March 2nd, 2005
Jakob Nielsen reports top 10 intranets
Web design and usability experts at the Nielsen Norman Group released their annual Ten Best Intranets study. Jakob Nielsen, the "guru of Web usability," said that the difficulty in selecting winners this time around was indicative of progress in designing usable intranets. "More and more companies are treating their intranets as productivity tools and are investing in improving their design’s usability instead of leaving the intranet to grow as it may," the report said.
One of the most interesting aspects of the report is that organizations of all types, sizes, industries, and to some extent, geographies, are on the list. This suggests that design best practices –such as leveraging the benefits of video, extending applications to support the physical environment, and internationalization–are gaining universal acceptance.
The world’s ten best intranets for 2005 are:
- Banco Español de Crédito (Banesto), the third largest bank in Spain
- Cisco Systems, the world’s leading computer networking vendor (U.S.)
- Electrolux, the world’s largest manufacturer of powered appliances (Sweden)
- The Integer Group, the seventh largest promotional marketing agency (U.S.)
- NedTrain, the Dutch National Railway’s maintenance subsidiary (The Netherlands)
- Orbis Technology, a small software developer (U.K.)
- Park Place Dealerships, operator of ten luxury automobile dealerships (U.S.)
- Procter & Gamble, a leading manufacturer of branded consumer goods (U.S.)
- Schematic, an interactive design and technology agency (U.S.)
- Verizon Communications, a leading telecommunications company (U.S.)
