6. Research

Research is not only classic usability testing. There are lots of other methods very useful and quick to assess the usability of your application. It doesn’t really matter how much you know about usability – after working on a project for a couple of weeks you’ve become blind to many of the problems. Sure, experience will help you avoid making many design mistakes in the first place, but something will slip through. Every time. That’s why doing even a very basic usability test will improve your site. Johansson (2005) You can not do enough user testing. Even when someone else already tested an aspect of your software, you have access to completely different people who might encounter completely different problems. It is very important to also test the improvements resulting from a previous usability test and iterate this development cycle. Be genuinely interested in people, in the end your software is for them to use. Don’t make it feel like a test or an interview, much more a casual talk about their likes and dislikes. At the same time remember that you are looking for issues, not design advice or new features. It’s you who analyzes the problems and designs or gives suggestions to the developers. If people give design advice or feature suggestions, find out the underlying issue.