This is a brief review about the importance of usability and design in websites.

1. Otoño
08
Search Engine Optimization 1
MDMK
09
Usability and design
SESSION 1: Introduction to usability and design: the two sides of
usability
05/10/09

2. Group A, MDMK’09
GROUP A: Leonardo Bittan, Rahul Nambiar, Anne-Camile Bianchi-Mirasole, Filipe Andre Gomes de Faria,
Gonzalo de la Mata and Elena Ibáñez.
Q.1. What are our goals when learning about usability and design?
Broadly speaking we could say that our goal is reducing the friction caused by poor usability.
In more detail we could talk about:
1. QUANTITATIVE GOALS:
- To reduce learning costs
- To reduce assistance and user help costs
- To optimize design, re-design and maintenance costs
- To increase website our conversion rate from visitors to costumers
2. QUALITATIVE GOALS:
- To increase our corporate image and prestige
- To improve our users’ quality of life:
•Decreasing stress
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3. •Increasing satisfaction
•Increasing productivity
Q.2. What do we need to be thinking about as team members?
1. Most critical thought that should be there in a team member when delivering any project is
"User is King" and whatever problem you are trying to solve should actually make him use
the system "without too much thinking".
2. Keep asking the one question: "Why and how a particular change will affect User
Experience?"
Q.3. What types of projects will we deal with?
We cannot categorize a usability project, because every project that involves delivering an
experience to the user can be potentially a usability project. It may be a Mobile Phone app,
Website, Intranet application, Device like iPhone or even designing a car can be a usability project.
But from the point of view of this course- Master in Digital Marketing- the projects we can talk about
should be more based around delivering interactive digital experience to the user or providing
users with a specific technological way for them to undertake a specific process, e.g. provide the
users with a web interface (technology) for them to buy our products.
All of us are most likely to be working on computer interface (websites) design and development
projects rather than on product usability, but the important thing is to stress that it is not only about
web usability, it is about all types of projects what aim to develop something that will allow the user
to undertake a specific process.
Q.4. What will our roles be on a team?
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4. Group A, MDMK’09
BUSINESS PROJECT MANAGER
• They work on the global vision of the project
DESIGNERS
• They work on the visual proposal, focusing on creativity but taking into account technological and
experiential patterns.
WEB DEVELOPERS
•They turn the design into HTML and CSS so browsers show content properly. It is a very
important rol since it connects the design with the programming.
WEB PROGRAMMERS
•They put the codes behind the developed web. The must separate the logic from the the
presentation.
SOURCING END USERS
•They work on the development of a usable experience
It is critic to insert enough knowledge in the organisation about the importance of usability in order
to achieve a state where everybody, designers, web designers, web programmers and the
rd
business project managers have usability in the centre of their work. This is the 3 stage of the
usability model from Bogo Vatovec :
1. Nobody talks about usability
2. Everybody talks about usability
3. Nobody talks about usability
Therefore we need to make sure that the mechanisms required to collect the information about the
user and his needs are in place and that they are spread to the team in order for the entire team to
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5. work for the same objective.
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