Conversion Optimization & Analytics Services

In the previous post I was talking about the importance of usability testing on software applications. In this post we are going to have a look at the usability testing on 2 web sites.

In the videos example below, you will see how a visitor interacted with two web sites “Mercedes and Bentley”. The test user had to accomplish 2 simple tasks – find prices and to book a test drive. Even though they are very basic tasks, they are very important for both websites. See which of them performed better.

Unfortunately, this is happening on many websites and without usability testing you won’t be able to find out. Anytime you visitor isn’t able to accomplish a task on your website you very likely loosing a sale. So make it easy for them and you will get rewarded by more sales.

Mercedes-Benz Video – Usability Testing

OK, but how do I know that visitors are struggling. Well, the only way to find out is conduct a usability testing on your website. At Proimpact7 we offer very affordable usability testing starting at £750 for 10 users. What will you receive? Videos of test users interacting with your site, plus their written review and finally our report with recommendations based on the usability testing.

Read the part 1.

I personally struggle with anything which is hard to use. Some years ago I thought it must be me when I couldn’t manage to use a product. But now, since I got into usability testing (I am in charge of usability testing at proimpact7) I realized that it wasn’t me at all. It was because often the people behind hard to use products hadn’t conducted any usability testing on real users and they simply produced an unusable product.

I am going to write about two usability examples: software usability and web site usability.

Let’s start with the first one, the software usability example. Currently I have been testing 2 video recording applications, one costing $250 and the other $175.
So I downloaded the 30 day FREE trial of the $250 software first, as I read something about it. To record movie was basically very easy, but the biggest challenge I found was saving the recording and editing it. Even after 14 days I was struggling to do so and I found it a very frustrating task. Just to illustrate how bad it was, let me describe my reactions. Generally I am very patient person, but if something doesn’t work for me within 10 min then as far as I am concerned it’s broken, period. With this particular software anytime I had to save the recording, there was a problem and I wasn’t able to save it and either I lost my recording or it was saved in a format I didn’t want.. And now I am not kidding, I was jumping in the room like a furious tennis ball when this happened third time. And when this happened to me the fourth time then…….I had enough and decided to test alternative software from a different vendor as well.

OK, so the $175 software, doing exactly the same video recording and editing was easier for me to use, and most importantly saving and editing the video is a breeze, so on that basis, have bought it. And there was no jumping like a furious tennis ball in the room!

Conclusion: The first software ($250) I tested was completely useless. If the vendor did usability testing on the product before they launched, very likely this wouldn’t happen and I would have purchased their product. The second, on the other hand, was so easy to use that I loved it from the start, so I bought it. Why it was so easy to use? They have probably done their homework well and did some usability testing.

What’s the moral of this story?  One thing you want to understand, I wasn’t buying on price, and if the $250 software had worked as it should then I would have bought it right away. The bad usability killed the sale in this case, not the price. Remember, always do usability testing and you will have more happy customers.

Usability testing isn’t that expensive, starting at £750 for 10 test users at proimpact7, and if done and all the issues fixed, then it could save you many sales.

Read the part 2.

Here I am going to have a look at Free vs. paid enterprise CMS. Some of you could find this review very minimalistic and not really comprehensive, as the purpose of this review is to only educate business owners about paid enterprise CMS. Many web site owner are probably asking a question, why on earth I would pay for a CMS if there are plenty of FREE CMS on the market?

The fact is, the free open source CMS allows businesses on tight budget to open their business website and start making money, and some websites don’t require enterprise CMS. And whether you use free open source or paid CMS at Proimpact7 the design result will be the same. So what’s the difference?

Firstly let start with who is the paid CMS best for?
• If your budget for your new website is over £/$10,000
• If you need to manage a large website which is constantly changing
• If there is more than 1 person who directly makes changes in the content, either by adding or editing the content
• If you need a solution which allows you and your team easy content management and site updates

One of the few major differences are that enterprise paid content management systems allows for better scalability, content management, staff permissions and are easier to use. Once you have seen and tried it for yourself, you quickly realize that those two are incomparable. In this case free does mean very basic.

Enterprise CMS are better long term solution compared to free open source CMS once you are in the position to afford it, have a team of people within your organization directly interacting with your site or simply Free open source is not enough for your needs.

There are many enterprise solutions available starting from £3-5k per license like Ektron, or some others starting from £10-15k like Alterian to mention a couple, depending on your needs. In the meantime read the review of free open source CMS MODx vs. Expression Engine.

Unfortunately, I didn’t manage to get a demo video of an enterprise CMS, but all the enterprise content management system providers will happily provide you with a demonstration tour of their product.

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