Good defaults

From DesignPatterns

One way to avoid frustration and provide a seamless flow through a site or application is to have good defaults. This means defaulting choices to what reasonable people would expect to be ok. Not edge cases, not the super paranoid, but reasonable people.

Often having to make a choice or fill in data that is already known to the system disrupts what otherwise might be an easy flow through a task -- and can frustrate people because they have to think too hard to finish.

Provide reasonable default values for fields and drop downs. Base this information on known information about the user if applicable, i.e. if they live in California, auto-default the next drop down to United States instead of forcing them to start with A and scroll through 100 countries. If there is a time constraint or time / date picking, default to the time zone of the computer in use. If there is a date range selected, default the second date to the next day after the selected day rather than jumping back to today's date.

Providing a good default can streamline the process, ease perceived frustrations. They can provide context when a user has no clue what type of data is needed and can be good enough for many users.

Don’t suggest gender, password, or assume they want to receive newsletters etc. from the site.