Can an AI Monkey Understand Your Website?

Many of you might already be familiar with Poe, Attractive's AI web expert, who tirelessly tests and analyses websites. But how many of you knew he also has a pet space monkey, MeMe? Like all monkeys, MeMe likes to take part in everything, often causing havoc along the way. Occasionally Poe forgets his computer open, offering MeMe the irresistible opportunity to play the expert.

MeMe obviously does not have the intelligence that Poe has. While Poe can figure out the key functions and goals of a website, and constantly execute them, MeMe is more easily distracted. In fact, MeMe somewhat stupidly just clicks on the UI element that is the most attractive. On MeMe's page you can find out where the monkey would end up on your site, and create a wonderful comic from the results.

You might consider this feature frivolous, but it can actually be very insightful. Most human interaction on websites is not that far from how MeMe would click, given the massive selection of sites out there. If you cannot grab a user's attention within seconds, and lead them towards where you want them to go, they will quickly leave or get frustrated. In fact we have even witnessed sites where the most attractive option was a link or a button that lead off the site!

Below you can find some examples, or alternatively you can try MeMe for yourself immediately.

How does this work?

Without getting too deep into the technology (after all, this is unique stuff that nobody else in the world has done), we have used a simplified version of our web autopilot engine (which gave birth to Poe). That means detecting a large range of user interface elements and then applying algorithms to work out which ones would stand out the strongest. Those algorithms are based on the colours used, the size, position and other items nearby. The algorithms are highly reliable at mimicking how human attention and eyesight works. We utilise a virtual web browser to create interaction based on the results. It is groundbreaking technology which can be used in many ways. The most important to know is that it is trustworthy enough, even when applied to our space monkey, that if you find MeMe going far astray, it would be worthwhile considering a design change.

Some Examples

Oura

Oura has become one of the most iconic and successful companies to come out of Finland in recent years. Their ring, that can measure bio signals, has become a symbol for modern biohackers and a way to connect to improved health. It is perhaps no surprise then that their website does a great job in our MeMe The Monkey test, guiding visitors step-by-step through the purchase process.

MeMe only gets stuck towards the end of the process where the 'Add to Cart' button grabs the most attention. Normally this would be a good thing, but in this case a selection has to be made before the cart button will work, and that selection does not stand out well. Even the resulting error does not show up clearly, and this leads to MeMe becoming confused. To improve this, Oura should make the button look disabled until a selection has been made, and to highlight the selection area as the logical next step.

Korkeasaari (Helsinki Zoo)

We felt it was only right to let our monkey loose in the local zoo. The site initially seems to focus attention to the right location, reserving a visit, but soon MeMe gets lost and clicks a button that acts as a language picker. Korkeasaari should consider whether a language picker, that actually leads away from the reservation funnel, really should be that prominent. After all, a site should follow the language suggestions offered by the browser itself (usually based on system settings), so there should rarely be a need for the user to have to switch language.

Try It Out

See how MeMe manages with your site. If MeMe roughly ends up where you would like your users to go, you are doing a good job. If, however, MeMe dramatically veers off course, consider what you could do to highlight the main journey that users should be taking.

Don't forget that our smarter AI, Poe, is available to give more UX insights, and to daily monitor the key functions of your site (for free!) so nothing remains broken for long.

Try MeMe The Monkey on your site.