Hello & Welcome to Week 9 of Rachael’s Blog. As discussed in previous blogs, there are many different moving parts that go into creating a website. If you are someone who recently graduated from college like me, or just someone who is trying to learn more about web design and development, I invite you to tune into my weekly blogs. This week is focused on usability testing. This aspect of web design can benefit your website greatly, whether you are creating a new website, redesigning a website, or simply trying to make a current website more functional. Usability testing is a very important aspect to consider when it comes to designing a website. Some decide to do it two weeks before a website launches, which is usually a request for a disaster check – people getting nervous and finally deciding to do some testing. Others decide to do it two minds in advance – usually to settle some ongoing internal debates amongst web teams. Usability testing can sometimes settle these arguments, but it usually ends up revealing that these arguments were not important at all. 

Other times, marketing people will call for a focus group to be done for their website, when what they really need is usability testing. There is a difference between the two: 

• Focus groups are when a small group of people (usually 5 to 10) sit around a table and talk about things, such as their opinions about products, past experiences with them, or their reactions to new concepts. Focus groups are good for getting an idea of a user’s feelings and opinions about things. 

• Usability testing is about watching one person at a time try to use something to do typical tasks so you can detect and fix things that confuse or frustrate them. 

In usability testing, you actually watch people use things, instead of just listening to them talk about them. Focus groups aren’t great for learning about whether your site works and how to improve it. 

A few true things to note about usability testing:

1. If you want a great site, you have to test it
2. Testing one user is 100% better than testing none 
3. Testing only one user early is the project is better than testing 50 near the end

It’s said that web development teams should spend one morning a month doing usability testing. If you test 3 users in the morning, you can debrief by lunch, and then can decide what needs to be fixed before the testing is done the following month. Additionally, the ideal number of participants for each round of usability testing is three. 

So how do you choose participants? It’s good to do testing with participants who are like the people who will use your site, but the truth is recruiting people from your target audience isn’t as important as it may seem. It’s recommended to use the approach – recruit loosely and grade on a curve.  It’s good to try to find users that reflect your audience, but don’t get hung up on it. Loosen up your requirements and make allowances for the difference between your participants and audience. However, if your site requires certain domain knowledge, you’ll need to recruit some people with that knowledge – but they don’t all need to have it. There are some advantages to using participants who aren’t from your target audience: 

1. It’s usually not a good idea to design a site so that only your target audience can use it
2. Were all beginners under the skin 
3. Experts are rarely insulted by something that is clear enough for beginners 

So how do you find participants? A few places to recruit test participants are user groups, trade shows, craigslist, facebook, twitter, customer forums, a popup on your site or even asking friends. Typical participant incentives for a one hour test session range from $50-$100 for average web users to several hundred dollars for professionals. 

It’s never too early to start testing. Even before you begin designing your site, it’s a good idea to do a test of competitive sites. This way, you’ll learn a lot about what works and doesn’t work without having to design or build anything. You’ll also want to test a site you’re redesigning before you start, so that you know what’s not working. 

A typical one hour test would be broken down into something like this: 

1. Welcome
   • Explain how the test will work so the participant knows what to expect 
2. The questions 
   • Ask the participant a few questions about themselves to put them at ease 
3. The home page tour 
   • Open the home page and ask the participant to look around and tell you what they make of it. This will give you a good idea of how easy it is to understand your home page. 
4. The tasks 
   • This is the heart of the test 
   • You will watch the participant perform a series of tasks. If you see them stop to think, ask them what they are thinking. Let participants do work on their own, don’t say anything that will influence them. 
5. Probing 
   • After the tasks, ask the participant questions about anything that happened during the test and any questions that the people in the observation room would like to ask 
6. Wrapping up 
   • Thank the participant for their help, pay them, and say goodbye. 

After each round of tests, you should make time for the team to share their observations and decide which problems to fix. It’s recommended to do this right after you do the tests, while everything is still fresh in the observer’s mind. Usability testing can uncover an abundance of issues, the best advice I can give is focus on fixing the most serious problem first. Here is a suggestive method: 

• Make a collective list 
• Choose the 10 most serious problems 
• Rate them 
• Create an ordered list 

Overall, if you are creating a new website, redesigning a website, or just trying to make a current site more user friendly, usability testing is something that you would greatly benefit from.

Hello everyone & Welcome to week 7 of Rachael’s blog! Last week was focused on how to design navigation, and what to consider when designing navigation. This week will be focused on how to design the homepage of a website. The home page is one of the most important parts of a website. Everything on the home page can contribute to a user’s understanding of the website overall. For this reason, there are a few objectives that a homepage needs to meet: 

1. It needs to show a user what they’re looking for – and how to get to where they want 

    2. It needs to expose users to aspects of the website that they may be interested in, even if they aren’t actively looking for them 

    3. It needs to give users a good idea of where to begin on the web page 

    4. It needs to create a good impression, establishing credibility and trust of the website 

Accomplishing the objectives that a homepage must meet is important for a user to better understand the overall purpose of your website. With that being said, you can better accomplish these objectives by accommodating the following when designing a homepage:

• Site identity and mission 

• • • Needs to tell the user what site they are visiting and what its for 

• Site hierarchy 

• • • Has to give an overview of what the site has to offer – both content and features – and how its all organized 
      • This is typically accomplished by the persistent navigation
• Search 
• • • • • The search bar should be prominently displayed

• Content promos 

• • • The newest, best or most popular content should be highlighted
      • This is typically things like top stores or top deals 

• Feature promos 

• • • Invite users to explore additional sections of the site or try out features 

• Timely content 

• • • The home page needs some signs of life – content that is updated frequently
      • This signals users that the site is not abandoned or outdated 

• Deals 

• • • Space needs to be allocated for advertising, cross promotion and co branding deals 

• Short cuts 

• • • The most frequently requested content may deserve their own links on the home page 

• Registration 

• • If the site uses registration, the home page needs links or text boxes for new and old users to sign in 

Everything on the homepage can contribute to a user’s understanding of what the site is. In designing a web page, you need to pay special attention to three important places in order to be certain that a user is able to determine what the site is about: 

• The tagline 

1. 1. • The tagline is the space right next to the site ID
      • Since its visually connected to the site ID, users read it as a description of the whole site 

• The Welcome blurb 

1. 1. • Usually displayed as a prominent block on the homepage, this is a description of the site 
      • Located at the top left or center of the content space in order to catch the users eye

• The “learn more” 
  • • People have come to expect a short explanatory video on most sites and are often willing to watch them 

Now that we have gone over the three important places on a page where users expect to find explicit statements of what the site is about, we also need to consider guidelines for getting the message across:

1. Use as much space as necessary 
2. Don’t use anymore space that necessary 
3. Don’t use a mission statement as a welcome blurb 
4. Show the homepage to others outside the organization to be sure the “main point” is being conveyed 

As previously mentioned, a tagline is something that users read as a description of the whole website since it is visually connected to the site ID. Taglines have been around for a long time in advertising, entertainment and publishing. On a website, the tagline appears right below, above or next to the site ID. They are a very efficient way to get your message across. The following will explain some attributes to look for when choosing a tagline: 

•  Good taglines should be clear and informative
  • explaining exactly what the site or organization does 
• Good taglines are just long enough, but not too long
  • Six to eight words seem to be the rule of thumb for taglines 
• Good taglines convey differentiation and a clear benefit 
  • A good tagline is one that no one else in the world could use expect you 
• Bad taglines sound generic 
  • Don’t confuse a tagline with a motto 
• Good taglines are personable, lively and sometimes clever 
  • Cleverness should help convey, not obscure 

If there’s one thing you take away from this week’s post, when designing a home page, be sure that it answers the four questions a user will have in their head when they enter a new site for the first time:

1. What is this?
2. What do they have here?
3. What can I do here?
4. Why should I be here – and not somewhere else?

If your home page can successfully answer these four questions, at a glance, correctly, with very little effort, you will greatly improve your chances of a user having a satisfying, successful experience.

Hello everyone & Welcome to week 6 of Rachael’s blog! Last week was focused on how exactly to create more white space on a web page. This week will be focused on how to design navigation. Navigating your way through a website can be compared to navigating your way through a store like Walmart. When you enter a store, you have to make a decision about whether you are going to start looking for what you need on your own or if you are going to ask someone to assist you in finding what you’re looking for. If you choose to start looking on your own – the store provides certain systems of navigation such as aisle signs or department signs. However, even if you choose to start looking on your own and aren’t successful in finding what you’re looking for, there is a good chance you’ll end up asking someone for directions anyway. 

The same goes for when you are attempting to navigate a website. You can either use the website’s navigation systems, or simply head straight for the search bar. Using the search bar is the web equivalent of asking for directions in person when trying to find something in a store.  

Website navigation is very important. Two purposes of navigation that are fairly obvious are: to help us find whatever it is we’re looking for and to tell us where we are. However, there are some other equally important purposes of website navigation. 

1. It tells us what’s here

• Navigation reveals content 

      2. It tells us how to use the site

• Used right, navigation tells you implicitly where to begin and what your options are 
• It should be all the instructions a user needs

3. It gives us confidence in the people who built it

• Clear, well thought out navigation is one of the best opportunities a site has to create a good impression 

Like a physical store such as Walmart, websites have navigation conventions. When we enter Walmart, the name of the store is at the top of a building, or we find signs at the end of every aisle. Although appearance varies significantly, there are basic navigation conventions for the web. Each of the following have a specific spot on a web page:

• Site ID
• Utilities 
• Sections 
• Page name 
• Local navigation 
• Footer navigation 

Persistent navigation is a term web designers use to describe the set of navigation elements that appear on every page of a site. It should include four elements you most need to have on hand at all times: 

1. Site ID
2. Utilities 
3. Sections 
4. Search bar 

As far as site ID – it is like the building name for a website. It needs to be seen on every page. In the same way we expect to see the name of a building over the front of the entrance, we expect to see the site ID at the top of the page, usually in the upper left corner. 

As far as the sections – or primary navigation – the sections are links to the main sections of the site. In some designs, the persistent navigation will also include space to display the secondary navigation: the list of subsections in the current section.In some, pointing at a section name or clicking on it reveals a drop down menu, in others,  clicking takes you to the front page of a section, where you’ll find the secondary navigation. 

As far as the utilities – they are links to the important elements of the site that aren’t really a part of the content. This is things such as sign in, register, help, a site map or shopping cart. They provide information about its publisher. Utilities should be less prominent than the sections, and they also vary for different types of sites. Utilities can include a wide range of things, but as a rule, each site should only accommodate four to five utilities – the ones users are likely to need most often. 

One of the most crucial items in persistent navigation is a button or link that takes a user to the homepage. Having a home button in sight at all times offers reassurance that no matter how lost a user may get, they can always start over. Almost all web users expect the site ID to be a button that can take you to the home page. 

As far as the search bar – every page should have either a search bar or link to a search page, for those users who prefer searching rather than navigating a website themselves. Its a simple formula: a box, a button and either the word “search” or the universally recognized magnifying glass icon. 

In short, these are the basics of designing navigation on a web page. Remember: these steps are crucial to take into consideration to make a user feel confident when visiting a web page.

Hello everyone & Welcome to week 4 of Rachael’s Blog! There has been a lot of speculation about how many “clicks” it should take a user to get to where they want on a web page. But in reality, it isn’t the amount of clicks that really matters, it’s the amount of thought that goes into each click. Navigating and clicking through a website should not be a difficult task for users and there should not be a large amount of uncertainty. With that being said, as long as clicks are painless and users have confidence in their clicks, you are on the right track.

Some web pages, however, can present users with difficult choices and questions that are hard to answer. If you can’t avoid presenting users with difficult choices, you may need to offer them guidance. There are three things to keep in mind when providing users guidance.

Guidance should be:

1. Brief
   • Offer only enough information that will help a user and no more than that
2. Timely
   • Make is so the user has to encounter the guidance exactly when they need it
3. Unavoidable
   • Make sure the guidance is noticeable

Having to make choices in life is inevitable. The same goes for a user who is trying to navigate a Web page. The best thing to do is to be sure the choices a user faces are mindless, and that is key to make a site easy to use.

Hello and welcome to Week 2 of Rachael’s Blog! This week’s post will be based on the reality of what users take away from a web page.  Last week we touched on two important concepts when it comes to taking a users web experience into consideration: 

1. users being able to understand a web page by scanning through
2. pages working their magic with just one glance

The reality is – what we design for and what users actually take away from a web page are two completely different things.  You may be thinking that users are going to carefully read everything on a web page, analyze the organization and weigh their options before deciding how they are going to navigate through. But this is not the case, it is actually the opposite. Users tend to glance, scan and click around aimlessly without much thought. So, if you want to design effective web pages, you must understand three facts about real world Web use. 

1. Users don’t read pages, they scan them 
   • They search for words and phrases that catch their attention
     • Users are usually on a mission to find something specific
2. Users choose the most reasonable option on a web page, not the best option 
   • Users click links that look like they might lead them somewhere 
     • There isn’t much penalty for clicking something wrong 
3. Users don’t tend to try and understand how things work, instead make do with what they know
   • Usability testing proves the extent to which users don’t fully understand how things work 
     • If users find something that works, they stick to it 

So, why does the design of a Web page matter then? Because it still matters if someone gets it. A well designed website will ensure users are able to find what they’re looking for, understand the full range of your site and most importantly, it will make users feel smarter and in more control, which will in turn bring the user back.