InterCity Coachlines Website’s Usability Testing Report

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Website evaluation as a critical factor in the management process of many corporate firms

Website evaluation has become a critical factor in the management process of many corporate firms. Technical communication is often identified as an integral part when it comes to the task of information processing. End users emphasize the interface where human-computer interaction plays a vital role. Considered widely as a multidisciplinary field Human-computer interaction (HCI) is a blend of psychology and other areas of social sciences and its association with computer science and other relevant technical fields.

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The main objective

The main objective is to make the computing systems applicable to the users. This strategy potentially relies on psychological research and novel innovative ideas that play an influential role. The factors that pose a challenge to challenge HCI researchers are novel approaches or options to meet the demands of users and vie groups of audiences (Olson & Olson, 2003).

The principles of psychology

The principles of psychology hold good about the applicable methods being developed. On these grounds, the evaluation of web tools or ingredients that make a functional website can be considered as one of the potential uses of technology communication. In this context, the present description is based on the usability evaluation of websites related to Inter-City Coach lines. This is a travel website, most probably a bus company, intended to provide services like ticket booking, timetable, and passes, and other relevant travel information.

The most frequent activities that people used to undertake on this website are ticket booking and route service. Booking service can be regarded as a major reliable element of bus service, as this is mostly concerned by passengers. An evaluation was done to check for the user-friendly columns, options being provided on the website.

InterCity Coach lines

On a busy journey, the vendor was identified at a busy shopping complex. Approximately, 100 to 200 travel customers were reported to visit the vendor for information gathering and ticket purchases. Application of site statistics and click indicators have revealed that most users have given priority to the booking option on the site. The columns ‘From’ and ‘To’ were provided with a drop-down menu adjacent to them. These columns contained the information on the list of cities which may be either boarding points or destinations. Most users (75 %) have revealed that they preferred the options being provided on the website in a self-dependant manner.

This user technology has minimized the interference of the travel vendor. Further, the information on the list of cities has reflected the reliability of the user-friendly service. The travel date option on the website further reduced the ‘inquiry period’ concerns of the customers. Similarly, ‘no. of passengers’ options were also considered to be an additional advantage. This minimized the fare concerns likely to be met with quantity. Next, the evaluation was the time table service. This was based on the customer’s feasibility to easily reach the destination as per their schedule. It was found that the time table option is mostly designed with the latest software technology where users could easily find all information at a glance.

For example, a user has described the service as ‘very adaptive’ as per his busy official tour schedules. An overall reduction (95%), in the commuter problem, was observed with this service on the website. Few commuters still need guidance from the travel agents to the places not being covered. These two services developed with the latest user-friendly technology were preferable as they are primarily dependant by the users for obtaining the information; with a simple drop-down menu they become knowledgeable about the destinations, and with table format of time table, the users can get all need guidance about the bus schedule to a specific destination and the routes being covered.

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This has reflected the website’s excellent technology destined for end-users. In this task, a baseline will be developed where users will be advised to rate the performance task.

The identification of the vendor

That is choosing an online bus ticketing vendor where face-to-face testing will be carried out and WebEx software-enabled remote end-user testing. Here, certain participants will be selected and advised to furnish information on design patterns of websites like redesigning, if needed, the presence of language complexity, graphics that appear relevant and engaging, lucid navigation, and relevant examples on the cultural grounds.

User center design criteria will be sought to determine how important they are for the target audience (Moore et al., 2009). This could represent the website developers’ work efficiency. Representative audiences will be mostly targeted who will be the travelers who have successfully carried out the journey. A questionnaire will be conducted to reveal the utility and value of the website on board.

This would help to make necessary changes that might benefit all users and becomes vital when a certain nontargeted audience will be approached. No targeted audience will be those who less frequently rely on websites and have minimum knowledge of user-friendly web-based bus services, for example, train commuters or car users. Here, the main objective is to determine whether user requirements are met by the website developers without fail. Secondly, the target audience may differ from the web developer’s perspective. As such, it will be mandatory to perform a tailor-made job for both design and evaluation strategies.

WebEx software

Hence, a multiple task-oriented usability evaluation of the website will need to be recommended to the web developers in this test plan. To test the efficacy of this usability test plan, both customers with low and higher computer literacy will need to be selected. In another task of the usability test plan, different methodologies will be applied. These will be targeted on a few specific comparable sites for the evaluation of design and content, focus groups, observation testing, a questionnaire survey of Web development staff.

The participants, in this context, will be the service providers of the website. The participants will be interviewed for a questionnaire format to give their personal opinion on the site applicability like content and scope to the target user or customer group. Their emotional feelings like enthusiasm and favoritism will also be recorded (Ebenezer, 2003). This makes the tester make necessary suggestions for the novel content if required.

To say, problems associated with usability will be considered. These are the terminology of the website that is employed for information sources and services and site organization. This would enable the web developers to make revisions like terminology upgrading within the site, accessibility improvement, and improvised men structure (Ebenezer, 2003). Therefore, this mode of usability test pan will enhance the site futures about specific features that most users are confronted with. Day to day requirements needs to be understood by the web developers. With the ever-growing technology and user convenience, frequent revisions may be necessary. This will be better addressed by creating a feedback form on the website. It seems that the website lacks a feedback column option. This is an essential component and worth incorporating.

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Feedback forms or columns created on the website

Feedback forms or columns created on the website may help to minimize the time required by the web developers to review the information given by the customers.

This makes an instant message giving strategy to the website developers and service providers and the overall bus company management staff. In another task of the usability test plan, visuals that appear on the website will be studied by taking the consideration of information given by low-literate users about their agreement of visuals focusing on text improvement and its understanding and without visuals.

For this purpose, a group of low literate customers will be selected based on their education at the travel vendors. The specifically tailored task will be given where voice-recorded text message and simplified text, visual aid enabled multimedia educational Website that includes photographs and pictographs will be developed (Choi& Bakken, 2010). A 5th-grade readability level will be used to design the text.

By measuring the time spent on the task and error completion, end-users’ performance will be measured. Similarly, a strategy of users’ perception of ease of use and usefulness (PEUU) will be recorded in the participant sample. The low literate users will be asked to rate various types of visuals on the Website that conform with the text being used (Choi& Bakken, 2010). They will be asked to compare the website that is provided only with the text. It can be inferred that text improved understanding of the website is a compulsory factor for the users. Also, a realistic and firm representation of pictographs and pictures with lucid captions would help to enhance the visual benefit.

On the other hand, limited use of pop-ups which are the technical features, avoiding lengthy text, limited use of one font type and size and colors, and overall design simplicity are the factors that need to be addressed as they are important for the usability test plan of the website. Therefore, the website content needs an emphasis on the literacy of the users who come from various educational backgrounds.

Heuristic evaluation of the website

The heuristic evaluation of the website will be based on a few questionable issues. These are from the end-users’ point of view. Almost, every display on the website has a title that describes the contents like fare, from/to options time table, etc. Menu instructions are precisely given on the website. Say on time table option, information was given on how to select the bus stop, preferred service, and on the bookings column-selection of dates, passengers, etc. Of course, there is no system of feedback available for every operator action. This needs to be implemented at the earliest. One flaw is that multiple options cannot be selected in a menu or dialog box which needs to be addressed. However, the current status of the icon is indicated reflecting the well-designed web.

More detailed information about the website

Hence, icons are concrete and familiar. The menu choices are given in an easily understandable logical manner. The website is informative as related and interdependent fields appear on the same screen. But the selected color, blue, is uniform and needs a change for a corresponding expectation, say from bookings to contact us.

The menu choices like bookings have the category fares, travel dates, passengers, etc that fit logically. Similarly, the time table has the category location, coach stop, etc.

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There is also a good grammatical sense in the provided menu titles that has nothing to do with computer jargon. It is purely user-friendly jargon.

References

Choi, J., & Bakken, S. (2010). Web-based education for low-literate parents in Neonatal Intensive Care Unit: Development of a website and heuristic evaluation and usability testing. Int J Med Inform.

Ebenezer, C. (2003). Usability evaluation of an NHS library website. Health Info Libr J, 20 (3): 134-42.

Moore, M., Bias, R. G., Prentice, K., Fletcher, R., Vaughn, T. Web usability testing with a Hispanic medically underserved population.J Med Libr Assoc, 97:114-21.

Olson, G. M., & Olson, J. S. (2003). Human-computer interaction: psychological aspects of the human use of computing. Annu Rev Psychol, 54: 491-516.

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IvyPanda. 2022. "InterCity Coachlines Website's Usability Testing." August 16, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/intercity-coachlines-websites-usability-testing/.

1. IvyPanda. "InterCity Coachlines Website's Usability Testing." August 16, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/intercity-coachlines-websites-usability-testing/.


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IvyPanda. "InterCity Coachlines Website's Usability Testing." August 16, 2022. https://ivypanda.com/essays/intercity-coachlines-websites-usability-testing/.

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