Making webpages easy to use, self-explanatory, and without obscurity are all parts of Web Usability. Really, the only way to know if your website is easy to use is to test it. Unfortunately, usability is common courtesy and it is overlooked – constantly. Project leaders and executives who are not familiar with the impact usability has on the quality of a website tend to cringe at the idea of spending resources to run test, they Reason:

No Time

Usability test does not have to be a huge expenditure of time. In fact – the key behind this test is to save time in the end by catching the issues early on before they escalate.

No Money

A camcorder, a computer, and someone willing to sit down use your website is all you need. Chances are you already have a computer, now just go download Skype, and grab a neighbor for an hour.

No Expertise

It’s not hard is it to watch someone use a website and pick up on which parts could be improved. Not hard at all considering frustrating patches are accompanied with visual cues. It’s really easy to do. Usability is about common sense.

AllegiantMDis a progressive physician practice. They were looking for a web presence that highlighted their benefit to hospitals looking for radiology services that can be offered at all times. AllegiantMD wanted to make sure that their website not only distinguished their practice, but also had the set up and functionality to rank high in search engine results when hospital personnel were searching for their products and services.

The website significantly extended the reach of the professional radiology services company.

A strong web presence increases the overall efficiency of your business. This is just one of the many stories everywhere that prove that. It is now, more than ever, absolutely crucial for a brand to have a digital footprint. This is power of Webolization.

We all claim to be free thinkers and pioneers of uniqueness, but the truth is, however, that we all look to others to decide what we should do. This is called Social Validation.

When designing experiences think about how you could use this truth about ourselves to influence decision making.

• Why not take the liberty of making suggestions? De Vries and Pruyn (2007) reveals to us how we can drive an upward of 20% more leads to an item by simply “recommending” it.
• Literally showing the user what others think (Reviews, Comments, Rankings) is extremely effective. The more real those people are to the user the bigger the pull.

A lot of us will usually fall back after feeling such pulls and think “let me be logical about this!” And -that’s- when you hit them with numbers, stats, and charts.

Understanding the way we think is part of Design – consider Social Validation the next time you’re thinking about creating websites, games or applications.

Bassed on work by Susan M. Weinschenk, Phd photo by Wamdem.