Nowadays, almost all companies are customer-centric and have a mobile-responsive web design process but most of them are yet to update their online platforms and stores accordingly.
Many of them are failing to realize the benefits that user testing can provide their business. Digital trends show that user expectations continue to grow for the websites they access and you can’t just gain their trust by simply increasing the load speed and providing a clean design but they also need intuitive user interfaces and frictionless navigation.
Early-stage testing is crucial because it’s quite probable that the learning will reveal the need for drastic changes in the initial design and the entire customer journey. Don’t be fooled by looks – something that looks good could potentially hinder all your efforts of getting more revenue and customers. Which is why usability testing is a must.
User testing with real people that match your target audience helps your team view the product from an entirely different angle. Several design pain points are likely to be revealed by ‘user testing glasses’ which you wouldn’t have thought of. For example:
- Tabs that aren’t sufficiently visible
- Areas on the website where the people’s tendency to click is great or where the time on page is better
- Unforeseen actions that are taken by users
- Usability issues that impact the desired outcomes of your product and can be fixed by your design team
- User experience glitches causing high bounce rates
- Navigation issues
- Insufficient information provided by the header text
More Testing Before the Validation Stage
Design validation implies that you’re already done with the product development stage. It means that you’ve invested a significant amount of resources for the sake of better customer conversions. Yet, sometimes these efforts do not convert into sales or better user experience and improved usage.
Planning for several stages of usability testing is a far better strategy, even if we use very small sample sets of participants for each one before launch.
A small, iterative but frequent user testing plan will allow you to play with the design of:
- Popups
- Icons
- Banners
- Menu Tabs
- CTA Buttons
Also, early user testing could reveal your customers’ preferences, for example, they may like actions such as voice searching, which require special design elements. If you’re still in the testing phase, you could just adjust the design much cost-effectively and easier than when your platform or product has already been launched or is in the latest high-fidelity design stage.
Role of a Usability Testing Company
There are various options on how you can conduct usability. Between hiring a usability testing company, doing it in-house, or upload it for beta testing, we suggest you go for the first option. Not does it save your time and countless other resources, but a good usability testing company has the required expertise, manpower, technology, and other resources to pull it off in a manner that can provide useful insights to you about the product and help you to attract more customers and revenues.
