When speaking about usability, in the first place we think of ease and convenience of use as well as effectiveness and overall satisfaction with a product. There are multiple recommendations, articles and books on usability standards, methods of improving usability and usability testing. However, you will be surprised to find out that usability does not come down to user friendliness of your product, but can help maximize ROI of your project.

Let us have a look at usability from this point of view. In this article, we will explore how and why investments in a quality user interface of proprietary software, Web site, or ERP module pay off ten-fold. For this, we have chosen an online store that allows user to search for and order merchandise as the best example, but do not let this make you think it is the only application of usability principles. Investments in usability of desktop systems, mobile phone interfaces and other GUIs return many times their cost.

Usability as VIP Service

According to formal definition, usability is the extent to which a product can be used by specified users to achieve specified goals with effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction in a specified context of use. To put it simply, usability is about how easily and effectively users can utilize your product to get what they need.

In an online shop, usability is the counterpart of service provided in a bricks-and-mortar boutique to help customer choose what they want without spending much effort. To appeal to a customer, both bricks and clicks-and-mortar stores invest in advertising heavily. Also, they are aware of the need to retain a customer, which is achieved trough added value service and convenience. In our example, the number of shop site hits illustrates return on investment in advertising, while the number of those who stayed and made a purchase show return on investment in usability. Have you ever tried to count how many visitors leave your site with empty hands due to unfriendly interface? Do you investments in usability match your advertising costs?

Usability and Advertising

Now, let us find out why investments in usability can return, often with interest. Firstly, let us compare them with investments in advertising. Many entrepreneurs invest heavily in promotion often forgetting about other aspects, such as convenience of use, and wonder why their investments return poorly or not at all. Advertising is a traditional means of promotion, its main goal being to attract as many customers as possible (in the case of a Web site — to produce as many site hits as possible). But what about the outcome of these hits? How much time visitors spend on your site? Do they manage to find what they came for? Do they like your service? If only two out of hundred visitors clicked further than your home page, was your advertising investment worth it?

The thing responsible for hit quality and visiting experience is usability. A site that is well-structured, professionally laid out, supplied with friendly navigation tools and informative content — these are the main tasks for a usability professional. When usability is addressed properly, your users do not click from your home page with irritation —they navigate to the information they need, select and order your merchandise and become your satisfied customers. Keeping in mind that a satisfied customer is the best advertisement, you can say that investing in usability you are indirectly investing in advertising, because a happy customer is ready to recommend your site to others.

Then why companies are so eager to invest in advertising and so apprehensive about investments in usability? Probably, because this is what most companies are doing. Today, there are just a few who recognize the significance of usability and invest in it. At the same time, those who do, succeed in keeping their market share despite intensive competition and economic worries. Google, Macintosh, and Apple are among them. For these companies, top priority is customer and product friendliness, and worthiness of investments in usability comes without question.

Return on Investments in Usability

Any investment is made to produce a return, in the case of investments in usability each dollar spent brings from $10 to $100 saved or gained. How it is possible knowing usability is not exactly chip? Often it requires not only paying experts, but also making amendments to your site to implement their recommendations.

In our example, this gain is generated thanks to retaining a greater number of customers who proceeded further from the shop home page, who completed their order and actually bought from the shop. Usability is sure to improve site conversion rate, i.e. increase the number of visitors who become buyers.

Moreover, a friendlier site means a happier user who managed to find items he needed and order them quickly and who is likely to return and suggest your shop to his friends and colleagues. Even if your prices are slightly higher than you competitors (remember boutiques?).

Several companies that previously improved the quality of their service through investments in usability released their profits figures recently. These are impressive: their yearly profits raised by 133%, conversion rate — by 198%, repeated purchase – by 198%. Can you think of any advertising media to yield such results?

Gain and Save

Investing in usability, you both increase your profits and save your resources. But how usability professionals can help you save?

Firstly, you can reduce support costs dramatically. Thanks to intuitive and friendly interface users no longer need to contact your support team, which enable you to cut down your support spending. This is true for any application, not only an online store.

Apart from support services, you reduce resources needed to process orders left by shop visitors. Keep it in mind that all orders, even those that have not been finished by the customer who navigated to your competitors’ sites, need processing. You spend resources on order processing, by it brings no results.

Do not forget that a quality site does not need defect correction — with usability principles at your service all bugs are fixed when your site is being developed, long before its operation.

Conclusion

Investing in usability can help you improve quality of your product, save funds and raise customer loyalty. Principles of usability can be applied not only to on-line stores, but to any software product.

Today, usability often referred to when speaking about mobile phones or computers, but it becomes increasingly popular as a means to boost efficiency of virtually all kinds of products. The number of companies hiring usability professionals to participate in their software projects from the early stages grows every day. These projects range from sites to business applications and enterprise-level information systems.

Ivanov Rodion

Anna Zheleznichenko