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Your
Online Business: Usability Testing
When you are preparing
to launch your online business or store, it is important to get outsiders
to do a usability test on your website. Why is it so important? Because
when you are working on something to hard, it is very easy to overlook
a mistake or error that sticks out like a sore thumb to a new visitor.
When picking people to
run a usability test on your website, you should ideally choose people
who fit your target audience. If you sell flannel diapers, your testers
should be moms of babies. If you run a scrapbooking business, you
should find fellow scrapbookers to test your site.
What should they check
for? Here is a list of common things you should get your testers to
check.
- Connection
- do the pages load
quickly?
- are you waiting
for the server to connect to a new page?
- Graphics
- do the graphics
suit the site?
- do they load quickly?
- do graphics have
alt tags while loading?
- Site design & layout
- is the site easy
to navigate?
- does the design
and layout suit the type of business?
- Ordering & shopping
cart system
- is it easy to order?
- are shipping instructions
and policies readily available?
- is it easy to understand
how the shopping cart works?
- are payment options
easy to find?
- is it a secure ordering
server?
- Contact information
- if someone has questions,
can they easily contact you?
- Best & Worst
- the three best things
about the site
- the three worst
things about the site (and suggestions for change)
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