The success ratio of any system majorly depends on its usage and that would be high only if the users find it efficient, effective, easy to learn, engaging and error tolerant. These are actually called the 5 E's of Usability.
User experience is all about how does a user feels about a system, which could be a product, service, application or combination of any of these. As soon as user interaction starts with the system, an experience is developed based on the perception and response that results from the interaction. Other definitions of user experience mention that it includes all the users' emotions, beliefs, preferences, perceptions, physical and psychological responses, behaviors and
accomplishments that occur before, during and after use.
A greater user experience means increased site success and here are the benefits, that we get with it
User Effectiveness
* increased success rate and reduced users errors
* improved ease of use and learning
* increased user productivity and user satisfaction
* reduced support and training costs
* increased user trust in the system
Development Costs
* reduced development costs and time
* reduced maintenance costs
Revenue
* increased product sales, revenue and market share
* increased site traffic and transactions/purchases
* attract and retain more customers
So how do we get started ? How do we get beyond "user friendly" to the true goal of all usability work i.e. to improve the final product.
The first step here is to define the problem statement with a clear objective of what we want to achieve. To be able to do that, we need to perform some user analysis using methods like user interviews, site visits , usability tests etc. Focus should be to learn about who our users are, what are their tasks and goals in using the product.
Using the 5E's to understand users:
For each of the five dimensions of usability (the 5Es), we think about how it is reflected in requirements for each of the user groups. The 5Es are:
Effective: How completely and accurately the work or experience is completed or goals reached ?
Efficient: How quickly this work can be completed ?
Engaging: How well the interface draws the user into the interaction and how pleasant and satisfying it is to use ?
Error Tolerant: How well the product prevents errors and can help the user recover from mistakes that do occur ?
Easy to Learn: How well the product supports both the initial orientation and continued learning throughout the complete lifetime of use ?
In my next blog , I will be sharing more about the techniques of implementing usability in new and already existing sites....
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