Cisco.com User Experience Guidelines and Standards
Multimedia
Creating Content
Pre-production is the most important stage of producing a successful multimedia communication piece. The following guidelines offer a solid foundation for creating powerful, persuasive communications that are relevant and properly targeted.
Know the message. Begin with your objectives in mind. In the end, you'll save time and money, reduce the number of review cycles, and produce better pieces that are easier to understand and provoke an emotional response.
Define a specific call to action. Identify what the audience should learn, feel, or do as a result of their exposure to this piece. Cisco messages motivate behavior, such as upgrading a network, choosing Cisco products over alternatives, or contacting Cisco. Other messages affect perception, such as "the Cisco Intelligent Information Network can give you a competitive advantage." In the end, success is measured by how well the overall goal is achieved.
Know your intended audience. Tailor the piece to your target audience. What motivates them? The more you know about them, the easier it is to convey the message.
Create concise materials. Shorter and simpler is better. Quick ideas that make sense to an audience are more likely to be retained. A typical Web audience has an attention span of approximately 30 seconds.
Be specific and support claims with evidence. Customers are wary of information that is too high-level or claims that aren't backed by evidence. Proof that supports a claim effectively boosts believability-especially if it comes from third parties, such as customers or respected industry analysts.
Use terms that customers will understand. The communication need to be informative and clear. Avoid using internal Cisco terminology; use industry-standard terms and minimize the use of jargon.
Support higher-level Cisco messages. Identify which messages work best, then adapt or modify them to match your efforts. Your message will gain credibility from the value of consistency: If customers hear the same basic message, they're more likely to believe and retain it.
Integrate your communication piece with other elements in the overall marketing strategy. Understand where it fits. Does it reinforce and enhance the overall messages and contribute to its clarity?
Review Process
Review your multimedia presentations with Corporate ID for compliance with brand standards (e.g., Cisco logo, colors, fonts, images).
Posting it on the web
Usage Criteria
A multimedia element must open in a child window. If the parent page to a child window or pop-up is closed, the application pop-up will remain open.
The content's MIME type is identified by one of the following ways:
When no short description text is available, the word "Flash"/"Video", etc should appear within parentheses after the link to the content and the pop-up icon.
When short description text is available, the word "Flash"/"Video", etc. should appear within the short description text that describes the link, such as "Launch Flash Demo" or "Watch Video."
Design the piece as a stand-alone presentation with its own local navigation.
Viewing these presentations is always determined by the user. It never appears unless the user specifically clicks the link to view it.
Visual Specifications and Guidelines
Hyperlinked titles of video content are followed by the non-hyperlinked word "Video" in parentheses.
Limitations/Constraints
Flash content adds significant download time to a page. Studies have shown that users will leave a site if a Web page takes longer than 15 to 20 seconds to load.
Search engines cannot index Flash content or links.
Be sure that the multimedia content really adds value to the user's experience. The linear presentation approach is often not a good solution for the forms of content users expect on Cisco.com.
Multimedia is inaccessible for some users. Content on Cisco.com is required to comply with the U.S. Government's Section 508 Accessibility Guidelines.
If you post a Flash presentation, provide a link to Macromedia's web site to enable users to download the latest Flash player and plug-in.
