Understanding users . . . Improving technology . . . Enhancing organizational outcomes . . .

Background

  • Gugerty Usability Services provides a full range of services for increasing the usability of software and hardware interfaces. We can provide design reviews, usability tests, task analyses and interface design ideas that will increase the usability and effectiveness of your software or hardware product.
  • Our employees have up to 20 years of experience in usability research and consulting. We are located in the Greenville, SC area near Atlanta, GA, Charlotte, NC and Columbia, SC, and can provide services anywhere in the US.

Clients

  • Microsoft, Philips Medical Corporation, NASA, US Air Force, Clemson University

Why you need to explicitly design for usability

  • Poor usability can reduce safety, productivity and profits
    • Medical example - Computerized physician entry of medication orders increased some types of medication errors due to poor interface design (Koppel et al., 2005, Journal of the American Medical Association)
    • Web example - Poor design of online job application sites led 42% of job-seekers to completely fail in submitting an application, while 32% applied for the wrong job or had to submit a paper application (creativegood.com)
  • Designing for usability can increase safety, productivity and profits
    • By identifying and fixing user problems early in the product development cycle, usability techniques can reduce development costs, speed up development schedules, and reduce the need for end-user training
      Usability techniques "are quite effective at detecting usability problems early in the development cycle, when they are easiest and least costly to fix. By correcting usability problems in the design phase, American Airlines reduced the cost of those fixes by 60-90%." (Bias & Mayhew, Cost Justifying Usability)
    • Usability techniques can increase the effectiveness of web sites and increase the productivity of workers using software applications
      "After move.com completed the redesign of the home 'search' and 'contact an agent' features based on a [usability] consulting firm's recommendations, users ability to find a home increased from 62% to 98%, sales lead generation to real estate agents increased over 150%, and [move.com’s] ability to sell advertising space on move.com improved significantly.” (Vividence Report cited by Bevan in Cost Justifying Usability)

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