Web Usability is a specialist UX agency – this is all we do. We don’t design or build websites, provide SEO or other services: we focus on understanding the user experience and providing advice to make sites more effective.
When we were explaining this to someone at the eCommerce Expo 2012 at Olympia last week he said “So you don’t mark your own homework”. Exactly! Thank you – a brilliant summing up of what we don’t do.
A large part of what we do is usability testing – user testing designs developed by other people: consequently, we’re not wedded to the design solution – we just look for ways to make the site work better for users. We champion the voice of the user throughout the process and constantly bring the conversation back to thinking about ways to reduce the customer struggle. By doing this we help clients to:
- Understand users’ needs
- Improve website task completion, conversion, cross and up selling rates
- Improve online transaction rates
- Improve social media/email campaigns
But we deliver more than just reports and ‘a mark’ – our collaborative approach ensures research gets turned into action. Because we reference all discussion back to the user evidence, we get stakeholder buy-in and alignment – this includes people from different functions in the client and their external agencies: as Craig Sullivan of Belron says “User testing removes any opinion, whim and ego from the design process”. Our approach also means that recommendations fit the client’s technical, financial and political constraints, and reduces time from research to action.
