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What is User Testing and why is it important?

21 April 2021 •

By: Amy Design

When creating digital products for our clients, our Product Designers focus a lot of time on User Experience. 

What is user experience?

User experience refers to how people interact with a product or system. This includes the users’ feelings and their perception of ease of use. A product that is easy to use and that users enjoy using will often attract loyal users and create happier customers.

One of the ways we evaluate user experience is through user testing. It’s important for us to speak to the users that will be using the product. We may utilise user research to better understand the problem users are experiencing, understand how they interact with the products they’re already using or see how users would react to a new product entering the market. 

We do user testing through surveys, focus groups or interviews. 

Why is user testing so important?

Apart from wanting to better understand user behaviour, we also use the user testing process to evaluate new products that we’re developing. In User Testing, we may ask participants to look at or even use a digital product (like an app or a website) and give us feedback. It’s important to gauge how easy or difficult a product is to use.

Feedback is then used to make future decisions about that product. If users are unsure of how to use a new feature we may decide to change the design, include clearer instructions or even decide to take it out completely.

Tests to determine how easy a product is to use are called usability testing. 

In some situations, we may decide to conduct user testing completely online. This is known as Remote User Testing. This could be in the form of online surveys, video calls or digital exercises that we email to you. 

Why we created the Byte Orbit test pilot community 

In some cases, like when testing a new classroom tool application, it may be important to have many participants from the same profession or background - in this case, a group of high school teachers. But with other products with a broader use - like a new banking app - we may want to test with a diverse group of people with different ages, backgrounds and professions. 

For this reason, we’ve created the Byte Orbit Test Pilot community. Test pilots come from different parts of the country, different age groups, professions and backgrounds. We reach out to our test pilots when we’re conducting user testing and are looking for participants to give their feedback. 

Test pilots take part in surveys, interviews, focus groups and online exercises and are often incentivised with Takealot vouchers. They also get early access to new products before they’ve hit the market and get to have their say on products that are relevant to them. 

Sign up to become a test pilot today and have your say!

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21 April 2021
By: Amy
Design

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