Web Usability Blog

We recently talked about the benefits of usability testing early – it saves you time, money and headaches. But how do you test early?

There are many ways to skin a cat, as the saying goes. There are also many ways to conduct usability testing. For us, the best method is moderated usability testing in the lab or remote. Why? It allows you to find out why problems happen on websites and apps by watching behaviours in real time and probing around testers' responses.

• What are Personas
• What do personas 'look like'
• How do Personas help
• How Personas can be used
• How not to use the Personas
• In Conclusion...
• References

User-centred design puts the user at the heart of the design process so that the resulting product is easy to use. 'Personas' are a way of bringing the user alive - constantly reminding the development team who they are designing for. Personas, for developing web sites, have been around for a while and over the years we have seen both good and bad practice in the ways they are developed and used - so just how helpful are they?

Usability testing early in the web development process saves you time and money and will result in a better outcome overall.

There are now lots of ways to gain insight into the user experience:

How many times have you tried using a website that just makes you want to give up? Either they just don't work, you can't find what you're looking for or the the company in question does not meet your expectation of share your values.

We know budgets can be tight and often stretching to a fully-fledged usability project is just not achievable. For anyone in that boat, here are our top tips for running your own usability session on the cheap...

Organisational change is like steering a big ship – hard work and slow to turn.

Most current chatbots are not very good. This makes it very easy for people to be sceptical about them and ignore the whole approach. However, this is often because the user’s needs were not fully understood or because they have not been adequately tested with users.

How people interact with your organisation is likely to change radically over the next few years. The maturing of some key technologies, most notably machine learning and conversational interfaces, means your users may no longer be using your website.