz 17y ago

thaumaturgy 17y ago
I would love to see auto-complete text entry used in country fields. Provide the massive drop-down as usual, and then in JavaScript replace it with a nice auto-complete.
- nrr 17y ago
  I've found that just having folks enter free-form information works amazingly well too. The caveat is that you have to make sure error handling sucks a bit less; otherwise, you run into people getting frustrated that their country isn't listed or that they're using a foreign name for it or similar. ... or maybe you could dump those cases into a customer service bin straight away and have those folks talk to a real human to straighten things out.
- arnorhs 17y ago
  A better alternative might be just to list the name of the country the users's IP address is originating from, in no input field, just as text - with some button or method of changing it - that could bring up a nicely organized/filterable country list.
- dchest 17y ago
  Don't drop-downs already have "find as you type"? Focus on a drop-down, press a few letters.
  - ams6110 17y ago
    In most browsers yes. Some, and specifically IE6, this works only for the first letter of the option, not cumulatively. E.g. typing 'd' then 'e' leaves the dropdown focused on the first option starting with 'e', rather than 'de'.
cwan 17y ago
I think the second part of that post applies (as to avoiding alpha order and making it easiest for the user). I think it makes sense to look at where users come from and list them accordingly. Maybe there's a bit of bias here but I find the ones that list the US, Canada first to be more useful (though one of the problems is that it is perceived as arrogant by foreigners but then again I'm Canadian). Another alternative is to default to the country from which the IP address originates - but I'm not a programmer and don't know how difficult that is.
- andyking 17y ago
  How many countries do you list first, though? I find those forms annoying - the US and Canada sit at the top of the list, but then to find the UK I have to go down and look near the United Arab Emirates or Uruguay or some such place. But then, some forms have "Great Britain", others just "Britain" and some split us into England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. It can take minutes just to find my country and I do wonder how many people just give up and never sign up or finish the check-out.
  - cwan 17y ago
    Again, not being a programmer, and obviously there's a bit of cost-benefit involved here, is it possible to put the default under the pre-set non-alpha list? Usually I can type in the first few letters to have it skip to the country I'm searching for if they're listed in alpha order. I tend to type the first few letters to see if this works first but then if I use the drop down I see the unordered select few countries above this default. thaumaturgy also suggested a great alternative. Though in doing the autocomplete/alpha list, I would list each of Great Britain, Britain, England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland so as to avoid the problem you describe.
lmkg 17y ago
Group by continent. Organizing a flat list of 50 items into 7 groups of 7[1] should improve accessibility, if the categories make any sort of sense. I would be interested in seeing research comparisons of flat dropdown vs grouped dropdown (ie some items are unindented unselectable categories) vs double-dropdown, where the items available in the second are determined by the selection of the first. [1] For the purposes of dropdown menu length, 49 is equal to 50.

Does this apply to country drop downs as well? Pretty much every checkout form uses a massive list of countries. What should we use instead?

by naz 17y ago

Does this apply to country drop downs as well? Pretty much every checkout form uses a massive list of countries. What should we use instead?

thaumaturgy 17y ago

I would love to see auto-complete text entry used in country fields. Provide the massive drop-down as usual, and then in JavaScript replace it with a nice auto-complete.

nrr 17y ago
I've found that just having folks enter free-form information works amazingly well too. The caveat is that you have to make sure error handling sucks a bit less; otherwise, you run into people getting frustrated that their country isn't listed or that they're using a foreign name for it or similar. ... or maybe you could dump those cases into a customer service bin straight away and have those folks talk to a real human to straighten things out.
arnorhs 17y ago
A better alternative might be just to list the name of the country the users's IP address is originating from, in no input field, just as text - with some button or method of changing it - that could bring up a nicely organized/filterable country list.
dchest 17y ago
Don't drop-downs already have "find as you type"? Focus on a drop-down, press a few letters.
- ams6110 17y ago
  In most browsers yes. Some, and specifically IE6, this works only for the first letter of the option, not cumulatively. E.g. typing 'd' then 'e' leaves the dropdown focused on the first option starting with 'e', rather than 'de'.

cwan 17y ago

I think the second part of that post applies (as to avoiding alpha order and making it easiest for the user). I think it makes sense to look at where users come from and list them accordingly. Maybe there's a bit of bias here but I find the ones that list the US, Canada first to be more useful (though one of the problems is that it is perceived as arrogant by foreigners but then again I'm Canadian). Another alternative is to default to the country from which the IP address originates - but I'm not a programmer and don't know how difficult that is.

andyking 17y ago
How many countries do you list first, though? I find those forms annoying - the US and Canada sit at the top of the list, but then to find the UK I have to go down and look near the United Arab Emirates or Uruguay or some such place. But then, some forms have "Great Britain", others just "Britain" and some split us into England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. It can take minutes just to find my country and I do wonder how many people just give up and never sign up or finish the check-out.
- cwan 17y ago
  Again, not being a programmer, and obviously there's a bit of cost-benefit involved here, is it possible to put the default under the pre-set non-alpha list? Usually I can type in the first few letters to have it skip to the country I'm searching for if they're listed in alpha order. I tend to type the first few letters to see if this works first but then if I use the drop down I see the unordered select few countries above this default. thaumaturgy also suggested a great alternative. Though in doing the autocomplete/alpha list, I would list each of Great Britain, Britain, England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland so as to avoid the problem you describe.

lmkg 17y ago

Group by continent. Organizing a flat list of 50 items into 7 groups of 7[1] should improve accessibility, if the categories make any sort of sense. I would be interested in seeing research comparisons of flat dropdown vs grouped dropdown (ie some items are unindented unselectable categories) vs double-dropdown, where the items available in the second are determined by the selection of the first. [1] For the purposes of dropdown menu length, 49 is equal to 50.