Usability and Your Website

Proof in Usability ROI is Knowing What to Measure

There are two common reasons why many small business owners or site owners do not conduct usability tests on their websites. The first is the simple fact that they cost money. The second reason is that even if they are willing to spend the money, they are afraid it may not even be worth the money. Where is the proof that I will get a return on my investment (ROI)?

The Proof is Knowing What to Measure

Yes, you can measure usability, and it may be a lot more identifiable than you would expect. The most important ones are effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction. Measuring the time and success rates are the obvious tools in judging a site, but you can also use the test subject’s feedback. A users satisfaction in the form of feedback may seem a bit vague in measuring, but after getting just a few a real interpretation of a site, it starts revealing itself on how most people see it. Having pre-designed questions with multiple choice type feedback can additionally give you real identifiable numbers as well.

Setting a Benchmark

After conducting a usability test, you now have a benchmark. You know what to expect when a visitor shows up to your site, you know the probability of success, and you know what the pitfalls are. When making changes to your site in the future you will now have an identifiable measuring stick to see whether those changes were good or bad. Having a personal benchmark for your site can also be beneficial, because you can compare those numbers with industry standards.

Making It Pay

So you have conducted the analysis, you have some numbers, how does it pay? It pays off in a number of ways:

• Changes in effectiveness can be compared to the current version – Will the change be more profitable?
• Stopping/bouncing effects to users are identified – Prevent visitors from leaving your site and reduce marketing costs
• Priority in future changes are identified – Don’t waste time and money working on fixes that users think are fine the way they are. Fix the obviously bad stuff first.
• Reduce time spent on customer service – They won’t email you as much if they understand right away.
• Reduce maintenance costs – A less confusing site to the users is typically easier to manage on the back end.

Assuming your site works, and depending on the budget, two big items on that list can really pay off for you. If you can identify some of the negative items that are bouncing your visitors this can drastically reduce your marketing costs, or at least make that marketing money a great deal more beneficial. Would you like 1 out of 100 making a sale or 4 our of 100? The second one is actually knowing what needs fixing first. Every aspect of a site could use some improvement, but knowing what is hurting the most can save you big money on site development fees. It’s the quickest way to decrease the bounce rate, and to improve user satisfaction.

This article was written for Temi by Rob Campbell of Best Web Image. Rob is a usability and web design consultant. You can contact Rob via the contact page on Best Web Image. You can discuss this article and other web design related issues at UK Webmaster Forum .

eCommerce the only safe haven in recession?

The unprecedented turmoil in the British economy has seen ’safe’ institutions like Banks nationalised (another word for saying administration?), picture of UK High street landscape redrawn with names that has been there for decades such as Woolworth and Virgin Mega stores omitted from the new picture.  Also for the first time in over a decade, UK unemployment has reached and exceeded two million with another one million people expected to be out of work within the next 12 months.

Whatever sector of the economy you look things seem to be on a downward trend with the exception of ecommerce. Online shopping not only bucks the downward trends on the High street but it did it with double digits; 13%. The latest figures about the e-tail sector released by online retail research group IMRG Capgemini. IMRG added that  February online shopping fell 11% from the month before, the monthly drop was down to enhanced sales in January, which was the result of  continuing post-Christmas sales.
The report also said that  online sales of beers, wines and spirits were up 30% on January and a surge of sales was recorded  in the few days before Valentine’s Day on 14 February.

The increase in online sales is expected to keep bucking the trend for the rest of this year, it was claimed in some quarters that online sales growth would have been much stronger if the rest of the economy is not as weak at it currently is.

Usability and Your Website – Time to take a critical look

Your site is fine you say. It is not hard to figure out how to use it you say. You designed it yourself, and you have been building sites for years. There are no known problems with the site. Here is something I will say; I bet your site is failing your visitors at least 50% of the time.

Understand the value, and learn the basic methodology of usability testing in this four-part post.

Understanding Usability Testing

I think most of us understand what usability testing. It is a simple test to see how easy it is to do something. Usability or usability testing is really more than that though. Usability is all about measurement of a user’s experience on different levels. It is about clearly understanding what is failing your users from completing their tasks, and knowing what the current level of effectiveness is. When you know how effective your task is, you can then know if future changes to your site were positive or not. You can also compare your current effectiveness to your markets known benchmarks. Many surprises come out of a usability test so be prepared to be amazed at what a difference it can make.

What does Usability Testing Measure?

Offline or online there are four key factors to measure when conducting a usability test. These are the items we can measure, and work to improve.

Items to Measure:

• Ease of learning
• Ability to memorize
• Error Frequency
• Satisfaction

Ease of learning is basically, how quickly does a user understand how to complete basic tasks on the site. The ability to memorize is calculating the user’s ability to remember a previous session. How much did they remember? Was it noticeably easier on the second visit because they remembered much of the method of site structure? Measuring the error frequency can detect the number of times errors are being made, and how serious the errors are. Measuring error frequency additionally finds how often they actually recover from the problem or user error. Satisfaction is a simple measurement made by user feedback on how much they like the site or task.

50% Failure and Why You Should Think UCD

So I first started this post saying that your site is most likely failing your users 50% of the time. It may not be true, but most likely, it is. Several tests have been conducted over the years, and the numbers point to failure. Some of the best sites have a success rate of just 42%. All of this means there is plenty of room for improvement, even for the best of us. I’ve personally conducted hundreds of usability tests on websites, and am amazed at how something as simple as making an order on an ecommerce site has failed. Words to live by when you own a website, “Test, test some more, then test the things you know that work.”

UCD is short for User-centered Design. UCD is designing a website based on user input throughout all the designing stages of building a site. In short, design using visitor action, not on visitor or designer thought. If your site is not easy to use, do you think visitors will come back? The second part of the four-part post will be all about UCD so stay tuned.

Usability testing is an essential part of building a website, and you don’t have to wait until you start a new site. Start testing your site today, even if it is five years old, even if it is doing great. Finding what is failing your visitors is not easy, but can make the difference between just another website, and a great website.

This article was written by Rob Campbell of Best Web Image. Rob is and expert on Usability and Design Analysis, he can give you expert advise on Usability and web design related issues, contact him directly via his website.

You can discuss this article, other articles from on this website at Webmaster Forum .