Case Study - Building a Usable Site

Live Testing

Once you're reasonably happy with your Website, its time for the real acid test.

There are several utilities that will test your Website for you, and by all means do take advantage of them—the more feedback the better, when it comes to building an easy-to-use site.

But nothing beats the real thing. If you really want to know how your Website impacts its visitors, go straight to a visitor to find out. I don't mean to ask for feedback on your site, though — we've already been over that. No, this is the final stage to testing; for a lack of a better term I tend to call it 'live' testing.

Go out and hire somebody — preferably somebody you don't know, who's interested in the subject your site focuses on. Pay them to sit down and spend a fixed amount of time looking over your Website. Arrange to be present, but other than giving them the primary url before the session begins, don't interact with them at all, until after they have finished browsing through your site.

Sit behind them and a little to the side, so you can easily see what they do. Take notes on what they do at your Website, and how they do it. Note down what order they view the pages in, how long they tend to spend on which pages, what content is read, and what is just skimmed. If you sell any products, have them make a purchase. Take especial note of any actions that appear to leave them confused or frustrated — these are signs that your Website usability in that area needs immediate attention.

Once their visit is over, interview them, or even better, present them with a feedback form for them to complete — people tend to be a little more honest on paper or by email than they may be comfortable with when face-to-face. Ask that all questions be answered with as many specifics as possible, and be sure to leave them plenty of space to enter comments.

Here' a list of simple questions I often ask:

• What was your general overall impression when arriving at the site?
• What did you think of the appearance of the site?
• What did you think of the content?
• Did you find it easy to find information you were interested in?
• Were you able to easily access all the information you wanted?
• What did you like about the Website?
• What did you dislike about the Website?
• What kind of improvements do you think the site needs?
• Do you like the Website's use of colour?
• How do the colours used on the Website make you feel? (I can guarantee that you will be surprised at some of the answers to this question)
• Do you think you will visit this Website again? Why or why not?

Once you have repeated this 'trial-by-fire' with a few different people, you will probably begin to see a pattern emerge. You may be surprised at some of what you are told, and might feel that some is irrelevant. It may be—but if everybody tends to bring up the same point, then it is wise to pay attention to what they are saying — maybe they're noticing something you've missed.

My Usability Checklist

Here are the steps I used to evolve my site to one that's usable and meets the needs of my audience.

1. Take care to use:

• correct tag syntax,
• image alt tags,
• optimized images, and
• colours that work well together and view similarly under different OSs.

2. Offer both text and graphic links, and always specify alternate as well as primary fonts.

3. Check that your Web pages display similarly at screen resolutions from small to large, and in different browsers. One easy way to do this is to see that tables are set to percentage widths rather than fixed-pixel widths.

4. Pay attention to your Website visitors:

• Ask what they think of your offerings, and listen seriously to their suggestions.
• Use surveys and feedback from email, web forms or message boards to learn who your visitors are, and what they are looking for when they visit your site.
• Be sure to keep asking what improvements they would like to see!

5. Keep in touch with users through an email list once you've established a relationship with them. Make sure you:

• keep them posted on seasonal or breaking news in your field
• inform them of all new website developments and offerings
• let them see that you are trying to offer what they've asked to find

6. Never stop testing, and never expect your site to be 'finished': by definition, a good Website is an ever-changing, growing, evolving entity.

7. Take advantage of the mutability of the Internet, using it to enhance your Website's evolution in order to keep visitors happy and coming back for more.