Improving Web Site Usability

The following article was published in Issue 84 of Practical Internet.

Q: How do I know how usable my website is?

A: No matter how usable you think your website is, there will be visitors that find it difficult to navigate and find their way around your site.

Firstly, it is very important that you adopt standard workflow conventions that will enable your visitors to easily understand how to use your site. Look at the major players on the web and follow their workflow. Ensure that the design of your site is both simple and consistent. An over-complicated, ‘clunky’ site will result in visitors who won't stay for long and definitely won't return. You should also ensure that they are able to easily navigate around the site, know where they are and be only one click away from the home page.

Secondly, do not assume that all visitors have the same skills and experience as you do when surfing the web. Many don’t. You should always test a site’s usability with a selection of volunteers prior to going live. These volunteers should have a range of Internet experience. Set your ‘usability testers’ a challenge e.g. ordering a product from your site and get them to provide feedback on how easy or difficult it was to complete.

Thirdly, use your hits-tracking software to analyse how your visitors are using your website. From analysing these logs, you will be able to establish the navigation-paths used by your visitors and also establish navigation-bottlenecks where your visitors are participating in a workflow transaction and then simply give up due to a usability problem.

Q: How important is it to provide email feedback to visitor actions, e.g. registration and order placement?

A: Humans need feedback in aspects of life and this is just as true on the Internet. As there is no face-to-face contact in an Internet transaction, it is vital that you give your visitors instant feedback, especially if they are purchasing from your site.

If your site requires registration, ensure that you provide instant feedback via your website and email them to tell them that the registration has been successful. This gives your visitors the feeling that they are important. It also means that they won’t forget about your site in a hurry.

Ensure that if a visitor purchases from your ecommerce site that they receive instant confirmation of their order. This confirmation should include full details of their purchase including delivery date and have links to enable them to track or cancel their order. If you promise a delivery date for shipping of their order, ensure that you can meet it and if for some reason you can't, let them know as soon as possible giving them the option to cancel their order.

Many companies forget that feedback is a vital element in the usability of their websites.

Q: When optimizing my website for Search Engine placement, my website seems to be less usable? Which is more important?

Search-engine placement within the major search engines is a vital means of promoting your website. However, unless your website is well-designed and usable, the visitors that find your site due to its top-10 ranking will soon leave again and chose a lower-ranking but more usable site. You need to ensure that your website can be found easily by your visitors and that it is easy to use when they find it.

Optimising pages for search engine placement does not imply that your site is usable or well designed from a usability perspective. It simply means that search engine spiders have been able to easily index your site.

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and usability-design must both be addressed together in any website development and it may be necessary to compromise on SEO in order to make your website more usable.