SharePoint Site Hi- light: We Know Where Your Stuff Is

Have you ever had your car, laptop, luggage or motorcycle stolen? If so, was the stolen item returned? How did you manage to get it back?

Well, if you answered yes to the first two questions, then you might have been helped by the company that happens to be the focus of this installment of “SharePoint Site Hi- light”. They have recovered over five billion dollars worth of stolen cars and equipment worldwide with two billion in the U.S. alone. Their recovery rate of stolen vehicles is over ninety percent, and their web site is hosted on and driven by SharePoint. One can also upgrade to a low cost dedicated SharePoint server with hyper-v hosting.

The site we are taking a look at today is Lojack, a world- wide provider of theft deterrent and recovery systems. As with the other sites in our series, we will look at overall design and usability as well as how the site might take advantage of SharePoint’s dynamic capabilities.

At first glance, Lojack’s site promises lots of easy to access information right from the start. The home page opens with six very visible links to each kind of situation they handle, and a two-minute movie talking about theft and how Lojack can protect you. Note that standard navigation links appear at the top of the page.

If you follow any one of the prominent links on the home page, you are taken to a page explaining how the company deals with that particular type of situation, be it protecting your vehicle or keeping your loved ones safe.

I followed the automotive link as if I need to protect my car from theft. I am presented with a short blurb on car theft and another on vehicle monitoring, and options to click a button to learn more. Upon following that link, we find that we are directed to the main page for their vehicle solution. The pages for this section make learning about their product and finding the solution you need relatively easy.

For the most part, Lojack’s SharePoint site behaves as expected, with a minor but irritating exception. The navigation at the top breaks two of my rules for usability. First, you cannot click on the actual main navigation; this is not what people expect, they want to click and go.

Which brings us to our second no-no. To get anywhere through the top navigation, you have to click a link in a drop down menu. As we have discussed before, all the information should be visible, it does not make sense to have potential customer hunting blindly through drop-downs to find what they are looking for.

The saving grace for this navigation mistake is the links on the home page that lead potential clients right where they want to go. After all is said and done, Lojack gets a solid 3.5 out of 5 stars. Not the very top of the heap, but definitely in the running for usability. Now sign up with us for SharePoint 2013 Hosting services.