Case study series: Banking client

We recently undertook extensive usability testing for a large banking client. For this project, we tested with 18 target customers and surfaced insights to improve the navigation, content and design of the existing website on desktop and mobile.  

Who: A central bank of the United Kingdom 
What: Feedback from users to understand the intuitiveness of the main navigation and effectiveness of content  
How: Remote and in-person usability testing with 18 target customers in individual, 60-minute sessions 
Result: A prioritised list of insights and issues covering navigation, content and design with solutions divided into short-term wins and long-term solutions 

Background 

This banking client has a website full of fantastic content aimed at a wide range of audiences including financial professionals, researchers, policy makers, journalists and interested members of the public.  

The website launched a number of years ago following research to understand users and their digital goals. 

Since then, some changes have been made, including a recent navigation update and a new visual design, however, no further research with users had taken place.  

As part of this project, the client wished to gain feedback from users to understand: 

• The effectiveness, usefulness and relevance of content, with a focus on the homepage 
• The intuitiveness and ease of use of the navigation 

What we did 

We worked closely with the client’s project team throughout the testing process: 

• A kick off call to agree the research objectives, tester profiles and testing plan. 
• Develop and agree the recruitment screener. 
• Recruitment of the 18 target users needed to take part in the testing, including journalists, economists, financial industry professionals, academic researchers and members of the public. 
• Develop a facilitation guide, including an extensive list of tasks for the testers to undertake. 

• Test sessions took place either remotely or in person, on desktop and mobile, and all of them were live streamed to the client observers. 

Between testing sessions time was taken to debrief on the findings and tweak the facilitation approach as required, allowing the client team to adapt the list of tasks and the research focus as we progressed through the 18 sessions.  

Outcomes 

Testing insights were prioritised based on how seriously they impacted the user journey, and recommendations were split into short-term wins and long-term solutions. 

This was discussed with the client team to help structure ongoing workplans and smooth the process of turning research into action.  

The client is currently in the process of implementing changes to make the information architecture and homepage more user focused and easier to use.

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