Comprehensive Report on Website Usability Testing and Analysis

This report presents a comprehensive analysis of website usability, focusing on a client's website. The evaluation includes a cost-benefit analysis justifying the consultancy services, highlighting the importance of a user-friendly website for business success. The methodology involves direct user observation and questionnaires, revealing issues in website attractiveness, navigation, and purchase processes. The report details user feedback on the website's design, including the use of colors, fonts, and information categorization. Physical and psychological factors influencing user experience are discussed, alongside a critique of the website's interface and utility. The report concludes with recommendations for improvements, emphasizing the benefits of a more user-friendly design, and proposes a storyboard to illustrate interface enhancements.

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USABILITY TESTING

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Usability is defined as the degree to which software can be utilized by consumers
with effectiveness and efficiency with the purpose of achieving some set objectives. A
critical analysis is the evaluation of a specific area, topic or item with the purpose of
giving an individuals opinion based on the topic or item in question. Websites have
been in existence for over a decade now and they have become the first point of
contact between a business and its clients (Nielsen 1994, p. 165). This has forced the
development of websites to be very critical to ensure that they can adequately
represent the mission and purpose of a company to its clients. A website needs to be
designed in a way that ensures it is easily usable so that it can bring maximum benefit
to its users. We shall be evaluating a website based on the specific goals it is meant to
achieve.
A cost benefit analysis which is also referred to as a benefit cost analysis is a
systematic approach in which the strengths and weaknesses of alternatives for a
specific venture are estimated so that one can identify the best option for them to
utilize or use (Schmettow 2008, p. 93). A client has commissioned our company to
perform consultancy services on the usability of their website. Your company is
charging you out to the client at a daily rate of £650/day. The cost is very high and for
the client to willingly pay such an amount for the services being rendered we need to
show them what we are offering them and how much the services we are offering will
benefit them. Based on the reputation of our company and the number of clients we
have helped in maximizing their websites usability speaks for itself. We have been
known to turn sites which were very user unfriendly to the best and most user friendly

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websites available. Our track record proves to you our client that we have the needed
experience and expertise to get the job done. We also have a keen eye to detail based
on the numerous training our experts have been undertaken through. We know that
there are other service providers who offer the same services at a cheaper rate and we
do not refute that competition is good to keep us doing our best (Vertegaal, Shell,
Chen & Mamuji 2006, p. 785). We however want you to choose us because whatever
you may pay us we will ensure that it is only a fraction compared to the benefits in
which your company will gain. We will make sure that your website is very user
friendly such that when clients come to your site they are able to maneuver their way
easily across the site and get the most out of it.
As mentioned earlier a website is usually the first point of contact between a
company and their clients. Therefore it is very critical that the website represents what
the company does and it should be easy for the users to maneuver through the website
and get the most use out of it within minimal effort (Sieker, Villemann, Ormholt &
Sage 2007, p. 1405) . If the company can get their website to be very user friendly it
means that their clients can easily get their way around it and buy products which will
bring in more revenue for the company (Huberman & Fang 2008, p. 491) .
After winning the contract to offer consulting services an evaluation is needed in
order to obtain a usability specification. The usability specification is meant to
evaluate the design of a website based on a range of given criteria. The evaluation will
be done through two different methods which are direct observation of the users
interacting with the website and giving the users questionnaires to fill after using the

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website. Five users will be enough to fulfill this task. While users interacted with the
given website they mentioned that the attractiveness of the website was not premium.
In this regard they mentioned that the only way the website tried to capture the users
attention was by the use of big bold words and different colors in some text. An
exercise was done to identify the ways in which users were able to interact with the
website in order for them to purchase an item. The exercise involved observing the
users trying to purchase an item from the site and how easy or difficult it would be for
them to purchase a specific item. The users from observation seemed to take a long
time in trying to find what they needed. Some of the users scrolled up and down the
website page trying to look for the item they wished to purchase very fast but with a
lot of frustration (Dray & Siegel 2004, p. 14) . Other users chose to read all the
information from the website so that they would be able to find what they needed. In
both cases it took a very long time for all the users to find the information they
needed. They users also had a hard time making a purchase from the website. The
website did not give clear instructions on how exactly a purchase can be made. The
website did provide a lot of information on what they offered and how good their
products were but without the guiding information on how a user can make a purchase
they can potentially lose a lot of revenue. This is to show even if a user managed to
persevere going through the site to find what they needed some of them would not be
able to make a purchase unless they had been assisted or had interacted with the
website before and made a purchase through it.

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The users were also given a questionnaire after completing the exercise which
was in line with the usability specifications. The questionnaire was meant to give
information on whether their experience on using the website was in line with some
set specifications. The information gathered from the questionnaires was that the users
agreed to some extent the website did live up to some basic usability (Vertegaal 2003,
p. 30). This is because users were able to reach and interact with the website by
reading the information on it and finding what they needed. The website was however
lacking in various aspects which would have improved its usability. This is because
users had to spend a lot of time looking for the information they needed. A user
friendly website should be one where information has been categorized according to
specific criteria such as goods and services offered so that users can easily get the
information they need on the website without a lot of strain (Kapil & Greenstein
2011, p. 2230) . The users also mentioned that the use of the similar font color and
size made it hard to identify certain information or sections from others. They
recommended the use of a blend of appropriate font colors and sizes to make the
website more presentable. One example was the use of different font color for the
headings and subheadings so that users can identify them easily from the rest of the
text on the website. The users commended the use of margins and borders to segment
some parts of the website and to outline images. They helped users easily identify the
images which were present on the website. The users mentioned that most of them
were at a particular point in using the website frustrated and stopped using it for a
while. They felt that it had a lot of information which they had to go through. They

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mentioned that the site was too cluttered and needed to be made a bit simpler so that
users would be able to navigate easily through it. The usability of the website was
very basic according to the users and the company can do more by making the
website more user friendly based on the feedback they had given and they were
confident that with the changes the website would attract more users and would have
a high usability rate.
Physical factors are factors in the environment which influence the development
and growth of organisms. Psychological factors are the mental factors that may
prevent or help an individual from being able to perform or act well while undertaking
a task (Caulton 2001, p. 4) . In our case we shall evaluate the physical and
psychological factors in regard to the website’s interface design. The website uses
color on some of the font to highlight some of the most important sections they wish
to get to the attention of the user. The website has also used borders to section out
some specific areas of the website which deal with various tasks. They use them to
highlight images on the website which enables a user to identify an image easily from
the website. The different colors and sections are what can defined as the physical and
psychological factors which individuals or users can observe and make their use of
the website more effective. They help users have an easier and user friendly
experience while interacting with the website. They promote the effective use of the
website and this is of benefit both the users and the company who owns the website.
The owner company of the website can be able to gain more revenue by having
their products available to a large base clientele from all over the world. The users can

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also shop for what they need from the website without actually having to visit the
physical premises of the company. It is imperative that the site is designed in a very
user friendly way so that users can be able to get their way around the website and
effectively use it to purchase goods and gain information about the company (Breuch,
Zachry & Spinuzzi 2001, p. 231). The bad aspect of the interface used in the website
are that nearly all the text is dark in color which makes it hard to differentiate various
aspects of the website. The way in which the interface has been built is very
minimalistic. It does not utilize any creative design measures to ensure they website is
more presentable to its users. The website is not as attractive as might be expected for
a website which is trying to entice its clients to buy its products. The utility of the site
is not as effective because it clutters a lot of information straight to the user without
any kind of categorization. It might put off some clients and make them seek other
websites which are easier and more attractive to them (Holm 2006, n.p.). On an
overall basis we can be able to establish that the website enables the user to scroll
down easily as they read and look at the information in which they may need or they
maybe seeking. It gives a basic outlay of all the services and products in which the
company offers. It can however be designed and made to be more user friendly which
will increase usability and bring more leads which can turn into revenue for the
company.
A storyboard is a series of images or illustrations which have been organized
sequentially with the purpose of depicting an interactive media sequence. In our case
we shall utilize a storyboard to show how we can change the interface and usability of

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the website to enhance its usability. The most effective action to take in ensuring the
website is more user friendly is in terms of its attractiveness and organization
(Horvitz, Kadie, Paek & Hovel 2003, p. 55). If the website is sectioned out based on
different criteria it can ensure that the user can be able to easily identify a section they
are interested in and maneuver to that section to purchase or view some information.
The other aspect is using different sizes and colors of font on the website. If headings
and subheadings are uniquely identifiable as compared to other text it can ensure that
users are able to easily view the information they need and get the most user-friendly
experience out of it. The story board can contain pictures of the best typical scenario
in which a user gets the most out of the website. From the initial interaction with the
site to when the user acquires or buys an item and maybe they can also leave a review
of how they liked the usability and friendliness from the site.
Reference List

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