Usuability test on an ecommerce boots company

1. Justin Quick
Professor Lamer
Intro to Web Publishing
26 October 2017
Usability Test for MuckBootCompany.com
TestPreparation
Before conducted the usability tests, I started by first taking the test myself and running
though all of the tasks. I started by setting the environment for my normal shopping experience.
In order to accurately conduct the tasks the most natural environment needed to be set up. I
performed the tasks in my room while listening to music and conducted the test. As I went
through the tasks I found that my knowledge of the website made the tasks more simple than it
would be if the website were unfamiliar to me. To complete the first task my first step was to go
to the shop all section under the men’s drop down menu. Once on the products page I selected
the filter of price to be a range of $100-150.After this, I filtered the results from low too high in
terms of price. The final step I did before
counting the number of boots that met the
$140 was to view all the products on the
page instead of spreading them out over
two pages. After doing all this, I
determined that there are six options for
me to choose from.

2. From these six options the only way I found to tell if the boots were steal toe was to
select each boot individually. Doing this I was unable to find any steel toe options out of the six
in my price range. Once I found this out I did a site search for steel toe and used the filters to
find the men’s under $150 shoes. There was one option that fit the price range, but the shoe was
not labeled as steel toe. The description says the shoe has a steel shank in it. The steel shank is
not a steel toe, but this was the closest I could find so I used this in the next tasks. The issue of
not finding the steel toe labeled on the boots hindered my ability to find them.
Finding the shipping went a little smoother than the steel toe task. Going through the
checkout process listed out the shipping options and the three-day shipping option was the only
option that would get the boots in on time and stay in budget.
The last task quickly followed the third one. Once I selected the shipping method
and entered the require information, the final review screen showed the final price. The tax is
included during this screen adding
another amount to the total that is
unaccounted for before this screen.
All together, the boot total came out
to $139.86. Squeaking just under
the $140 budget. Adding the tax
during the last stage of the process
is due to finding the postal code and

3. state the screen before. This added tax may turn some consumers away because they are
expecting to just have to pay for the boots and the shipping and not having to factor in the taxes.
Overall as a consumer, I found the website to be relatively easy to navigate as an
experienced web user. The difficulties some may have fulfilling these and other tasks are the
insufficient amount of filters and the unorganized categories.
Choosing Participants
Tester 1: Jake Burgess
Jake is a 22 year old senior at Northwest. He is full-time student, while having a part-
time position with the proctoring center in the B.D. Owens library. He lives in Tower Suites east
with three other roommates. Most of Jake’s days are spent going to classes, working on
assignments, going to work, scrolling through social media and relaxing watching Netflix or
listening to music. He has experience with the web, but is not an expert in terms of mastering
everything. Jake frequently visits ecommerce sites such as Amazon. Most of the shopping he
does is through Amazon or in person, being familiar with ecommerce sites made Jake an
appropriate tester for MuckBootsCompany.com.
The split in which Jake uses the internet is mainly split into school/work time and social
time. Between these two categories he said that he spends roughly 65 percent of his time online
for work or school related reasons. While he spend the other 35 percent browsing social media
apps/webpages or scrolling through Amazon.
Environment for Tester 1:

4.  Location of test: Most of the school and work hours Jake spends on the internet
is at his work space, but the social and ecommerce time is spent mainly in his
room. This is where we conducted the test. In order to simulated the common
shopping experience for him this was the most logical place to set up the test.
 Physical Environment: The hours that Jake spends in his room on the internet
has a specific environment to it. In order to get the closest to unaltered behaviors
or reactions, this environment was recreated. He laid on his bed while taking the
tests, with the window open and the lights on. He relaxed for a few minutes
before taking the tests in order to clear his thoughts from the day. This is the
normal behavior for Jake and this is what was duplicated.
 Technical Environment: The technological set up was the easiest to accomplish.
Jake lives on campus and uses the campus Wi-Fi connection to browse through
his University provided HP laptop. This is the exact same scenario that was
created during the tests. This way the factors outside of the website where the
exact same as his normal shopping routine. There were no non-factor settings on
the browser, Google Chrome. All of these factors are the same as when Jake sits
down to scroll through Facebook or buy a book from Amazon.
Tester 2: Tamla Hackler
Tamla Hackler is a 50 year old woman who lives in Oak Grove, Missouri with her oldest son and
his girlfriend. They have many pets and the girlfriend’s son lives in the house with them. She is

5. currently unemployed due to medical issues and has never seen or heard of the Muck Boot
Company before this test.
Tamla has a very small experience with the internet and making ecommerce purchases.
This provides a different view than mine or Jake’s. It is important to see both sides of the
spectrum when analyzing the effectiveness of MuckBootsCompany.com.
Tamla’s typical day consists of watching TV waiting for her son and his girlfriend
to get home from work and then possibly doing something with them. She rarely uses the
internet, but when she does it is usually on social media. She steadily uses Facebook and would
say that 90 percent of her internet time is spent their or on social media.
Environment for Tester 2
 Location for test: most of Tamla’s time is spent in the house. This was the
obvious choice to administer the tests. The test was specifically conducted in the
living room with her sitting on the couch and the laptop on the coffee table. The
house is in the city limits of Oak Grove and is where she has stayed for more than
a year.
 Physical Environment: the physical environment may have been the most
distracting between her, Jake and me. The animals acted as extra distractions with
four dogs in the house and a squirrel in a cage adding to the noise. While me and
her were the only ones in the house the animals made it difficult to focus on the

6. task at hand. Another big distraction was the musty odor floating in the air. The
smell of old cigarettes caused the test to be moved from the couch to the chair.
 Technological Environment: Tamla had a relatively normal laptop, she owned a
HP. The laptop was connected to an Xfinity Wi-Fi that ran from a small router
near the wall. Once again the main search engine used was google chrome with
out the additional add-ons. The laptop seemed to be running without a hitch and
the test went on.
TestResults
Initial Site Thoughts
Both Jake and Tamla had never been to MuckBootsCompany.com before. When Jake
first loaded the website, the slideshow in the center of the screen was what first caught his
attention. He then goes on to say that the homepage looks a little congested with all of the
categories and so many pictures. Another thing that really caught Jake’s attention was the
categories up top in the drop down menus. These categories really helped him to know where to
go as the test went on and he constantly kept refereeing back to the drop down menu no matter
what page he was on.

7. Tamla on the other hand thought the images on the homepage took up too much space
and could be reduced. She said it was annoying to have to scroll down so far to see the different
categories and that those are something that they should have had higher on the page. At first she
did not realize the drop down menu was a drop down. She ignored the menu up top, because she
thought they were just promotions of what kinds of boots they sell. The biggest thing that stood
out to Tamla was the
photo gallery. She
thought this was a really
neat way to show off
the boots actually being
worn by people, instead of just a still frame of the boots.
Both Jake and Tamla said the overall impression of the homepage was that it was just a
little cluttered and could be reorganized or reduced in some way. Jake suggested since the best
for drop down menu has the categories
listed to just remove those six blocks to
free up space. While Tamla believed the
best way to fix the issue was to reduce
the image sizes on the page adding
much more space to the page.

8. Task 1/Scenario: You have just volunteered to spend a week in Louisiana helping hurricane
victims clean their homes and businesses. You need a pair of sturdy, waterproof boots within a
week and your budget is $140 total.
Determine how many boot options are less than $140.
Summary for Both Testers:
Jake Tamla Average
Average Satisfaction 4.5 4 4.25
Both Tamla and Jake follow similar paths to accomplish this first task. Jake wen to the
men’s section of the drop down menu and looked for the categories that would fit the
description. Tamla on the other hand went to the women’s section and selected shop all boots.
Since she selected the shop all option she got to the products screen much quicker than Jake did.
Jake went to the rain boots section, the work boots section and the outdoor boots section in order
to find his matches. Both of them used the price filter immediately upon entering the products
page. Jake took about ten minutes to complete this task while Tamla finished in about three
minutes. This is largely due to Jake not selecting the shop all category. By selecting this
category instead of one specific category Tamla was able to filter all the boots by price and
search for the waterproof ones.
Tamla finished seeing eleven boots that she saw as fitting the description. Jake on the
other hand searched through three categories and only found six boots that fit the limitations. Not

9. clicking on the shop all option may have caused him to miss some options that were available to
him.
Highlights
1. The biggest problem that faces both Jake and Tamla was the uncertainty of the sales
tax and the shipping costs. There were many times both Jake and Tamla said, “This
one is in range, but it may not be after shipping costs I do not know yet. “ This was
an issue on at least three or four boots for them both.
2. A problem that was presented on a smaller level was that they did not know for sure
which boots were waterproof until they clicked into the single product page. This
frustrated Jake in particular who though that this was something that added
unnecessary time to the shopping experience.
3. The last and smallest issue faced was that some of the categories were too closely
related to determine what to use. This problem relates to Jake completing the task. He
questioned many times if outdoors versus hunting would work better. This is a
relatively small issue and could be related to the tester over evaluating the situation.
Alignment to Heuristic: Visibility and system status
While the system does keep you knowledgeable about what is happening at all times the
visibility of the shipping and sales tax causes issues. Having a set budget added to the crucial
nature of knowing exactly what they could spend and how much the base cost of the boot could
be in order to maintain this budget.

10. Task 2: You have just been advised that you will need steel-toe contracted boots. Of the options
you have found, which offer steel-toe construction?
Summary for Both Testers:
Jake Tamla Average
Average Satisfaction 3 2 2.5
Jake and Tamla went in finding steel-toe boots in different ways. Jake visited each
individual product page for his options. Tamla just looked at the boots and made a guess as to
which one had steel-toes based on her knowledge of steel-toed shoes. Jakes approach was much
more successful and lead to him finding a single option out of his original that had steel-toes.
Tamla however did not see any options even though two of the boots she picked out did contain
steel-toes.
Highlights
1. The largest and most abundance problem faced in this task was that there was no
clear way to see if the boot was steel-toed other than reading the description.
Nowhere on the product pages or the individual product page does it list the steel-toed
nature of the boots, except for the description. The description is almost hidden in the
product page.
2. The other problem faced during this task was how hidden the search bar is. Both Jake
and Tamla stated that they should have and would have used the search bar for this

11. task if they noticed where it was. The small magnifying glass blends in with the rest
of the design and does not stick out to draw attention.
Alignment to Heuristic: Flexibility and efficiency of use
The added feature of putting a small steel-toe or waterproof icon to show the features of
the boots would help to increase the efficiency that a consumer searchers through and
finds the products they are looking for. This will drastically reduce the time sent
searching for a specific characteristic and help with user frustration.
Task 3: Assume/pretend that it is Tuesday at 3:30 p.m. and your flight leaves at 6:00a.m.
Monday morning. Determine the cheapest shipping option to receive the boots on time,
and determine the associated cost.
Summary for Both Testers:
Jake Tamla Average
Average Satisfaction 4 2 3
When I asked both Jake and Tamla to complete this task, Jake went straight to the
boot he thought would be okay with shipping included and picked that one. Tamla picked a boot
that would not work with the shipping included and had to go back and pick a new one once she
got to the checkout screen. This frustrated her and she wondered why they would not include the
shipping in any screen before this.
Once she found a new boot that would work with the shipping, the both selected the
three day shipping in order to receive them before Monday. Both wanted to pick the ground
shipping that was free, but were uncertain about the time for the shipping.

12. Highlights
1. The biggest issue with this task was the unknown time of the ground shipping.
Both Jake and Tamla seemed upset and voiced their frustration about not knowing
how long the ground shipping would take. Both also said that this was the best
shipping option as it was free but with the uncertain time frame they could not
pick it.
2. Another smaller issue was that Tamla had to go all the way back through the
earlier steps, due to the unknown shipping costs. Whenever she first got to the
checkout page she chose boots that were $129.99 giving her about a $10 buffer.
With the three day shipping being $13 she was forced to go back and find another
pair of boots by going through the steps of finding those under $140 and with
steel-toe again. This frustrated her quite a bit.
3. The least prevalent issue was with Jake, he had a small issue with navigating the
checkout screen. He did say that when he left the checkout screen to double check
the boots, the checkout screen saved the information he put in. This was one of
features that he really enjoyed.
Alignment to Heuristic: Visibility and system status
This heuristic connects with the largest issue in the task of not having access to the
shipping information and price until after they chose their boots. The added price at the end of
the checkout screen would turn some people away from buying. Having this information when

13. the selection of boots is made would help to reduce this issue and give the consumers more
information.
Test 4: Choose the best boot option and determine the total order amount, including
shipping.
Jake Tamla Average
Average Satisfaction 4 3 3.5
Both Jake and Tamla went through the steps of the checkout to find their total prices.
Jake ended with a price of $139.89, while Tamla finished with a price of $128.79. Both were
able to navigate through the checkout screen with relative ease. Jake selected the three day
shipping and easily spotted the final price on the final checkout screen. Tamla was able to do the
same and found the overall price within a few seconds of the page loading.
Neither one really had much to say about the final screen. The only comments were
that is was very typical of their shopping experience. The filling out of the information and then
the final review and payment screen were very common to them and they worked throught them
cleanly.
Highlights
1. During this task the only issue really observed was the missing information in the
shipping boxes. Jake missed his email address, while Tamla missed the second
line of her address. This is most likely due both of them quickly glancing over the
information to see what they need to fill out. Both left boxes that were not marked
as mandatory unfilled.

14. Alignment of Heuristics: error prevention
The error prevention in this case is the marking of the required fields. Even though
they both missed one section, a message clearly state which section they missed and
allowed them to retain their other information and just add what was needed.
Final Site Thoughts
When Jake and Tamla were finished with the tasks, they expressed different view of
the website as a whole. Jake found the website to be very general in terms of an ecommerce
website. He said nothing really blew him away compared to the places he normally shops online.
The one thing he said that he really enjoyed was the keeping of information in the shipping fields
when he left the screen and came back. He overall rated the website as a four. Tamla was not so
impressed by her tests. She was not happy with the lack of filters and the difficulty in finding the
steel-toe boots. She said that the few times she does shop online have been much easier than her
time on MuckBootsCompany.com. She rated her overall experience as a 2 and said she would
probably go somewhere else if she needed boots.
Recommendations to improve user experience
Single problem being fixed:
The major issue that needs to be fixed from theses tests is the filters and the ability to
find the steel-toes. Right now there are a total of three generic filters, the price, size and gender.
This does not provide the user options to match exactly what they are looking for. This is the
issue that I will be attempting to mend.

15. Alignment to Heuristic: Flexibility and efficiency of use
The more useful filters the visitor has at their disposal the quicker and more efficient
they will be able to complete their goal or tasks. This allows for quicker access to what the users
want and not as much frustration searching for 15, 20 or even 30 minutes, trying to find a single
pair of boots.
Problem Improvement:
Before:
After:

16. Changes:
The changes I made were small but I believe they have a major impact in user
experience. To start with, the filters in the products page need a more diverse category field. To
resolve this I have added two new fields. Both will operate just the same as the other filters but
will narrow the search by style of boot and material of the boot. Muck Boot Company has
different materials that they use to make their boots. They have leather, rubber and fleece
materials in their boots. This would help a visitor not only find the type of boot they want but
know what kind of boot to look for to best fulfill their goal. These would be the three filters able
to apply.
The second filter I added was the style filter. The style of the boots would be listed as
high cut, mid cut, low cut, ankle cut and steel-toe. This filter would allow the customer to find
whatever style of boot they are specifically looking for, or they could select multiple filters to
compare two different styles. This would also help eliminate the confusion on the steel-toe issue
both Jake and Tamla faced.
The final change I made to help improve this issue was to add a characteristic section
underneath the boots in the product pages. The characteristic would consist of waterproof, steel-
toe, fleece and air mesh. These symbols would be in a small circular image underneath the boot
and would allow customers to browse for specific characteristics without having to go in and out
of individual product pages.

17. These changes would benefit both the experienced and inexperienced visitor. The
filters would give the experienced user who have knowledge in how to use them a benefit of not
having to scan through hundreds of boot options just to find the few they are looking for. The
characteristics underneath the boots would let the inexperienced user who does not use the filters
know a little more about the boots and help them to find what specifically they are looking for
more efficiently than clicking on every product.