User Testing Round 03

The goal for the third round of user testing was to see if the users better understood the redesign based on the changes that I made from the previous user test, while also seeing what more I could do at this point to improve the user experience.

Scenarios

1. You have been thinking about applying to Yale School of Art for a while and are ready to apply. Start your application for Yale School of Art.
2. You want to subscribe to the monthly emails from Yale School of Art. Find and subscribe to the monthly email subscription.
3. You are curious about the history of Yale School of Art. Find out more about Yale School of Art’s history.

User 01

• The user quickly found the ‘Apply’ button in the top right corner and noticed the ‘Donate’ button beside it.
• The user scrolled down the homepage and clicked on news to find the monthly email subscription. They went back when they couldn’t find it on that page and went down to publications. On the publications page, they scrolled down and found the ‘subscribe’ button.
• The user almost clicked on the ‘Visitors’ tab, but then decided to scroll down the homepage. They stared at the ‘About the School’ link, then clicked on it. There they scrolled down then saw the history section.

User 02

• The user hovered over the ‘Students’ nav link for a moment, but before they clicked they saw the ‘Apply’ button and said they’d click there instead.
• The user said they were deciding between clicking on the ‘News’ section or the ‘Publication’ section, but thought that once the body copy was added they’re decision would be easier to make. They clicked on the ‘Publication’ section and scrolled past the ‘News from New Haven’ section, but came back once they saw ‘View Past Emails’ because they weren’t sure that was the name of the email subscription.
• To find the history of Yale School of Art, the user went to the ‘Alumni Page’, then said they would click on ‘Alumni Resources’.

User 03

• The user quickly found the ‘Apply’ button and clicked it.
• The user scrolled down the entire homepage and looked through all the navigation links and could not figure out where they would go next and gave up.
• The user scrolled all the way down the homepage and quickly found the ‘About the School’ link. They then scrolled down that page and found the history section.

My biggest takeaway from this round of user testing was that the placement for the monthly newsletter subscriptions was not in the best place for users to easily find. I learned that I should instead use a newsletter subscription banner to make it more easily accessible.