The Importance of User-testing Products

When developing products and services, many companies conduct user research. It is considered to be one of the most important aspects of making a business successful. But what exactly is it?

Usability Photo credit: David Travis on Unsplash

Definition

User-testing and research is the process of understanding how people perceive and use products and services. The process usually involves conducting user research in any stage of the product development – before, during or after. User-testing is mainly done through interviews, focus groups, surveys or usability evaluations (Kuniavsky, Goodman, and Moed, 2012). For many companies, user-testing is a set priority. What is it that makes it so important?

Importance

User research is important because it can make or break the success of a new product or service. When developing a new product, it is not simply enough to be the first to launch it into the market, it also needs to be based upon fulfilling human needs and being user-friendly. In the world of product development there is a term (or even an unspoked law) that says: ‘Speak the user’s language’ (Krug, 2006). In other words, observe and understand the user’s interaction with a product.

User-testing digital products

In the digital world, user-testing revolves around testing websites, apps, and other digital products. It is especially important for online companies, as on the Internet, there is an abundance of similar products just one click away. If users can’t understand how to navigate the website, they are likely to seek other websites – resulting in the company losing potential customers to competing websites. This is evident in the joint research by Huff Industrial Marketing, KoMarketing and BuyerZone conducted in 2015 on B2B web users (Komninos, 2020). Here, research shows that as much as 46% of users leave a website due to lack of contact information, and 37% leave because of poor layout and design (ibid).

The most important principle for websites and digital products is that their function should be obvious and self-evident. For example, if a person is using the website and spends more time wondering what is what and how to use it – the website is not user-friendly. The process should be effortless. Therefore, in designing and developing a website, the focus should be around eliminating the questions that might come up in the user’s mind when navigating their way through the applications.

Benefits

The benefits of user-testing are the same for both physical and digital products:

  1. It helps a company save time (Praxent, 2019). If a problem is discovered early in the developing process, there is still time to fix it. Equally, the user reactions can even help in understanding whether or not the product is feasible to complete.
  2. By saving time on product development a company also saves money (ibid). For instance, in the case of identifying what product features to either keep or get rid of.
  3. It helps in understanding product desirability (ibid). If users find value in the product, this can be an indicator of the success and appeal that the product might face in the marketplace.

As a result of the benefits of user-testing, product developers are able have in-depth research and answer important questions that surrounds the product, like: what will the product do; how should it look; how long will it take to make it; and how much will it cost us? (Praxent, 2019).

Conclusively, user-testing is a valuable method that can impact the design of the product or service; the product development process of a business; and the product or service’s success.

References:

Komninos, A. (2020) ‘An Introduction to Usability’. [online] The Interaction Design Foundation. Available at: https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/article/an-introduction-to-usability [Accessed 2 Mar. 2020].

Krug, S. (2006) Don’t make me think! A common sense approach to web usability. 2nd ed. Berkeley, Calif: New Riders Pub.

Kuniavsky, M., Goodman, E. and Moed, A. (2012) Observing the user experience: a practitioner’s guide to user research. 2nd ed. Waltham, MA: Morgan Kaufmann.

Praxent. (2019) ‘Why Do Usability Testing? 4 Reasons to Make It a Priority’. [online] Available at: https://praxent.com/blog/usability-testing-4-reasons-top-priority [Accessed 2 Mar. 2020].