WHAT CAN USABILITY REALLY TELL US? Kirstin Dougan Music User Services Coordinator University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign MWMLA Annual Meeting Kansas City, MO October 24, 2008

What is usability? Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign “Usability rules the Web. Simply stated, if the customer can’t find a product, then he or she will not buy it.” (Nielsen, Designing Web Usability) Usefulness, Effectiveness, Learnability, User Satisfaction (Ruben, Handbook of Usability Testing)

What is usability testing?  User-centered  Real users from target audience  Task-oriented  Real tasks that demonstrate how site should be used  Quantitative and Qualitative  Can be used in conjunction with other methodologies such as surveys, focus groups, and field observation Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Usability testing CAN tell you…  Whether your site is working for your users  Whether your site poses barriers to your users either in organization or in terminology  Whether you’ve designed your site for library staff or for users  Whether you’ve omitted important information or included unnecessary verbiage Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Usability testing CAN’T tell you…  How every user interacts with the site  How each user will perform a task every time  How to design a site that all users will find enjoyable and easy to use Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

What we started with

What we needed to do  Redesign for 21 st century  Convert into a content management system (CMS) (w/ predetermined templates)  Incorporate third subject area (theatre) and balance site  Make site easier to use and more attractive Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

What we wanted to find out  Is new design easy to use?  Is new design easier than the old one? (not all web usability tests incorporate the comparison element)  Are users familiar w/ library terminology and tools?  Are there observable use patterns and do these vary among user groups represented in study? Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

The human element  Institutional Review Board process—required because of human subjects  Recruiting users  Fliers, notice on website, word of mouth  15 volunteers who had used ML website at some point; no ML employees  Music, theatre, dance, undergrad, grad, faculty, other  Nielsen says need no more than 5, and he’s right  Incentives ($10 coffee shop cards) Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

The mechanics Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign  Hardware/Software  Camtasia Studio—records screen activity and clicks  USB Microphone—records audio (saved in Camtasia)  Instrument design  Developing tasks for old and new site  Moderator and recorder  Survey (subjective element)  Pretesting

What we learned about the process Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign  Start earlier in the design process—don’t wait until prototype is complete  Have users help determine what tasks should be (first find out where they have problems)  You really don’t need a lot of users—in future, do more tests with fewer users  Remember—you’re testing the site, not the user!

Nielsen’s Five Users Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign Five users find 80-85% of problems. Best to have 3 tests with 5 users each. “Real goal of usability engineering is to improve the design and not just document its weaknesses.”

More findings about the process Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign  Some things about your website will always be out of your control, especially if you are part of a larger library system and/or are using a CMS  Don’t bother to consult users if you aren’t willing to act on their input (i.e., don’t be too in love with your design)—it’s called a feedback loop for a reason

What we learned about users  Users scan text more than actually read it—makes word placement important  Users generally do not know how to find journal articles—even with headings that say “Find Articles;” don’t recognize database names and acronyms (RILM, Music Index, IIMP, &%#&*!)  Users did not know how to use ORR (metatool for online library resources;  Some users will click and click before giving up, some will give up right away if they don’t find what they want Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

More findings about users Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign  Users generally do not know what “class guides” or “subject guides” are  Users’ search terms are not necessarily what we use to describe resources  Users did not learn from experience—if they wanted to look for articles in catalog the first time, they would do it the 2 nd time too  A good reference interview will always be needed—no matter how good your website is

Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign What we ended with

Kirstin Dougan | University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign

Thank you! Kirstin Dougan Co-researcher : Camilla Fulton—Web Content and Digital Services & Development Librarian, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign