The article is about a user and usability testing and it’s importance, not only for design but for every product or service that is created, and why it is bad to not test at all. We will cover differences between user testing and usability testing and how to improve it.
There are many businesses, and even many designers, that think assumptions are good since they can predict everything that users will do or say. Which, of course, is not true!
Assumptions are bad for business simply because we hold opinions based on the way we see the world and the things that happened to us, which creates so-called “Subjective” opinion. When it comes to design, making assumptions is dangerous because it costs money, time and resources. Thinking that process is too slow and not necessary is going to cost you double than it is costing you now.
Simple user testings can help or disprove the theories we hold. Assumptions can be reflected on the following things:
- Wrong design — no matter how good your design look or how much you paid for, it can do nothing if it is not set for the right users. The wrong design can reflect negatively and even draw potential users from it.
- The right thing, but the wrong way — also a common mistake by many who don’t test their products. Even if you know what to design, doing it in the wrong way can also have a bad influence on the users.
User Testing is finding out what are the user needs and Usability Testing is overall user experience on the website or app.
USER TESTING
What is user testing?
User testing is where you actually talk to your users and see do they really need your website or app and will they even going to use it. The goal of the testing is the user feedback and insight that can help you know is your product worth investing in it or not.
There are many ways to see is your app or website good for them or not, a survey is one of the good options. Creating a list of questions that will potentially interest a user will help you decide is it worth spending time and money in it. A/B Test is also a very good choice to see which of the users of your products like the most and why. Overall, user testing is finding the best possible solution for your idea.
USABILITY TESTING
What is usability testing?
Usability testing is where users actually use a website or app, some suggest to even test logo and other branding material to make sure users will use it. The goal of the testing is the user feedback and insight that can help to improve the product.
There are many helpful and good apps today that we can use to test our products on the real users remotely, which is cheaper and time-saving. But always the best way is to invite users to your office, create a list of questions before and after the test. You then ask the user to use the product and think out loud so you can see what and how he is thinking. There are many good techniques of how to test users successfully, and one of them is also giving them assignments while they use the product.
When to user test?
You might be wondering, when should I conduct usability test? Well, as often you can. Usability testing is recommended as early as possible, in prototypes and even when it’s just a wireframe. Because early tests cost less and save more time since you don’t have to go back and fix already build phases of the project. That is why there is a popular phrase in a design called TETO (Test Early, Test Often).
Designers and teams that don’t test waste a lot of time brainstorming and thinking about what to do or what did they do wrong. When you know your users and you test your products, you always know what to do and how to do it.
When it comes to user testing the core question is: “Does it solve the problem?” or “How well does it solve the problem?”. But we need to separate here another type of testing and that is Usability Testing.
User Experience
User experience is something that is common for both user and usability testing, the end goal is user satisfaction with the product and that is exactly what UX does.
What is user experience anyway?
That is a persons’ perceptions and responses that result from the use of a product, system or service. UX includes all the users’ emotions, beliefs, preferences, perceptions, physical and psychological responses, behaviors and accomplishments that occur before, during and after use.
As we said, there are many different techniques that can be used to check users satisfaction with the product, their answers may vary, in which case we do target audience and market research before it so it can be at least in the same circle of interest. The point of all this is also to know what a person will do in a certain time and situation, will they come back and why, etc.
List of good UX testing platforms:
Optimizely — Very good A/B testing platform to track visits and conversions.
UserLook — Usability testing platform that can help you with user testing a lot.
InVision — Invision is a prototyping tool that is very good optimized for teams and individuals. Also is connected with various UX testing platforms that can help and save a lot of time in user/usability testing.
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