Usability Testing for UMBC’s New Programs & Degrees Webpages

Create prototypes, write user testing scripts, and interview UMBC students and high school counselors to determine site usability, content comprehension, and layout preferences.

High-fidelity Prototyping and Usability Testing, User Interviewing, Presenting Insights to Stakeholders

Summary

Templates for a new website system meant to house over 300 programs & degrees webpages for The University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) were designed by a contracted agency.

Prior to development and launch, usability testing was required to determine which design components and layouts best serve prospective students and counselors.

My Roles & Responsibilities

  • Create 6 high-fidelity clickable prototypes for various BA and MA program pages to use in usability testing research

  • Write interview scripts for each user scenario being tested

  • Interview students (6) and counselors (2), record their browsing behavior and verbal responses, present insights to stakeholders

Specific Testing Points

Prototypes of a long page and a short page were created to observe user browsing behavior. A number of design components were tested through an organic conversation and planned questions for participating users.

A few examples are shown below.

“Jump to Section” Links

  • Stakeholders previously voiced concerns about jump-links being small and potentially missed by website users.

  • Testing revealed 75% of participants instinctually clicked the jump-links within 30 seconds of arriving on the page.

  • The same participants were also observed to frequently use the “back to top” button when navigating the page.

Locating Content

Questions to prompt participants to organically browse the page and find specific content were asked, examples include:

  • Where can you find information about faculty?

  • What are two classes that seem interesting to you?

  • Where can you find student research opportunities?

Browsing behavior was recorded via virtual screen sharing, and clips were shown to stakeholders during the insights presentation.

Testing Various Page-Lengths and Content Layouts

Background

A contracted agency provided UMBC with MAX and MIN template versions to apply programs & degrees content to.

Collaborating with faculty in various departments, writers from UMBC’s communications team provided text content to be applied in the templates for testing.

Placeholder imagery was used to create a general feel for these web pages.

Key Points

  • Stakeholders voiced concern about lengthy pages.

  • Usability testing indicated that website visitors are able to locate content by using jump-links, however too much scrolling led 2 of 6 students to give up when unable to find information.

  • The development team’s final decision was to use a shorter mid-sized template to ensure easier browsing and room to display all necessary content.