In this report I examine the usability of my personal portfolio Web site, www.chrisbayne.com, through a usability test of my own design. I asked three participants to complete three separate usability tasks on my site. After the participants completed the tasks, I asked them to complete a four-question survey about their experience using my site. Overall, users reported that my site is easy to use and predictably organized. They also reported that my site did not create a distracting Web environment.

Many Web sites, especially personal portfolio sites, are not created with their audience in mind. Authors typically place their work online without considering how their audience will try to access, read, and think about the information. I have tried to accomplish the opposite with my Web site. I began planning my site by considering the information my audience expects to find on my Web site, how they expect to find that information, and how Web users in general read on the Web.

With this usability test I aim to examine whether or not my Web site is usable by my target audience. Specifically, I want to find out if my site is easy to navigate and predictably organized.

chrisbayne.com is my personal portfolio Web site that I created for ENGL 4814: Writing and Designing for the World Wide Web. This usability test evaluates my site’s navigation menu and content organization.

My intended audience of this Web site is prospective employers and admission committees at post-graduate institutions. I predict that this audience will be accessing my site from a personal computer, not a hand-held device, so I designed my site for a minimum screen resolution of 800 x 600 pixels. Finally, my site loads in all three major browsers (Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, and Macintosh Safari) with minor discrepancies.

I have four objectives for this usability test:

• Evaluate the usability of my site's navigation menu
• Evaluate the predictability of my site's content organization
• Determine if my site's use of graphics creates a distracting Web environment
• Evaluate my site’s overall ease of use (i.e., does the site leave users relaxed or frustrated)

This usability test asks participants to complete three usability tasks consistent with the goals of my audience. For example, prospective employers that visit my site want examples of my previous work and my contact information. Usability participants will interact with my site’s navigation menu and content organization to find such information. I focused this usability test on the accessibility of items in my portfolio and my contact information because I believe they are essential to my audience. This usability test does not examine accessing my resume since my audience will not always need this information from the Web: prospective employers probably care more about what I can make for them and admissions committees will already have a paper copy of my resume in my application.

This usability test is a combination of a classic usability test design and a contextual interview. Participants performed a series of three tasks on my site while I was watching. After they performed the tasks, I asked them to provide feedback on my Web site design through a four-question survey.

Participants
Three participants completed my usability test: an assistant professor in English Department, a graduate student in the Student Life Office, and an undergraduate student studying in the Communications Department. I tested the professor and graduate student specifically because I believe out of the university population they most resemble future employers. I asked the undergraduate to participate since her knowledge of the Web and graphic design would serve as a way to catch problems that neither of the other participants would notice.

Tasks
My usability test asked participants to perform three tasks on my Web site:

1. Find an example of a business card I have made for another company
2. Find my email address
3. Find my favorite place to eat lunch in Blacksburg (for an interview over lunch)

See Appendix A to view the actual usability tasks on my Usability Testing Web page.

I also asked participants to complete a four-question survey about their browsing experience on my Web site. See Appendix B for an actual copy of this survey.

Participant Computing Environment
Participants completed my usability test in their own office or home. I asked them to use their own computer and favorite Web browser. I wanted users to feel comfortable browsing my Web site. By allowing participants to use their own computing environment I hoped to gain a sense of popular Web browsers and computer settings.

Test Administration Tools
I did not use any specific usability software to test my Web site. I did, however, create a Web page for the testing procedure. The Web page introduces participants to my testing goals, the testing procedure, and the specific usability tasks.

See Appendix A to view my Usability Testing Web page.

Procedure
First I asked participants to visit my Usability Testing Web page, www.chrisbayne.com/usability/ to begin the test. Once participants’ Web browsers loaded the Usability Testing Web page, I asked to read the brief description of the usability test and my testing goals. Then, the site asks participants to complete the three usability tasks by following a six-step procedure:

1. Complete each usability task in order, beginning with Usability Task 1
2. Read each usability task description
3. Click the link to my Web site at the end of each usability task description to open my site in a new Web browser window
4. Complete the usability task to the best of your ability
5. Close all Web browser windows except this window (should you accidentally close this window, please reopen it by accessing www.chrisbayne.com/usability/)
6. Move to the next usability task

When users completed the third usability task and returned to the Usability Testing Web page, the page askes participants to follow a link to my four-question survey examining their experience on my Web site. See Appendix B for an actual copy of this survey.

Participant General Instructions
See Appendix A to read participants' general instructions on my Usability Testing Web page.

Participant Task Instructions
See Appendix A to read participants' task instructions on my Usability Testing Web page.

Participant Computing Environment
The assistant professor and graduate student both used the Microsoft Internet Explorer. The undergraduate student used Mozilla Firefox. All of the participants browsed my Web site in full-screen mode with a screen resolution greater than 800 x 600 pixels, so participants never had difficulty viewing my site.

Participant Completion of Usability Task 1
All three participants quickly and successfully completed Usability Task 1 with only one combined error. The graduate student first looked for an example business card under the “Art” section of my Web site. She corrected her mistake by accessing the “Professional Writing Portfolio” section almost immediately.

See Appendix C for videos of participants completing Usability Task 1.

Participant Completion of Usability Task 2
All three participants quickly and successfully completed Usability Task 2 without errors.

See Appendix C for videos of participants completing Usability Task 2.

Participant Completion of Usability Task 3
All three participants quickly and successfully completed Usability Task 3 with only one combined error. The graduate student first looked for my favorite restaurant to eat lunch in Blacksburg under the “Resume” section of my Web site. She skipped straight to the “About me” section without browsing the entire “Resume” section.”

See Appendix C for videos of participants completing Usability Task 3.

Participant Completion of Survey
All three participants took the usability survey after completing the three usability tasks. The participants unanimously agreed that my Web site’s navigation menu was “predictable,” that the Web site’s content design was “Not distracting at all,” and that their experience using my Web site was “Not frustrating at all.”

Judging by the high success rate for all three usability tasks, I believe my Web site’s navigation menu and content organization create a highly-usable Web site. Participants reported that the Web site layout did not distract them at all and that they did not become frustrated while attempting to perform the usability tasks.

I suspect the two errors that the graduate student performed were simply a matter of clicking the first item she saw rather than incorrectly judging the division of the navigation menu. She realized her mistakes quickly, before she even had time to skim through the incorrect section, and navigated to the correct section. I support this assumption with results form my survey that indicate all three participants found the navigation menu predictable.

Overall, the participants easily navigated my Web site’s menu, quickly completed the usability tasks, and reported that my Web site was predictable and not frustrating to use. Participants found my Web site so easy to navigate, in fact, that I do not believe I need to make any serious modifications to the design or content organization.

I would like to find a way to better indicate the content each section on my Web site contains, however. I used anchor links near the top of each page to help users judge if a section contains their desired information. It seems the graduate student participant may not have seen this secondary menu. If I can find a way to make it more visible, perhaps I could reduce the severity of user mistakes, even if they are not frequent.

APPENDIX A: Usability Test Web site

APPENDIX B: Usability survey

APPENDIX C: Participant videos