1. Context

An overview of Gmail’s menu

Gmail contains several functions which are available for the user to manipulate. Upon entry into the app, the user will first hit the landing page: Primary. Thereafter, different actions may be performed: Search, Star, Reply, Delete, Forward, Create New Email…and so on. What’s interesting then, is how Gmail has carved out arbitrary categories for the user — in particular, Social and Promotions. Different messages are thus classified and distributed to these segments.

With reference to the in-app menu, one is able to see more options that have been created by Gmail to possibly facilitate more efficient information architecting (e.g. Important, All emails).

However, on the contrary, I believe that this leads to:

User Pain Point 1: Gmail creates ‘unread spam’.

The creation of alternative categories for messages to be slotted into seeks to instil a sense of structure and organisation. However, it also increases cognitive effort for the user to process more information, located at different points within the product. More often than not, at least for myself, I tend to solely stick to the Primary feed — the place which is primarily important for me. I favour quick and intuitive retrieval of information all in one place, and therefore I do not habitually explore other places within Gmail to try to maximise my user experience. I just stick to the simple, functional stuff. Therefore, my Promotions feed looks something like this:

I feel sorry for the companies wasting their marketing dollars on me…

It is virtually untouched. Also, because I do not see this guilt-trippingly pile of unread mail on the Primary feed, there is a lack of top-of-mind awareness about the presence of this category within Gmail — and the fact that it actually exists (along with Social) gets ignored most of the time. As a result, this leads to a build-up of what I like to call, ‘unread spam’. The content sent by Owler, for instance, may very well be valuable — but because they remain unseen and unread, I gradually perceive anything unread as that of something as undesirable as spam. I wish they’d disappear, but they won’t; and day by day, they simply clog up my inbox. But I pretend to not see it. Ultimately, Gmail is supposed to help me organise my messages effectively, but this does not happen really well.

And speaking of organisation…

User Pain Point 2: Gmail’s information architecture is confusing and superfluous in certain instances — i.e. some features are redundant and adding to clutter!

Here’s the current information architecture for Gmail:

The fact of the matter is that there exists a whole bunch of functions and categories for the user that seeks to increase overall utility; but as with those which are shaded in light red, they present examples of what I perceive to be superfluous categories created by Gmail that serves to negate the entire user experience. Personally, it becomes slightly paradoxical as to how this element of utility may be marginally diminishing in nature; as the more features there are, the less useful they may actually be.

Thus, there are a few questions:

What is the difference between Important and Starred? Won’t I ‘star’ something which is fundamentally important to me…? Is there much value in Gmail creating custom labels? From the point when I created my Gmail account, I have only created my own labels instead of using Gmail’s. And also, what’s Receipts? For me to save my online purchase receipts in there? As mentioned in the first user pain point, does the creation of Social and Promotions (that remain chronically unread) take anything away from the whole user experience?

User Pain Point 3: Gmail contains both inconsistent and hidden affordances, which then creates user confusion.

First, let’s take a look at the second half of the menu as you continue scrolling down.

Labels

Then, I’d like to draw your attention to the option Create New. For a moment, I was left wondering if that actually meant creating a new email. And then, I thought to myself, isn’t that denoted by that icon with the pen in the red circle? Why have a duplicate function? After tapping on Create New, I realised that I was mistaken — it actually meant creating a new label. That moment of confusion as a user did stand out for me though. The question then becomes, why not make this affordance clearer, and more salient?