Each of these snippets was taken from a single screen for a particular Cruise website – there was a lot going on!
But, what really caught my eye was:
- Each of the blue text titles is a link
- Yet each blurb also contains a separate ‘Go’ link at the end/bottom
- And both go to the same place!
- And this is only a small sampling of the times this occurs on the page
I got to the point where I was so focused on all the ‘Go’ links that I didn’t even notice the actual information they were trying to promote.
This is what I call overkill. 
My Recommendation:
The Go link, while trying to give users extra affordance, actually makes it more difficult. As a user, I am being driven to these links; however, they are a smaller target area than the larger and longer title links, which means it will take more effort for me to ensure I am clicking on this smaller area.
There is really no need for both the title links and the Go links. The title links already include the browser hover effect, giving the user another clue that the text is actually a link, and I find that I cross over many of the title links on my way to click to Go link.
If the designer was concerned that users may not realize the titles were truly links, they would have been better served to simply include the ‘>’ (or similar) symbol at the end of each title link.
It’s easy to layer on more and more features/indicators just in case your users may not realize how something works on your site, but it’s generally not the right thing to do. You’d be better served trying to understand what the issue is and fix that rather than layering on more ‘stuff’ that might, in the end, make the user have to think/work harder.
P.S. I could also go on a diatribe similar to my ‘An Ode to Click here’ post, since these Go links cause the same context concern, but I’ll refrain.
If you haven’t read it, check it out.
