Does the subliminal sign on your website say, “Welcome?” Or are you telling people who surf your site to “Go away!”—by making the site more complicated and difficult to use than it should be? Don’t know the answer? Maybe it’s time to find out, through usability testing. As enterprises shift more and more of their interaction with suppliers, customers and employees to online websites, it’s surprising how little they test the usability of those sites. In the days of desktop software applications, web usability testing was a common element in the development cycle; however in today’s web-centric world, it’s often forgotten. But the value of website usability testing is clear—a relatively small, upfront expenditure can help save developers untold hours of wasted programming time—and save companies thousands—if not—millions of dollars. According to Creative Good, Inc. (October 1999), “a dollar spent on [on-line] advertising … produced $5 in total revenue, while a dollar spent on customer experience improvements yielded more than $60.” If cost-savings isn’t convincing enough, consider the impact of poor design on customers, employees and suppliers. More and more, businesses seeking to control their call-center costs are driving consumers to the web for sales and support. But, according to Forrester Research, two-thirds of online shoppers abandon their shopping carts before they complete the transaction—often because they can’t figure out how to buy what they want. Triggering the Wrong Response from Users With high rates of shopper abandonment for relatively simple transactions, think about the buying process for a complex product or service—such as DSL or cable service. Does your local communications providers make it easy to order DSL service online—or is the ordering process itself so complex that the average person can’t figure it out? What’s a consumer going to do? Call the service rep—or maybe the competition. In either case, the communications providers have triggered exactly the opposite response they want to engender in the consumer—they want the consumer to buy online. "Executives shouldn't stand for designs that put roadblocks between users and their goals,” notes Harley Manning, research director at Forrester Research. “People will struggle with a hard-to-use site to get valuable content—but only until some other site makes it easy to get similar value. When users can't get to the content because the site isn't designed properly, it's like a broken assembly line that halts production.” ¹ Web site Usability testing can help identify and eliminate problems before they affect the user. From focus groups to keystroke tracking, usability testing helps developers “see” into the minds of their users—and simplify the elements of their sites that are often only obvious to customers. As Jupiter Media Metrix points out, two-thirds of customers name “ease of use” as one of the most important attributes of an online service—yet it’s all too often overwhelmed by fancy animations, great graphics and complex design. According to a study in May 2001 by web research firm Vividence Corporation, of 69 Fortune 500 Internet and B2B websites, over half of the sites (53 percent) had poorly organized search results; 32 percent had a poor information architecture; 32 percent suffered from slow performance; 27 percent had too much clutter; 25 percent had confusing labels; and 13 percent had inconsistent navigation. Most of the problems, Vividence concluded, resulted from relatively common design errors that were overlooked as the site was developed. ²" “Great technology is a significant competitive advantage,” notes Richard Barton, president, CEO, and director of the popular online travel site, Expedia. “But it's only by translating that unique technology into an easy and relevant customer experience that we're able to drive travel sales and profits." ³ Of course, the web experience isn’t solely about online sales. Often, it’s about customer education. According to Jupiter Media Metrix, 45 percent of consumers used a retailer’s website to research a product before buying the product in the retailer’s physical store. For Brick-and-mortar retailers that recognize this important sales driver, they will find the return on their web investment could improve by 65 percent compared to online sales alone. Experiencing A Website Like An Average User What can companies do to determine the viability and usefulness of their website? One particularly valuable exercise is usability prototyping, an iterative process where web designers can easily track the usability of a particular web feature—virtually as it is created. The programmer designs a feature, the user immediately tries it out—and the designer can make immediate changes whenever there’s a problem. Through this “instant feedback” process, designers anticipate future user problems before they occur. This is one approach used at Accenture’s network of Usability Labs. According to Lynn McMahon, director of Accenture’s Innovation Center in Murray Hill, New Jersey. “At our customer experience lab, we have found that this process enables programmers to design and test in hours as opposed to weeks or months.” This process saves a project team a tremendous amount of time and energy. When business owners and developers create or change websites in the absence of customer input, the process can be a very long, often very political exercise. When these same people collectively observe a customer actually using their site, the contentious issues can be solved in minutes, not months. The customer becomes central to the decision process; decisions are made on customer feedback, not 'hypotheticals' based on what the project teams think the customer will do. Through focus groups, video monitoring, keystroke tracking, user questionnaires, prototyping and other methods, programmers can recognize many common web-design mistakes—and better understand the mind and logic of someone using their site for the very first time. In turn, the improved usability of the site should translate into a greater number of completed transactions, more satisfied customers—and a greater web ROI. Usability testing is a tool that will translate small investments into positive returns in customer satisfaction, streamlined operations and potentially increased revenue streams. It allows companies to immediately visualize the needs and desires of their customer and caters to that market. In addition, usability testing is a way to prevent future dilemmas and create the user loyalty that comes with an efficient website that delivers on customer expectations. Finally, in immediately detecting and satisfying customers’ online needs, usability testing saves time and investment for companies willing to make an initial investment that will payoff handsomely in the future. About the Authors: Lynn McMahon is a Partner at Accenture and Director of the Innovation Center in Murray Hill. Ronnie Battista is a Manager at Accenture and Director of the Innovation Center Customer Experience Lab. ¹ “A Great User Experience Is The Most Cost-Effective Way To Win Online, According To Forrester Research,” Forrester Research Press Release, May 31, 2001.
² “Tangled Web 2001,” study by Vividence, released June 7, 2001.
³ Ibid. Talk to someone about this topic  To Top
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