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Learn usability testing from Apple

Usability testing is a vital part of any retail business both on the high street and online. So why is usability testing so rare. One reason is that many people consider it to be expensive and if you take the example of Apple it probably is. However it does not have to be. Apple joined the world of retail in May 2001 and now has 287 stores worldwide as of March 2010. However Apple did not jump into the world of retail blind and they knew their stores would be a success before the doors of the first store in Virginia even opened.

With no experience in retail how could they be so sure it would work?

First of all Apple brought in the leader in the retail world Mickey Drexler to fill the skills gap on their board. Then on the advice of Drexler they hired a warehouse where they built a prototype of the store they had designed on paper. They then brought in a test group and watched them interact and interviewed them to see which aspects of the store were the most popular. From the results they knocked down the first version and rebuilt a new store layout and re-tested. They did this several times until they were happy with the study and this final design was then used universally in all new Apple stores. The data they collected was invaluable and even the most bizarre questions in the interviews gave them the best ideas for the design. The famous genius bar came from the question “Tell us about the best service experience you have ever had”. With 90% of interviewees stating that it was in a hotel. Once you have booked your hotel they are not selling you anything except good service and the staff are all there to help you. Based on this answer Apple decided to set up their genius bar to mimic a bar in the hotel lobby but instead of selling alcohol their bar would be a source of information and advice to all their customers.

Your online business is no different to this we can study the movements of visitors to your website with Google analytics. You can ask your customers opinions with polls and surveys and with the WSI Inter-View service you can have real people browse your website, complete chosen goals or search online for your products. You can see exactly what they are doing and even hear them as they think out loud and give their opinion on your website.

What is in a competitor analysis?

We have seen great success over the last few months with our competitor analysis reports which previously were only offered to existing customers, however we are also getting a lot of emails and phone calls asking for details of what information will be provided in the report and how the customer can then use this information. The reports are full of very detailed and accurate statistics of what your chosen competitors are doing to promote and market their businesses online. The details of the standard reports are explained below however we are able to create customised reports by special request. The data in the report is yours to do with as you please. Some customers have decided that they are happy with their current position in the market and order regular reports to monitor competitor activity. Others have taken the report and the recommendations to their in house team and implemented some or all of our suggestions. Most however have felt the need to increase their market share and strengthen their position online and have therefore asked us to carry out some or all of the recommendations contained in the report.

Search Report – In this report we look at your competitors search engine strategies. We analyse their Pay Per Click strategies to uncover their daily ad spend, find out which of their adverts generates the most traffic and see which keywords they are targeting in their campaigns and how they are performing.

The second part of this report looks at their Search Engine Optimisation strategy and uncovers how many quality inbound links their site has, their Google page rank, the number of pages they have as well as carrying out a detailed on site survey to see if they are using best practice when building and adding to their website. Based on the information gathered in this section we are able to estimate their monthly spend on SEO based upon the amount of work carried out multiplied by the average hourly rate for SEO work. This of course may vary depending on who they are using for SEO. The final section of this report will give you an overview of your competitors’ online activities as well as a list of recommendations and estimated budgets required to position your business above the competition.

Search & Social report – In this report we expand on the search report and look at your competitors’ presence on the social media networks. Detailing each network that they have a presence on and analysing their activities on these networks our researchers discover which tactics they are using to engage with customers and which of these tactics generate the best response and send the most traffic to their website. Based on their activity and the average hourly rate for social media experts we estimate their monthly spend on this form of online marketing. We analyse this data and as before recommend the best action for you to take to ensure your company is positioned above your competitors.

Complete online report – Covering all aspects of your competitors’ online presence in this we expand on the previous reports also looking at your competitors’ additional online marketing tactics such as email marketing and banner ads as well as looking at the functionality of their website, use of landing pages and the design of their website. As before each section of the report has a summary of the findings, their estimated costs for each and a list of recommendations along with an estimated budget to carry out these recommendations.

This has been a busy month so far for our research department with our competitor analysis reports of all levels becoming very popular as more and more businesses are looking for their place online. Monitoring your competitors has always been important and businesses of all sizes need to keep track of what their competitors are up to. However this has never been more important than it is now as the internet continues to grow and your competitors begin to market themselves online. If you are not watching them they may just run away with your customers. Our reports are proving to be popular for two reasons according to a recent customer survey.

The first reason is the data they contain is invaluable to you especially if you are trying to set an online marketing budget. The report contains detailed analysis of your competitors’ strategy and budgets based on reported figures or estimated man hours, as well as recommendations and estimated budgets that you need to position your business as the market leader online.

Everything we do begins with research. Whether you are looking to launch a new product, rebrand your whole business or start a new company if you fail to do thorough research then you will either fail or at the very least you will learn the hard and usually the expensive way. The Internet now gives you access to such vast amounts of data either free or through paid software as a service tools, that there is no excuse not to have carried out your due diligence.

So we have established that you can get general information just by searching the web, looking at specialist sites, news and information sites and social media sites. What you can also do is get people to complete surveys or comment on your ideas.

Taking this one step further you can gauge demand for your product by testing it online. If you are selling a product that is already readily available you can estimate the demand just by discovering how many people search for that product every month. However if you are launching an entirely new product you can use the internet to sell a small batch before you go and spend big money having it mass produced. By doing this first you can not only accurately establish the demand for your product but you can also find the correct pricing point. What would traditionally have taken weeks of research can now be completed in only a day or two and often you get much more accurate results which can be backed up with solid data.