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Is The User Experience Overrated?
Those of us who participate in website design communities hear a lot of talk about the User Experience. What constitutes a usable design? How do you get them to interact with your website the way you want them to? Not only do we have to learn how users think, but also how they adapt to new techniques as they are introduced. Is one method more effective than another? Is the new way really better than the old? The habits of our users are different today than they were last month, and five years ago it was a different ball game entirely. As web development professionals we benefit from paying close attention to usability in our designs.
Usability testing originated in the 80’s when computer companies like Intuit and Xerox started to take an interest in human-computer interaction. They would record people (“users”) interacting with their products and take notes on their emotions, how much the were able to recall, how many mistakes they made, etc. Afterwards, developers would hurriedly make changes to the user interface before the next tester had their turn. This formed the basis for usability as we know it today, including usability with regards to website design.
Only thorough testing can determine whether a website has maximized its potential as a usable design. The remote testing services that are cropping up streamline the process so that it is more affordable to do the testing. To bring users in for a local test can cost thousands of dollars, depending how many testers you include.
But how do you know when a design is usable without testing? Is a good looking design automatically a usable design?
There is no simple answer to that question, but many sites that are eye-catching are not usable. There are, however, some guidelines you can follow that will go a long way to prevent confusion. They should be implemented in the planning stages:
- Grid systems like 960.gs to help structure your website with proper spacing.
- Map out the elements on your site using ‘wireframe’ or ‘graybox’ layouts.
- Draw up flow charts documenting the user processes (i.e. registration, login, upload a new video).
These techniques have been around for longer than websites. They stuck because they are proven techniques. Not to mention, planning ahead generally improves your design aesthetically.
Have you taken every preventative measure? Followed all the guidelines to ensure that your site is usable? There still may be room for improvement. Despite widespread belief, usability should be included in the planning and pre-design process that ensues. This will save money, time, and severe headaches.
As we’ve already discussed, there are two types of usability testing: local and remote. In some cases we still conduct local user testing, but it is becoming less common. Local testing is like what the computer companies were first doing back in the 80s. Test and adjust one user at a time. If you are on a budget and looking for a simple yet effective usability test, get your friends and relatives to do the testing for you.
Remote testing, on the other hand, is a new innovation that allows web designers to analyze their designs with regard to usability for large groups at a fraction of the cost of local testing. Some sites have feedback buttons that allow users to volunteer their take on the website, and there are other sites that let us post a project and have selected testers analyze it. They give us qualitative feedback, which can be very useful because the suggestions are more actionable when they are written down with specifics.
The most valuable feedback that I believe you can get from remote testing is the information that you can read from what I like to call “fly on the wall” overlays. These are the heat maps and click maps that I mentioned before. While all forms of usability testing have benefits, only the click maps record how users actually use the website. Little does the user know that the motions of their mouse are being tracked invisibly (I mean, who really reads the privacy policy on websites?). You can see the user’s gestures and analyze data such as how long it takes to complete a specific action, load a page, or where users get stuck. Again, the user does this in the comfort of his own home without any knowledge of the testing and so they provide real-time data.
Should we, as designers, be paying more attention to usability trends? The answer is a resounding Yes. Analyzing the user experience allows us to create sites that are more effective and that create a better (and quicker) return on a user’s visit. No matter how much reading we do, we will never fully comprehend our users, but with proper testing we are able to take a little peek into their complex minds and habits of our users. Therefore the User Experience can not be overrated, as we will always find new innovations in handling it and getting into those minds.
James Costa
James is the founder and Creative Director at The Phuse. Managing the majority of projects that come through the company, he can also be found keynoting conferences in North America, DJing, or spending time with his son.
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David Hamill on December 16, 2009
Hi James. This is an interesting article but I’d like to pick on 3 of the points you make.
The first is in the opening paragraph:
“How do you get them to interact with your website the way you want them to?”
This is back to front thinking. If you care about the user experience, the way you want your users to interact with your site is the way that they want to interact with it. You then reap the benefits of giving them what they want.
The next is your comment about usability testing being the thing that happens just before launch. Often this is too late. It’s best to find out early on that the thing you’ve spent oodles of money developing has a fundamental flaw in it. it makes it a little cheaper to fix.
Lastly is the assertion that ‘Local testing’ as you call it is in decline. What is this based on? Do you have anything to back this up?
It’s true that there are a lot of tools out there to help people get feedback from users. I’ve tried a lot of them, including some very expensive ones and none of them compare to sitting in a room with someone and watching them trying to use a website. The people who are using these tools are the people who didn’t do usability testing in the first place.
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