User research: the foundation of awesome websites

I’m a user experience designer and every day a recruiter contacts me with a new job opportunity.

This shows many companies understand that UX is the most efficient and effective way to create websites. A site with a good user experience will delight users and make them want to buy. Why is that? because UX relies heavily on user research: to find out what works best for customers (be it the product for sale, the website design, the way users access that website or anything else regarding the experience a user has of the brand/its products/its website).

Here are 4 steps to get you inside the minds of your customers and tailor products/websites for them:

1. You are not your customer

2. Testing is CRUCIAL, no matter what

Testing a website on customers can reveal a lot of crucial issues: be it with the product on sale, the site’s features, its look & feel, the devices used by users… Designers and company owners are always surprised by unexpected ways users visit their sites.

Designers are experts (they bring on their experience and design principles), but for all the above reasons, testing should never be short-circuited.

3. You can easily fit usability testing into a low budget

The best tests are as similar as possible to the real use of your site, on real customers. That said, any test is better than no test. I get best results when following these rules:

• you don’t need a lab; a meeting room or any other place akin the usual place where users visit your site
• you can test a paper prototype (a sketch of your website)
• test on 5 to 10 users is usually sufficient for small/medium sites (experts Jakob Nielsen and Steve Krug agree)
• each test and interview to last no more than 1 hour (past that user will loose focus)
• combine testing with interview. The test will tell you how customers visit your site. The interview tell you why/what matters to customers.
• in-person or by Skype
• test early and often – Every 4 to 6 weeks is ideal

For very large sites, a larger research programme maybe be necessary. The beauty of low-budget testing is that it gives quick results and can be best incorporated throughout the project.

4. Everyone in the team shall attend tests

Involving the whole team in testing will improve the website:

• invite anyone in the team to observe the test: they will soon realise how important it is – they will empathise with users
• to motive them: offer snacks and drinks, involve them in debriefing activities (discussing test results and solutions)
• understand what matters to your colleagues and show them how they could benefit from testing. For instance for developers, testing will root out issues early so developers will waste less time altering their work

Read more arguments against testing avoidance. Additional ideas to improve usability buy-in.