We'll show you some things to look for, and you'll conduct short usability tests in small teams. It's great if you've done usability testing before, but it's fine if you haven't. When you leave the course, you'll be armed with essential skills in designing and conducting usability tests, and you'll know what to look for when you test your own site. Because we don't want you to blindly believe everything we say, we'll start the day with hands-on exploration of live web sites. Usability of Web Sites When creating a web site, you need to know what kind of site you are creating, who your audience is, and why users are coming to your site.
Some sites work better than others for finding information.
The Quality of Links Links play a vital role in the user's success at finding information. The arrangement of links on a page affects how quickly users can find information. We'll give you the quick and dirty on facilitating a usability test. The way you present content influences its ease of use. Some designers place more emphasis on graphics than they're actually worth.