| Planning | Rough Sketches | Page Designs | Prototype | First Usable Version | "Cubicle Eval" (Peer Eval) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| What to Evaluate | Competitors' Sites | Sketch of home page Names of top level categories and site features | Home page Second level page template Content page template | As much as you have working | As much as you have working | Each unique page |
| Format | Live site | Paper | Paper | HTML prototype | Live Site | HTML page |
| How to Evaluate | "Get It" Key tasks |
"Get It" Names of things | "Get It" Basic Navigation | "Get It" Key Tasks |
"Get It" Key Tasks |
Key Tasks |
| What You're Looking For | What do they like/love? What works well? How hard is it to do key tasks? | Do they get the point of the site? Does it seem like what they need? | Do they get the point of the site? Do they get the navigation? Can they guess where to find things? | Do they still get it? Can they accomplish the key tasks? | Do they still get it? Can they accomplish the key tasks? | Can they accomplish the key tasks? |
| Session Length | 1 hr. | 15-20 min. | 15-20 min. | 45 min. -1 hr | 1 hr. | 5 min per page |
| # Of Evaluations | 1 | 1-3 | 1-3 | 1-3 | 1-3 | 1 per page |
| Evaluation Type | Inquiry | Inquiry Inspection | Inquiry Inspection | Inquiry Inspection | Inquiry Inspection | Informal Exploratory Test |
Adapted from: Krug, Steve. Don't Make Me Think! A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability, Que, 2000.
- Before you even begin designing your site, test comparable sites. Use yourself, then watch one or two other people use them see what works and what doesn't. Do "Get it" evaluation and Key tasks.
- "Get it" means do they understand the purpose of the site, how it is organized, how it works, etc.
- Key Tasks evaluation means asking the user to do something, then watching how well they do.
- As you begin designing, its never too early to start showing designs to users, beginning with the first rough sketches. Later, as you begin building parts of the site or functioning prototypes, you can begin testing key tasks on your own site.
- Steve Krug recommends Cubicle testing. Whenever you build a new kind of page-particularly forms-you should print the page out and show it to the person in the next cubicle to see if they make sense out of it.