Do-It-Yourself

Usability Testing:An Introduction

#diyux

Rebecca Blakiston

Associate Librarian

University of Arizona

@blakistonr

Arizona State Library, Archives and Public Records | Library Development | Nov. 21st, 2013

What to expect

• Use chat for questions

• 3 sections:

1. How to plan for usability testing

2. How to conduct a usability test

3. What to do with the results of a usability test

• Will break for questions after each section

About Me

• Access services (’05-’07)

• SIRLS grad (’07)

• Instruction librarian (’08)

• Web product manager (’10)

University of Arizona Main Library

Users should alwaysbe part of the process.

Usability Testing

Small budget?

No problem.

1. Plan

Establish

primary tasks.

Who am I and

what am I

trying to do on

your website?

Examples of tasks:

• Find a specific book/ebook title

• Find a book based on a topic

• Find open hours

• Find out how much printing costs

• Request an interlibrary loan

• Donate money

• Donate books

Translate tasks into scenarios.

Task Scenario

Find a specific

ebook title

You want to see if the library

has The Hunger Games that you

can download to your Kindle.

How would you find this out?

Donate books You have books you would like

to get rid of, and wonder if you

can give them to the library.

Find out how to do this.

Gather incentives.

I will take notes.

I will lead the testing.

Identify a facilitator and a note taker.

Pick a time.

Pick a place.

Questions?

2. Test

Let’s do this!

Let them know it is

for a good cause

and it won’t take

much time.

Introduce the test.

• We want to improve the website.

• You can’t do anything wrong.

• Talk out loud, it will help us a lot..

Facilitate the test. Keep them talking.

What are you thinking?What are you looking for?

Manage their emotions. Keep them happy.

This is very helpful.

Know when to end the test.

Questions?

3. Analyze

Don’t freak out.

Don’t blame the user.

Debrief right afterwards.

?

What was he thinking?

Why was he not successful?

Focus on the most serious problems.

Focus on the problems easiest to fix.

What’s the smallest change

we can make right nowthat will at least smooth

over this problem for most

people?

Calendar Event Calendar

Calendar

Keyword Searching Tips

Test again.*

Test

Improve

Test

Improve

*optional,

sometimes

1. Users think the WorldCat Local search box will work like a site search.

2. Users don’t know what “WorldCat Local” means.

3. Users often go to “University Libraries” and click on the library location in this drop-down menu expecting to find everything related to that library on that page (when it’s actually a really simple page just listing some collection information and location information).

4. “How Do I” could mean anything and so users often go here but don’t find what they are looking for. Same with “Services A-Z” which could essentially be a list of everything on our website, the way users think about it.

5. Users don’t realize that the clock for “hours” is clickable.

6. Users don’t notice the “Search this site” link in the top right.

7. Users almost always fail when trying to find Video streaming – when they succeed, they find it indirectly in Services A-Z, not where it actually lives on the document delivery page.

8. Users get frustrated making sense of all the software information which is confusing and more complicated than it needs to be.

9. Users get confused by “Libraries and Collections” which is just duplicative content of “University Libraries” and could be combined into one thing.

10. Users find Frequently Asked Questions hard to navigate and think it’s weird they aren’t actually questions.

Keep an ongoing list of problems.

Create a plan for ongoing usability testing.

Build it into your workflow.

Questions?

Want to learn more?

Steve Krug

Rocket Surgery Made Easy: a do-it-yourself guide to finding and fixing usability problems

Want to learn more?

Library Juice Academy

Do-It-Yourself Usability Testing

April 2014

• 4 weeks

• Online, asynchronous

• Only $175

http://libraryjuiceacademy.com

Want to learn more?

Rowman & Littlefield Publishing

Usability Testing: a Practical Guide for Librariansby Rebecca Blakiston

[To be published in 2014]

Final Questions

Rebecca Blakiston

blakistonr@u.library.arizona.edu

@blakistonr

#diyux