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Philosophy
1. Know your customer
Not only must we know who the client is and what their basic characteristics are, but more importantly why are they coming to this product? What are they going to try to do here? Not just what do WE want them to do on this page, but what is THEIR goal and how can we help them accomplish that? If we look at each web page and determine what is the customer trying to do here, and make that the top priority and easiest thing to find we will be truly helping the customer, and that’s what it’s all about.
It’s also important to remember you are not your customer. It’s always best to get feedback from real customers performing real tasks.
2. Listen with your eyes
What people say they do and what they actually do are two different things. It is not enough to have people report what they think they would do in a particular situation, or even tell you what they are doing right now. In order to really understand, you must watch and see it for yourself.
A big part of usability is observing the customer using the product. Watching them struggle or breeze through a task will provide a lot more information than listening to them explain what they would do without ever touching the keyboard.
3. Non-Attachment
This is harder to articulate. First we can’t be attached to the design. Just because this is the way it has always been done, we need to open our minds and see it fresh from the client’s perspective. It is difficult if not impossible for a designer to evaluate their own product. Like editting your own novel, you are just too close to the work. Remain open to the possibility of change toward improving the visitor’s experience.
Second is to not be attached to the outcome of the evaluation. I may have ideas about what works and doesn’t work, but I need to be open to what each user is experiencing. This way I can see and understand any patterns that develop which might be different from my expectation.
4. Make the product work so the customer doesn’t have to
When people say that a product is intuitive, they mean that the product or website makes sense without them having to think about what they are doing. This is the ultimate goal of usability. Customers are not interested in how things work, or why they work. They just want the product to work for them, so they don’t have to think about it.
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