Website Usability Guidelines

Website Usability Basics

Be as fair as you possibly can, and make it understood that the numbers you assign are subjective scores, not the results of ironclad science. They're assigned and used primarily to have something quantifiable to point to and discuss, instead of just guesses and raw opinion.

You can perform this task of crunching numbers manually or with a spreadsheet. Excel and other spreadsheet tools provide built-in functions for calculating means, medians, modes, and other statistical values.

Writing the Report - A good report should not contain any surprising twists and turns. In fact, the readers of your report will be expecting something along these lines:

• An Usability Test Reports, which contains a summary of your report. You'll probably write this section last. Subsections of the Usability Test Reports should include a section summarizing why you undertook the analysis, a summary of the sites and rankings, and a summary of recommendations for further action.

• A methods section, in which you explain the methodology you employed for selecting and rating the sites, including what criteria you looked at. This section provides insight into your thinking when you undertook the analysis.
  
  
• A findings section, in which you summarize your findings for each site. Start each subsection with the name of the site, the site's URL, and the overall score for the site. Then go through each part of the site and describe how it ranked, including a site section score. Do this for each site. The findings section will comprise the bulk of your report.
  
  
• A discussion and recommendations section, in which you provide future direction for the team. This is the appropriate section to mention integrating other sites and best practices to the site being deployed by the company.
  
  
• One or more appendixes, in which you provide detailed information. It's appropriate to list raw data of your findings here.