Web Usability Blog

You’ve just completed a research project and have a shiny set of recommendations. You’d like to think that is the hard work done. However, in many organisations the implementation of these recommendations is often the harder part of the battle.

Most of the research we do on websites is now done during the development stage: thank goodness the days of usability testing just before, or even after, launch is now in the past for the vast bulk of our clients. See User test early - Quicker, better, cheaper outcomes.

As the web has grown up, a number of user interface design conventions have established themselves.

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Over the years we have worked for a number of charities, all doing amazing things. Optimising online donation journeys is often a key objective of conducting UX research. Arguably, one of the main reasons for a charity to have a website is to generate donations. However, many make the process long winded and laborious.

As UX Consultants, we spend a lot of time watching testers scan content. Very rarely will a tester knuckle down to read, word for word, the text in front of them. Instead they will pick out words that are relevant to them and skip over everything else. We recommend watching five minutes of eyetracking footage if you don’t believe us.

Recently, the Nielson Norman Group published an article* reviewing the benefits of individualised personalisation on websites.

Developing effective websites often requires organisational change to a culture where people at all levels in the organisation adopt behaviours that make a 'good user experience' an important goal. A good user experience is one where a user achieves their goals and is highly satisfied with the process; it will encourage reuse and recommendation of the site. If the organisation is not focused on providing a good user experience, they will be unable to build an effective web site. Understanding the user experience, through research methods like usability testing, can be a powerful tool in driving the organisational change needed to develop effective websites.

• 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?

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