Don’t let me think – Usability Testing
Long time ago marketing people were always talking about “The Customer is King”. And we can still learn a lot when we talk to the customers.
What if we have the best quality product and it’s also the cheapest one. Well we should have some sell going on then. But maybe our viewers can’t find the product.
People are impatient. So if they can’t find the information they are looking for right away they will leave your site. So the issue is “Don’t let the viewer think”.
There are plenty of other websites available – most of the people will leave your site within 10 seconds.
I found this example.
Go and check out your own Google Analytics data.
What is usability testing?
Usability testing is a quality test that will tell you how easy your website interface is to use. The goal is to improve the ease-of-use during the design process.
Usability has 5 quality components:
- Learnability – how easy is it for users to accomplish basic tasks the first time they see your web design? Remember don’t let the customer think too much.
- Efficiency – how quickly can the users perform different tasks?
- Memorability – when the users are coming back to your site how well can they perform different tasks?
- Satisfaction – how satisfied or pleasant are the users with your design?
- Errors – how many errors do the users make?
The basic components of a usability test are
- Find some representative users
- Ask these users to perform a task with your design
- Observe what the users are doing – is it difficult to find the information? Is your navigation logic?
When we are talking usability we also have to talk about utility. Utility is whether your design provides the features they need. Do the users want a search bar? Do you have a search bar?
And how useful is your website. Useful is usability AND utility. So the perfect website design is a website with high usability and high utility.
Usability testing is an ongoing process
You will need some different usability tests. Here are the main steps
- Before starting the new design – test the old design, what is the good part and bad part of the present design.
- You can test your competitor’s design. Get some ideas of alternative interfaces and features.
- Make paper prototypes of one or more designs and test them
- Keep on testing during your design process.
- When you have your final design ready test it again
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Henrik
