Thoughts, ideas and solutions on UX, web accessibility and design
Briefing someone on a potential new UX project can be a difficult task. You’ve decided what is needed, budget accordingly and hire an agency or individual to do the job. However, sometimes you find at the end that you don’t necessarily get the results you were hoping for.
According to a recent blog post on econsultancy, more than half of businesses (56%) rely exclusively on Google Analytics to measure performance of their website (data taken from a survey of almost 900 digital marketing professionals between April and May 2013).
With government funding for charity programs being cut, many charities are currently looking at increasing their income from individual giving. However the current economic climate means that people are less willing to give their spare money to charity – charities have to work harder to make their case.
Online donations are one source of individual giving that can work well. A whole range of marketing campaigns can be used to drive people to your website where they can then quickly and easily make a donation.
We have just published our latest research report. This report showcases the findings from a detailed piece of research in which we reviewed the checkout processes of ten of the top online retailers in the UK. The list included “pure-play” retailers such as Amazon and Play, as well as high street names, like Next, Debenhams and B&Q.
Why are big-name pure play sites like Amazon, Very and ASOS losing up to £420 million a month in lost sales?
According to a recent report by Moneybookers, some popular online stores have painfully slow checkouts. Reportedly, some of the worst offenders were “pure play” sites such as Very.co.uk (with a checkout time of 6 minutes 45 seconds), Amazon (5 minutes, 38 seconds) and ASOS (4 minutes, 36 seconds). By Moneybookers’ calculation, this potentially translates into £420 million a month in lost sales.
When launching a new website or new functionality on your website, you want to be confident that it will be successful and provide a good return on investment. For example, you don’t want to build a forum that doesn’t attract any comments.
How can you be sure that your site will be successful? Research and testing with your audience is one way to help ensure confidence. However, doing the wrong type of test can generate false confidence and lead to costly mistakes. Coca-Cola is one such example.
Usability testing is a great way to connect with the actual users of your website and to understand not only what issues and problems users have when trying to use your site, but also what they like and what is working well.
Can your users find their way around your website, select products and successfully complete a journey to the shopping basket without getting lost or frustrated? Or is there a key piece of information your users cannot find? It is here that usability testing comes in. Usability testing closes the gap between thinking you know how your users behave and knowing why they behave they way they do. Closing this gap will result in dramatic increases in customer satisfaction, conversion rates and profitability.