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Back in the early days of large-scale computing, Sun founder John Gage first uttered the immortal phrase, “The network is the computer.” This statement has become more and more true over time, as increasingly sophisticated grids have proven to be more powerful and useful than any one computer could be. The power of the collective is starting to trickle down from the giants like Sun and Google to the little guys. This is making it possible for businesses of all sizes to create, store, and deliver quality web-based applications to users without the large-scale investment in computing grids that would ordinarily be required.

Part of this change has come about due to the proliferation of Platform as a Service (Paas) companies like Force.com (a service of Salesforce.com). Force.com offers customers the tools they need to create proprietary web-based applications that can replace the software they would normally use. The platform they provide is specifically geared towards businesses who rely on enterprise tools like those of software vendors Oracle, Microsoft, and SAP. IT departments, instead of spending valuable time on disastrous software upgrades and user training, could actually add value to the company through innovating applications that require only an internet browser to access. This would also allow designers the ability to create a better user overall user experience which is typically impossible since software tends “lock down” the user experience and allows minimal customization. No more installations, no more licensing fees, just a quick and cost-effective way to build customized applications for businesses.

Some industry experts estimate that this PaaS model could reduce the costs associated with traditional software by as much as 75%. No longer would an online retailer need to build or buy an e-commerce software package. They could use the foundation created by Force.com to generate a web-based application specific to their needs. Force.com offers their own development services to businesses without experts on hand, but they also boast an AppExchange section which allows users to share in the tools created by other users for subscription fees. Open source software is also being applied in this model, allowing businesses to combine tools like OpenOffice (an office suite to rival Microsoft Office) and customer service applications to meet the needs of multiple departments.

While the market for web-based applications continues to grow (and software dies a slow, agonizing death), big players in the computer infrastructure world are stepping up to fill a gap in the system. Back in 2006, Sun launched what they called “the world’s first on demand supercomputer,” giving smaller businesses a way to provide applications without the expense of developing their own server farms. The infrastructure was available to any one with a browser and a credit card. As Sun’s official blogger Jonathan Schwartz put it, “We believe the simplicity, accessibility and affordability of this service changes the face of computing for all organizations, large and small, public or private.” This initiative, and others like it, removed the last barrier to the triumph of web-based applications over software.

Now, e-commerce giant Amazon is getting in on the game, with their Web Services division offering server space and computing capacity on a subscription basis. Amazon is courting developers in the hopes of renting out their computing cloud during the off-season. The company’s infrastructure sees the heaviest use in the fourth quarter holiday season, and they’re generating extra (albeit small for them) revenue by hosting applications for developers. They’re specifically reaching out to companies who develop applications for Facebook. In a recent press release, Amazon Web Services details the benefits of their model: “Using these infrastructure web services, your Facebook application is able to reach “web-scale” by scaling up and down seamlessly as demand dictates — with pay-as-you-go pricing and no upfront costs.” In other words, if it’s a hit you pay more, but if it’s a flop you don’t suffer. This allows developers at small companies to reap the rewards of popular applications without taking the risk of buying their own computer infrastructure.

Amazon’s growing list of customers for their cloud rental service includes SanDisk and the New York Times, though it appeals mostly to smaller fish at the moment. They’re up 135,000 customers since 2005, and as their service becomes more reliable, the list will continue to grow. The pay-as-you-go model frees up businesses with big ideas but without bid budgets, and this trend is a perfect parallel to the Platform as a Service industry. Not only will independent or small-scale developers have access to the best tools for building cheap, quality applications, but they’ll also have the ability to store and run their ideas with the big boys. This means reliable, cost-effective, and customized applications for businesses everywhere.

It’s hard to spot a pitfall in these growing trends, and it seems fortuitous that they are emerging and growing together. The only potential downside is for major software outfits like Microsoft, Oracle, or Adobe. My guess is that even these traditionalists will get in on the game, producing more and more tools that can be accessed through the web on a subscription basis. As software breathes its last, we’ll see a major shift in the way programs are developed, stored, delivered, and accessed by end users.

Three letter acronyms. The technology industry would fall apart if we didn’t have them. “ROI” is a classic that has been around for quite awhile, although it has reached a bigger audience in recent years. For those who avoid buzzwords, it stands for “Return on Investment.” While we can acknowledge that ROI is the essence of business economics (money earned - money spent = profits), it should never take the place of providing a good customer experience.

The concept of ROI, while easy to quantify in a retail establishment or a traditional manufacturer, is more elusive in the IT industry. How to you put a price on saved time or increased satisfaction? For this reason, IT companies are taking the lead in providing a different kind of return on investment, that of great user experience. In the growing world of Customer Relationship Management (CRM), companies are investing in software and web-based applications to facilitate customer service. A recent article in Baseline magazine gives the example of British telecom company BT used Citrix Online’s Go-To-Assist improved their customer satisfaction scores by 97 percent.

BT had a problem with the way their help desk services were delivered to clients. While the issues were eventually resolved, customers disliked being passed from person to person, and each technician was spending too long with each caller. With the implementation of Go-To-Assist, technicians had remote access to clients no matter what their location or connection. Multiple technicians could work on the problem simultaneously, and the resolution was minimally invasive to the caller. Customer satisfaction went from 20 percent to 97 percent, and it’s hard to argue with the ROI of this type of marked improvement.

Another company which is focusing on CRM as a business strategy is Salesforce.com, which has made waves in the IT industry. Salesforce uses a web-based model for delivery, and it offers a “platform as a service” package through Force.com. Clients can customize the platform to meet specific needs, and they can choose to build or buy an application. Salesforce is self-described as “ROI for IT”, and their website argues that traditional CRM software is an unacceptable risk for businesses: “CRM should solve your business problems, not create more headaches.” The message seems to be getting through, and they’ve seen astronomical growth since the company was founded in 1999. They’ve now landed major clients such as IBM, Expedia, Dow Jones Newswire, Microsoft, and Kaiser Permanente.

Both Citrix Online and Salesforce.com are representative of this new trend in ROI. Your customer satisfaction is a factor of business success, and you can make your customer service efforts pay for themselves. While these two players focus on web and software applications, this concept could be applied to many different aspects of business, including product development, marketing, and manufacturing. Instead of viewing all business activities through the cost vs. profit lens, successful businesses have started looking at processes throughout their workflow as a means by which to improve customer satisfaction and user experience. A better manufacturing process means faster delivery of products, a more thorough market research strategy means better-directed advertising, and a fully-vetted design means a slick, intuitive interface for customers.

The maxim, “You get what you pay for” has always been true for customers, but it’s now starting to impact businesses as well. An investment in user experience is an investment which can pay for itself. That is the ultimate ROI, not just another buzzword. With IT projects failing roughly 75% of the time, it is important to set solid goals to work towards a beneficial ROI while mapping metrics to judge your success. If you ignore this important step, you will be “SOL”.

It’s a struggle for any company to reach the right market for their products and services. How do you know what type of person will want to use what you’re selling? How do you find the right tools to market your service specifically to those people? And how do you know if your efforts were fruitful in the end? One process that can be applied to answer these questions is called persona building. A persona, simply put, is an easy-to-navigate dossier that describes a typical user or group of users. It is a detailed biography of existing or imagined customers. Building these personas can help you identify, cater to, and gather feedback from the customers who will find your product or service the most useful.

Many companies approach user profiling with little more than unfounded assumptions about user’s needs and actions. They believe that they “know” how users think, or can predict their behavior. Avoid this kind of conjecture. A truly effective persona will be based on concrete data and actual user profiles; it should be much more than baseless suppositions about their needs. Do the research, compile the data, and use that information as the skeleton for a user profile. You can organize this information in much the same way you would format a resume or CV. The skeleton profile can include sections on your user’s objectives, educational and occupational backgrounds, favorite activities, skills and abilities, and even shortcomings. Adding personal details, photos, even sound and video files (a theoretical subject’s favorite song, for example), will flesh out the picture, making your persona as human as you and me.

One mistake that businesses often make it to create just one user profile for each product or service. This can control your marketing efforts and restrict freedom and success. There are many different “standard” users for every product. For a high-volume website, for example, it would be advisable to create many personas, each of which are representative of a portion of your user-base. This is especially true if your product or service will reach a diverse or even international audience.

Another common mistake that is made is “over-doing” the persona. The profile you create should match your the type of customers that you actually have - nothing more and nothing less. Incorrectly identifying them will lead to decisions that will impact your business and the type of applications your trying to build. Missing a group of people could mean that certain features are not available or may not be easy to use. Identifying someone who does not fit with your audience could result in the addition of features that no one will use, and it will scuttle the user experience.

Below are two brief examples of personas for two different users of Talkibie:

User A - Karen Fielding

Background info: Karen is a graphic designer with a local firm in the Phoenix, AZ area. She is good at her job, but she has not had any professional development classes in a while. She is largely self-taught, and she tries to keep up with trends and technology by reading blogs and online training documentation. She finds her coworkers are younger and younger, and she’s trying to stay ahead of the new talent in her field.

About Karen: She is in her mid-30s, and she’s very socially active with friends and coworkers. She likes to visit museums and galleries, and she considers her work to be an art-form. She uses the internet mainly for work to keep up with email, but she’s computer savvy and quick to pick up new skills.

What she values: Intelligence, efficiency, and a sense of humor.

Quote: “I like a website that’s informative and entertaining.”

User B - Dan DiMaggio

Background info: Dan is the CEO of a staffing firm which serves 3 states in the Northeast. His job entails managing a staff of 150, and they’re always suggesting ways to improve the company’s reputation through web-based technology. He’s great at the business-side of his job, but he’s lost when it comes to technology solutions.

About Dan: He’s in his 50s, and he’s been with the same company for 25 years. He loves managing his staff, and they like and respect him. However, he’s so clueless about computers that he has his assistant print out his emails each morning so that he can draft replies by hand. He wants to learn how to do these things, but it seems like no one has the patience to teach him.

What he values: Loyalty, hard work, customer satisfaction

Quote: “How can I approve new website functions when I can’t even figure out how to sign on to the internet?”

These two very different Talkibie readers have very different levels of experience and backgrounds, but after creating profiles of this type it’s easy to anticipate their needs. Dan would need a very simple interface which features instructive articles written so that anyone could understand the topic being presented. Karen, on the other hand, would want a slick-looking site where she can read about the latest trends and how to implement them in her regular workflow . Karen would be the type of user to give back to the online community by posting comments and questions on blogs, where as Dan would be more absorbent, looking for information rather than creating dialogue, and he’d probably want it in a printable format. A solid persona includes not just age, gender, and buying habits, but also less-tangible characteristics like experience-level, values, and attitudes.

The key to serving a diverse audience with any product is to actually get to know them and attempt to address their needs. Predicting this information can prove invaluable when it comes to designing an application or product tailored to your personas. If, for example, you know that a significant portion of your target audience is blind or disabled, you can maximize the accessibility of your application or service with careful design that allows your users to function at their peak. This would include strategies such as keeping content simple and organized so screen reading software can be effectual, including captioning options with multimedia portions of your site, allowing keyboard commands as an alternative to mouse-driven content, and enabling your user to control style sheets for maximum readability. If your target audience tends to be under 25, you can consider integrating social networking widgets for a customizable interface, or allowing each user to create a personalized profile for your site. A good user experience is the most obvious benefit of carefully crafting personas before beginning design. At the end of the day, the aim is to create a design for your customers that makes it feel as though it was built specifically for them, regardless of their various backgrounds. Having solid personas up front is key in reaching that goal.

But forget what the textbooks say about consumer profiles. When you create a persona, you should be creating an imaginary friend. Unlike when you were four, this imaginary friend should not be named Bongo or want to tip your milk cup over the kitty cat just to see what she’ll do. No, this imaginary friend should resemble your clients, your ideal clients. You should know this persona well enough to predict how he/she will use your services or products, and they should be an “easy sell” for your idea. Your persona’s motivations and abilities should become second nature to you. You’ll know before it happens that the milk cup is about to be overturned. And if you like, you still can name your persona Bongo.

Many companies struggle with their product development process. Some are constantly pressed for time and behind schedule, trying to balance quality content with tight budgets, and some have trouble keeping up with the desires of their users. One thing almost all companies have in common is the drive to innovate, but the inability to do so consistently. Not every product can be a breakthrough, and often new releases tend to be upgrades to old products instead of radical new products. One way to combat this stagnation is to implement the “lead user” process, where companies employ expert customers to search for breakthrough ideas.

Lead users are more than just early adopters, like those poor folks who bought the iPhone for $600. They are consumers who take existing products and adapt them to suit their own needs. A lead user is someone who cannot be satisfied by existing technology because it does not meet their unique high-level needs. For example, a NASCAR driver like Jeff Gordon might make tweaks and adjustments to his family car, while an expert jeweler may add a special clamp or built-in tool to a standard workbench. Incorporating lead users into your product planning and development cycles allows you to create a product that directly meets the needs and fulfills the desires of your most demanding users.

Several organizations have adopted the lead user process to give their products the best chance at innovation. Evolv, a company that makes rock climbing shoes, brought one of the best-known athletes into their lab to design a shoe from start to finish is one example. Evolv sponsors Chris Sharma, arguably the world’s best rock climber, and they invited him to participate in the creative product development process. Everyone benefits in this situation: Evolv gets an innovative product, customers gain access to a shoe designed by Chris Sharma, and Sharma gets a shoe he designed for his specific needs.

Another example of the lead user process is the growing world of open source software. Open source software packages make the source code available to the public so that creative programmers and developers can write ad-on programs and accessories for the product line. Mozilla is a company that has taken full advantage of this trend, and lead users have taken the source material to new heights with widgets and plug-ins that increase the functionality of their products. Facebook is another innovator in the field of open source software, and their site hosts thousands of applications written by third-party lead users for the benefit of average users.

Using outside experts is a great way to keep the product development process on the cutting edge. Organizations often doubt the willingness of lead users to contribute to product cycles, but most are enthusiastic about sharing their expertise and ideas. It benefits them just as much as it does the average consumer. Talent is talent, no matter what the source. It’s never too early to incorporate the lead user process into your product development group, and this technique, in conjunction with your existing usability techniques, can help you determine whether a new idea is viable, how you should approach your research, and what new users your ideas might be able to reach.

A few weeks ago, Facebook begun a revolutionary advertising system called Beacon, which would collect data about user’s purchases on outside websites and add them to their Facebook profiles, through the news feed/mini feed functions. The original goal for Beacon was, “to build a simple product to let people share information across sites with their friends”
(Facebook blog). The service would tell your friends what movie tickets you purchased on Fandango.com, for example, or which games you added to your queue on Gamefly. The idea struck some users, though, as a distinct invasion of privacy, and for others Beacon was literally the Grinch who stole Christmas. Reportedly, one man’s wife learned of the diamond ring he’d bought her for the holiday from his Facebook mini-feed.

Beacon was meant to be a key part of Facebook’s social advertising strategy, where social networking is a springboard for word-of-mouth advertising. Unfortunately, Beacon did not receive the accolades they expected. Instead, MoveOn.org, a civic action advocacy organization, became involved and accused Facebook of violating user privacy. Users formed a group on Facebook itself called “Petition: Facebook, stop invading my privacy!”, which now has more than 75,000 members. It wouldn’t be surprising if litigators get involved at some point (emotional distress over spoiled gift surprises is a far more valid claim than many of the lawsuits our courts are forced to hear).

All this hoopla and backlash has forced Facebook to apologize and make amends by giving users the option of turning off Beacon. Here’s how to opt-out:

• Click the “Privacy” tab in the upper right hand corner on your Facebook page.
• Select “Edit Setting” under External Websites
• Check the box that says “Don’t allow any websites to send stories to my profile”.

While allowing users to turn off Beacon is a step in the right direction, some users are still critical of Facebook, with one blogger noting that the text “is a very light gray…on a white background. Specifically designed to blend in with the background, once again making it all that more difficult to get out of the damn thing.” For those who choose to opt-in, Facebook added pop-up windows to the system that force users to click “OK” before any action at a third-party website is posted to their profiles/mini-feeds. This allows users to cherry pick which actions they want friends to see and which actions they want to keep private.

Other industry watchdogs claim that turning off Beacon does not mean that Facebook is not still collecting data about your activities from outside websites; it just means that your friends don’t see that data in their news feeds. Those claims are expressly denied by Facebook: “If you select that you don’t want to share some Beacon actions or if you turn off Beacon, then Facebook won’t store those actions even when partners send them to Facebook” (Facebook blog). Those partners, by the way, are mostly keeping mum about the backlash. It’s also surprisingly difficult to find a complete list of which websites are participating, though this blog published a partial list.

It seems that social advertising is not what the public wants, even though it would be enormously beneficial to the advertisers who get a ready-made captive audience. This hiccough is not likely to be the death of systems like Beacon, though. The idea is too juicy to let it die, though I guarantee that similar initiatives will be far less transparent in the future. While “they” (in the Big Brother sense of the word) may have lost this round, our actions on the web will continue to be tracked, shared, and stored. The only question is, will other companies have the guts to admit privacy violations like Facebook did, or will they simply make their efforts invisible to users?

Once upon a time, little more than a decade ago, if you wanted to rent a movie you had to physically visit a video store. You had to drive your gas-guzzling vehicle through rain and snow, busy streets, and crowded parking lots. When you actually arrived at the store, you encountered less-than-enthusiastic employees, little selection, and draconian late fees. You would pay a steep price per movie, and you would have to bring it back again the next day to avoid more fees. If you wanted a specific film, you probably should have called ahead to see if it was available at your local store, because otherwise you’ll end up watching whichever new release is still on the shelf.

Nowadays, the movie fan has many more options that do not involve the negative experiences described above. More and more people are signing up for online rental services like Netflix, which revolutionized the way we watch movies when they begun service in 1999. They are drawn to the convenience, selection, and service that a traditional brick-and-mortar store cannot offer. Netflix spokesperson Steve Swasey points out, “You can rent from wherever you want, whether you’re at home, at work, or at Starbucks.” Best of all, compared with the average video store’s selection of 3,000 to 5,000 titles, Netflix now offers over 90,000 films of every possible genre.

The subscription service works on a very simple model. Members sign up for one of nine different plans, each offering a different number of movies at a time/per month, and each at a different price point. They can then search Netflix’s catalog of films and add them to a personal “queue”. Films will be shipped based on their order in your queue, and you can reorganize the order at any time. Your DVDs arrive in those tell-tale red envelopes which are designed to be your return envelope as well. The business model is smart, efficient, and it filled a real need in the marketplace. In fact, Netflix finds themselves with with 70% of the online movie rental market, with approximately 7 million subscribers. They are still growing rapidly, and they are poised to be very competitive in the $8 billion movie rental industry.

Obviously, as the largest of the traditional video chains, Blockbuster had to step up to the plate. They announced a service to rival Netflix called Total Access, which allowed customers to receive DVDs in the mail and exchange them in the store, all for lower prices. The Total Access service was successful in the short term, and it caused Netflix to drop their prices and add more DVDs to their catalog, but it wasn’t as competitive as they had hoped. It seems that people don’t want to go to the video store, even if it means getting more movies at once, and Netflix’s members seem to be abnormally loyal. This is bad news for Blockbuster, who’s third-quarter results are looking dismal. They have been forced to close hundreds of stores in the past year and cut many jobs to keep their heads above water.

As CNET’s News blog points out, “Blockbuster has been a victim on an online company finding new and inventive ways of bringing a product to a customer.” Why has Netflix been so successful? Why are their customers so loyal? Swasey attributes it to Netflix’s commitment to improving the customer experience: “We continued to invest in content by adding Blu-ray and HD DVD options and improving our user-friendly website. We added price plans so there would be something for everybody.” Indeed, the focus on website customer experience has paid off, as Netflix has been named the #1 rated website for customer satisfaction for five consecutive periods as a result of independent surveys conducted by ForeSee Results.

Netflix cares enough about user experience to offer a $1 million prize to any programmer who can improve their movie recommendation application by 10%. The system allows members to rate movies they’ve seen, then recommends other movies of similar genres, themes, and styles. So far, one team has been awarded a progress prize of $50,000 for their efforts, but the big money is still on the table. Other website improvements are also a priority, with the newly added “drag and drop” queue and the “watch instantly” function which allows users to see films directly in their browsers. In addition to improving the online experience, Netflix recently moved all their customer service to a call center in Oregon, so users can actually talk to a real person if they have a problem with service.

More and more traditional businesses are seeing market share slip away to e-businesses, and their efforts to hold onto customers are not terribly successful. Like Blockbuster, many of these brick-and-mortars compete only with prices without regard to the level of service that consumers want. They undercut not only their online rivals, but also themselves, and their services are not financially sustainable. The best way to compete would be to take an honest look at the user experience, which is something most brick-and-mortars never do. E-businesses and traditional businesses alike could look to market leaders like Netflix for solutions to their customer service shortcomings. In the meantime, I think I’ll take a look at what films await me in my Netflix queue.

Long gone are the days of “counters” at the bottom of a web page, eagerly tallying the number of visitors to a site. Not only are they outdated, but they also don’t accurately indicate the success or failure of a site. After all, it’s possible that half those visitors left your site immediately, blinded by the bold red font on a blue background or annoyed by the pop-up ads. Counters also do not tell you what a visitor did on your site and if they were able to find what you were hoping they would find.

Analytics can help where counters cannot by providing more than just the number of views but also more detailed information which can help you fine-tune your website’s performance and usability. They can tell you where a visitor is located, what pages or buttons on your site are particularly sticky, how long they spend browsing, and at what point they left. Analytics, when done right, also present your data in a format that anyone can understand and interpret, and they give you the feedback you need to make your site usable and successful.

Analytics provides the user with metrics, i.e. measurements, that help determine how visitors are using a site. Metrics include any number of the following:

• where a user is located (based on IP address)
• click path throughout your website/application
• what task they did last
• what type of browser they use
• which page is the most popular
• how each of your pages performed
• how many unique visitors access a site
• how much time a visitor spends on a site
• if a visitor is new or returning
• which areas of a page they clicked on
• which page a visitor “bounced” or left the site from

While all of these metrics can give valuable information about a site, some are obviously more pertinent than others, and this largely depends on the purpose of the website itself. If your site focuses on e-commerce, you’ll want to know how visitors found you (what site they linked from), how they found the item in which they were interested, whether or not they purchased that item, etc. Knowing how your site is used will help you better tailor your website for your customer.

On the other hand, if your website is content based, you’ll be more interested in how long a visitor spends on a page, and how they got to your site in the first place. A website like CNN would use this information to determine what types of stories capture the attention of visitors, and they would cycle the headlines appropriately. A popular blog might form partnerships for sponsored links with other similar blogs, directing traffic to one another. A health care provider might set up an FAQ section when they realize users are leaving their site because they cannot find the information they need. This is how analytics increase the usability of a site. The criteria they measure provides the feedback designers and developers to conduct usability studies. Some analytics services, like Clicktale, record a user’s visit like a movie, allowing you to see exactly where they progressed naturally and where they stumbled or failed to find what they needed. The metrics provided by analytics help determine your level of success in making a usable site.

It use to be that only large web companies with big budgets implemented some form of analytics, because the service was often prohibitively expensive and the data was difficult to understand. All that changed in 2005 when Google released its free tool, aptly named Google Analytics. This created an explosion of websites using analytics to track their website’s visitors. Nowadays, only the tiniest of websites go without metrics. Analytics are not a nice supplement any more, they’re a necessity. Smart website owners will take the information gathered by analytics services and implement the changes implied by this data. For example, if the vast majority of your visitors are coming from Québec, consider a mirror site in French to serve those users. If your visitors always bounce on a particular page, put some serious thought into changing the look or organization of that portion of your site. Analytics are only useful if their “advice” is heeded. For those who use this service correctly, analytics act as an ongoing usability test that allows for constant improvements in the performance of the website, making adjustments in the user experience and ultimately ensuring success.

What are your customers really doing?

Reviewing website metrics is the easiest and most efficient way to see how your customers use your website. In examining this information, website owners can gain a sense of how many people are visiting their website, where the visitors are coming from, where they are entering and exiting, the average number of pages viewed per visit, and other facts that will educate the website owner. These statistics will allow you to better analyze how your customers are using your website including the effectiveness of your marketing efforts.

The goal of website traffic analysis is to assess how well or how poorly your website is working for your visitors. From these statistics you can gain valuable insight around how your customers are using your web applications, and if necessary, make enhancements to improve the overall customer experience.

The following terms are commonly found in most analytic tools:

Hits: There seems to be some confusion regarding the terms used to describe website visitor traffic. We usually hear website owners speak in terms of “hits” to their website. Hits don’t accurately describe the number of visitors viewing the website – they are actually just any sort of HTTP request made to your server. Not only are requests made for website pages, but also for all the images and other files associated with viewing a single page. Therefore, one page view could actually result in dozens of hits. If a single user visits many pages on your website, this visit could generate hundreds or even thousands of hits. This can excite some website owners, but this number is not a reliable indicator of how many people have actually visited the website.

Number of Unique Visitors: The term that website owners want to focus on is the amount of unique impressions that are generated by their website. A unique impression will measure the number of actual people visiting the website based on their IP address, browser, and operating system. No matter how many “hits” a visitor registers on your website, the server will record the session as one unique visit. Thus, the number of unique visits gives us a much better idea of the amount of traffic the website generates. What we want to look for is a trend in the average number of unique visitors. On a day to day basis, there may be a good amount of volatility in the number of unique visitors, but we want to pay attention to the trend of the average number of visitors per month. Optimally, we’d like to have the number increase on a monthly basis.

Entry Page Statistics: From these statistics we can learn which page people are using to enter your website. Most visitors will enter from your home page, but you may notice that up to 50% of your website traffic originates from a page other than your home page. It’s important that your website has an easy-to-use navigation structure to ensure that visitors can find the information they are looking for, even if they don’t enter through your website’s main page.

Bounce Rate: The bounce rate can be defined as the percentage of people who visit your website and immediately leave. Don’t get worried if your bounce rate is high – most websites have a bounce rate of about 50% or so. If the bounce rate is unusually high, you can experiment with your website to try and retain more visitors. Maybe you need more enticing graphics, less text, faster loading pages, or a more engaging design.

Exit Page Statistics: These statistics will show you where people are leaving your website. When you know which page is losing the bulk of your website’s visitors you can experiment with some changes in an attempt to retain more visitors.

Average Time & Page Views Per Visit: Website visitors are very goal-oriented and task-driven. Upon visiting your website, most visitors will merely scan the page to quickly determine whether or not it contains the information they are searching for. By analyzing the average amount of time spent on your website and the average number of page views per visit, you can determine how engaging your website’s content is. The key to retaining visitors and increasing the number of page views is to have relevant and interesting information on your website. Remember – content is key!

Top Referring URLs: This statistic lets you know where the bulk of your website’s traffic is coming from. This is important if you’re pursuing a website marketing campaign or search engine optimization campaign because you can easily judge the campaign’s effectiveness by looking to see how many visitors each marketing method is generating.

Top Search Words & Phrases: This information will let you know which keywords and phrases visitors are searching for in Google and the other search engines in order to find your website. With this information you can gauge the effectiveness of a search engine optimization campaign, or get an idea of how your website’s keyword density should be altered to position it for the keywords and phrases that you’re targeting.

Country of Origin: If your product or service has global appeal then knowing where your customer comes from globally is important to you. For instance, if you own a retail store that caters to the European Union and you notice that 90% of your website traffic is coming from the U.S., then it can easily be determined that you need to rethink your online marketing strategy.

Companies who do not measure the customer experience of their website or applications are at a disadvantage because there are so many businesses out there that do and those companies are capitalizing on what they have learned. There are several free and easy-to-use applications such as Google Analytics, which allows businesses to measure their success in metrics. For more advanced applications or richer measurements Gomez is a better choice.

Paying attention to user needs and analyzing how your customers are using your website will ensure that your web applications are easy to use and will increase the chances that your customers will want to come back again and again.

Most of us are familiar with the provisions businesses make to accommodate employees and customers with disabilities; wheelchair ramps, accessible restrooms, and Braille products are just a few examples. However, many of us have never considered how someone with a visual disability would be able check their email, conduct a Google search, or find directions on Mapquest. Freedom Scientific offers a solution with JAWS (Job Access With Speech) screen reader, which allows users with blindness or low-vision to output the content of the web page to a speech synthesizer. JAWS can read content in a variety of languages, and it will also output refreshable Braille displays, making it one of the most popular accessibility tools. Other leading applications include Window-Eyes, compatible with all Windows 9x and ME versions, and Hal from Dolphin Computer Access.

More and more businesses and web designers are taking accessibility into account due to the recent guidelines requiring all U.S. federal web sites to be accessible to the disabled. Careful web design can maximize the accessibility of your web page and allow screen readers to function at their peak. Some usability checkpoints to consider include:

• keyboard equivalents for mouse-driven commands
• captioned audio portions of multimedia files
• clear and simple language and images
• synchronization of visual, speech, and Braille display
• user control of style sheets (i.e., for color-blindness)

The U.S. government’s Access Board guidelines for web accessibility can be found by visiting http://www.access-board.gov/sec508/guide/1194.22.htm.

Even users without visual impairments or other disabilities may soon benefit from screen reading applications. Think about the commuter who wants to check email while driving, for example. A program like JAWS would enable a user to access the web without the distraction of handling a PDA or physically reading a computer screen. Voice recognition software could be integrated into car computer systems, allowing a user to “search” Google maps for a nearby restaurant while keep their hands and focus on the wheel. While traveling to a meeting, the organizer could review his/her PowerPoint presentation one last time, and hearing it spoken, may find ways to improve it. The possibilities are exciting, and they are closer to implementation than you might think.

Psychologists and human behavior specialists are the envy of the web design world: they have the knowledge and tools to determine what people look at, do, and like about almost anything. As early as the 1870s, behavioral psychologists were tracking eye movements when reading, discovering on which words the eye stops and why. They discovered that eye movements directly correspond to thought process, meaning that we look at things which interest or engage us. It is the mystery of what stops our eyes that web designers are trying to solve, and how this relates to where we click. Many businesses are turning to tracking hardware and software packages to help reveal the motivation behind their website’s visitors.

One such company, Seeing Machines offers faceLAB 4, an integrated hardware system complete with analytical tool Gazetracker, which helps interpret the data you collect. Gazetracker comes with a webpage analysis mode for clients focused especially on usability. faceLAB 4 operates on many different levels, tracking not only eye movements, but also mouse and keystrokes, scrolling, and even pupil dilation.

Recent web-focused reading studies have shown that eye movement differs when reading web pages compared to printed materials. We read more quickly, scanning the page instead of reading word for word, and our eyes gravitate towards color, lists, and we take in content in an F-shaped pattern (see http://www.useit.com/alertbox/reading_pattern.html for more details). Because so few web surfers actually read websites, other eye-tracking software packages focus on clicks and navigation rather than physical eye movements.

Clickdensity provides users with heat maps of their web activity, literally showing hot spots that were of greatest interest to visitors. Crazy Egg also uses heat maps to record clicks, but offers a more comprehensive product called Confetti, which can provide data on the types of users who visit certain areas of your site. Clicktale actually records visitor’s actions like movie and allows you to replay their every move. Most of these packages are priced by subscription, costing less than $100 per month.

While everyday eye tracking is not necessary in every situation, it is invaluable to gain an understanding of how your user is viewing and consuming your website. You will be amazed at how the color of a box or the density of a paragraph can change the way your user interacts with your site. Is one particular graphic or Flash animation clicked on more than another because it’s colorful, informative, in the top corner of the page? These seemingly insignificant details can throw off the balance of your page, causing users to overlook important features. Some form of eye/click tracking can highlight and help you solve these problems.

This process also helps reach that magical combination of social science research and web usability. Social scientists ask the “why” questions of human behavior, not just the “what” questions. In using eye tracking technology, web designers are prompted to do the same; heat maps and movies answer the “what” questions for us, and we are one step closer to determining why one particular part of the site is stickier than another. These are the questions that eye tracking software pushes us to answer, and if we take that extra step, our web designs to become truly user-centered.