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No.8 Evaluating Usability - Two Methods (June 14, 2001)
There are two main methods for evaluating the usability of a website. One is heuristic evaluation conducted by a specialist, and the other is usability testing conducted by having target users use the actual website, as discussed in an earlier column. By using these two methods of evaluation, you can discover any problems that may be lurking in your website.
However, employing both of these methods at once takes time and is costly. Reading this, you may be tempted not to conduct any usability evaluation at all. However, you can still increase the usability of your site by employing just one of these evaluation methods.
When choosing which method to use, you should consider not only time and cost, but also the characteristics and impact of each method, along with the state of the website to be evaluated.
In this column, we will discuss some of the characteristics of each method that will serve as a reference when choosing a method of evaluating usability.
 Heuristic Evaluation
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The word heuristic means "learning by self-discovery" or simply, "a rule of thumb." In heuristic evaluation, a web usability specialist uncovers problems with a website based on the experience of individuals. In this context, "experience" means knowledge about well-known rules that have been validated through various tests (e.g. there is no need for a "Clear" button on a registration page).
This method facilitates the broad investigation of problems that deviate from ordinary usability rules. Heuristic evaluation can be an extremely effective tool when used to test a website that has not undergone any usability evaluation, and it will lead to the resolution of many issues.
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Usability Testing
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Usability testing is a method of finding problem areas by having subjects who are similar to the target users actually use the website and follow certain prepared tasks. Specialists ascertain problems by observing subjects' comments and mouse tracks during each task.
Using this method, specialists can unearth intrinsic problem areas, including those related to how actual users behave on a particular website. For that reason, as compared to heuristic evaluation, this method of evaluation enables the discovery of fundamental problems associated with a particular website.
Usability testing can be very effective in catching problems that can't be uncovered through a user's subjective feedback alone, especially with well-developed websites that been repeatedly renewed based on user feedback.
One of the drawbacks of usability testing, however, is that as compared with heuristic evaluation, a greater cost is incurred in investigating tasks, gathering subjects, and other tasks.
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When you only have a limited budget available to invest in usability, the first step to improve customer satisfaction is determining which method is most suitable for evaluating your website based on each method's characteristics and then actually performing the evaluation and improving the site.
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