The Web Site Usability Handbook is for individuals who evaluate and improve the usability of Web sites. It does not, as the title might imply, specifically show Web developers how to make their sites more usable.

The book explores the growing field of Web usability, with equal emphasis on theory and practicality, and focuses primarily on measuring usability accurately and applying it to formal and informal testing. The concept of a usability toolbox--a collection of tools and techniques--is presented, along with sound reasoning for the use of each component. The tools vary from index-card sorting to heuristic evaluation to focus groups. There is some fascinating material also about the human factors of usability, such as the mechanics of vision and the idiosyncrasies of human memory.

A chapter that's devoted to design guidelines includes some concrete suggestions, such as "don't overuse emphasis" and "make printer-friendly pages." This chapter contains no revolutionary ideas; instead, it's a helpful list of pointers that are worth revisiting from time to time. More elemental are the 10 usability heuristics that are presented in the next chapter and that were developed originally by usability guru Jakob Nielsen. These high-level concepts demand careful consideration, but can produce impressive results.

The Web Site Usability Handbook presents the framework for a usability lab complete with video observation, and shows how to conduct objective usability testing. Many organizations skip the potentially critical development step of usability analysis; however, if yours wants to be more forward-looking in Web strategy, this is a good guide for getting it started in usability. --Stephen W Plain

Topics covered:

* User-centered design

* Usability tools

* Human-factors psychology

* Sensation and perception

* Design guidelines

* Heuristic evaluation

* Usability lab setup

* Usability testing

* Web accessibility

* Usability statistic analysis

Product Description

Does your company Web site convey your message effectively? Are your customers finding what they need easily? Determining these factors is a difficult task that has challenged Usability professionals since the first Web page was posted.

Company Web sites aren't optional in today's highly competitive business environment and ensuring that your investment on the Web is well spent, is a challenge facing all levels of Web professionals. With the hands-on guidance and examples provided in this book, readers will find practical tools to make certain that their site is as effective and user-friendly as possible. They'll learn to create sites that are free from navigation "dead ends", difficult to use interfaces, and other barriers to usability.

All of the principals of User Centered Design (UCD) are covered along with Critical Human Factors, and guidelines for implementing a test plan. Examples of Usability issues and how they are dealt with are covered through a case stdy focused on an existing site. As new techniques and tools are introduced, the team of usability specialists will detail how they implement these new tools as they work through the evaluation, testing, and transformation stages.