Web Usability Blog

I was reading an article in the Sunday papers about middle aged men drinking too much. This was accompanied by pieces by people who drank more than 50 units per week. These were not raving alcoholics but people with good jobs and happy family lives that you might meet in the course of your professional life. They saw their drinking as quite normal and they did not feel it was excessive. I was quite shocked that someone drinking this much might think this ‘normal’ behaviour because it is a long way from my experience.

We have recently completed a number of usability testing projects for clients with large information sites i.e. non-transactional sites. These have included organisations as diverse as a major UK charity, a manufacturer of precision measuring equipment, and an EU institution.

We estimate over 60% of UK, studio-based, qualitative market research takes place in London (*), most of which will use London-based respondents. Londoners accounts for 13% of the UK population and a key question is how representative is this 13% of the whole UK population?

“Can I watch the testing remotely?” is a question we keep getting asked. In the past, while possible, this was complicated, unreliable and expensive.

We’ve just done some user testing on the prototype of a new website for a very large brand in the travel sector. The site was full of really useful widgets to help users achieve tasks – but also full of wordy content, outside and inside the widget boxes, none of which the testers looked at (as we could see on Liveviewer through our Tobii eyetracker). “Woah” we said “let’s try to cut out some of these words and de-clutter the site”. To which our client replied “we pay a lot of money to an agency to write this stuff, to help our SEO”.

It was recently estimated in the US that Google receives 182 million unique views a month, 9 million hits above its closest competitor Yahoo!, And 20 million views ahead of bronze medallist, bing*. So why is Google the world’s most popular search engine? Firstly, it gets us the results they want. Secondly, as we all know, it is extremely easy to use. On the Google homepage the search box is smack bang in the middle of the page while Yahoo! has squashed it well out the way up the top and thrown the kitchen sink at the homepage.

User research isn’t only useful in identifying issues on a site, but a great way to change the way in which an organisation works and thinks about their customers. Web Usability worked with Cancer Research UK to design their new masthead Information Architecture, and with their skills and expertise conducted several workshops, each with up to 30 key stakeholders to gain buy in and support for their site strategy.

Responsive design seems like a brilliant solution for coping with the rise in mobile users but what are its pros and cons, and what has to be considered to make it effective?

Web Usability  has recently been working with digital agency Front Page doing early stage prototype testing on some designs Front Page is developing for one of their travel industry clients. We tested flat images linked together with simple hotspots to create a browsing experience. A number of issues - both strategic and tactical - emerged which will inform the continuing development of the site. By testing at this early stage the client saved money because no coding had been done and avoided the problem of 'invested effort' where designers and clients had become so attached to the designs that there was resistance to change. And the changes will improve the user experience and increase conversion. So win-win all round!

I had an interesting telephone conversation with one of our clients recently about benchmarking their web site. They are a major government organisation and are redeveloping their website. They wanted to benchmark the site before and after the redevelopment. The main driver for the benchmarking seems to be to justify the expenditure on the redevelopment.