Usability Testing & Evaluation

Course Description

User-Centered or User-Experience Design (UX) is an exciting and rapidly expanding field. In this course, the fourth in the certificate, and building on ideas introduced in previous courses, students will learn about the concepts underlying usability testing and evaluating web sites and apps, to generate guidance for creating more usable websites and apps. Topics in this course include creating and moderating usability tests, conducting remote usability tests, using surveys to find suitable participants and knowing when to conduct an A/B test. This is a hands-on course and the instructor will introduce students to the usability testing process of defining a test goal, creating a test plan, defining testing tasks and analyzing usability test results. Additionally, students will be introduced to Google Analytics, to better understand how users navigate around a website. Students will have an opportunity to join in two question/answer sessions. At the end of this six week course students will present the process and results of their usability test project that can be added to their portfolio. Applications used in this course are freely available and no purchase of software is required.

Course Length - Online 6 weeks

Learner Outcomes

At the end of this course, students will be able to:

• Create, moderate and analyze the results of usability testing
• Conduct a remote user test
• Create a survey screener for finding and recruiting test participants
• Describe when it is important to conduct an A/B test

Additional Information

Benefits:

• Students will understand when to conduct usability tests throughout the design process.
• Students will be able to create a professional report of their process and results and understand what kind of reports are most appreciated by different audiences (clients, executives, product / marketing teams).
• Students will be able to explain the value of usability testing to their product teams.
• Students will contribute to improving products through the iteration process.