A structured UX Audit, utilizing methods like heuristic evaluation, analytics review, competitive analysis, stakeholder and user interviews, can identify pain points, provide actionable recommendations, and lead to enhanced business conversions and customer satisfaction.

BootStrapDash is an online marketplace for digital products like admin dashboards and bootstrap templates. Their team was concerned about the drop in sales over the quarters. AufaitUX offered to conduct a 5-day audit to evaluate the causes, and after implementing the recommendations, and a month later, sales have increased 100%, of which we believe UX Audit had a significant contribution.

The key is to provide an effective, efficient, and satisfying experience to your customers. In addition, our online interactions are constantly subjected to change in response to evolving digital trends.

A UX Audit follows a structured and strategic approach to identifying the pain points a digital product or service experiences in achieving target conversions and suggesting actionable recommendations based on evidence.

UX Audit Methods

There are different approaches to an Audit in the digital space, and you can use a combination of them based on your requirements.

Heuristic Evaluation

Its a popular qualitative method that uses a set of heuristics (rules-of-thumb) to cross-check the functionality and ease of access in navigating a website or app. You can create your own heuristics to customize your audit. Check out Jakob Nielsen's list of 10 usability heuristics for a commonly used list of heuristics. 

Analytics Review

Analytics can give you quantitative insight into how the users interact with your website or app. It can tell you the number of people that visit your site, the pages they interact with, the time they spend per page, and more.

Competitive Analysis

If you know who is leading in your industry, you can take inspiration from their approach to serving the customers. Then, do a comparison study to list the possible styles and methods you can test to improve your product's usability. 

Sales Figures

Your sales data can tell you about the nature of your clients and the projects you undertake.

Stakeholder Interviews

One-on-one interviews with your organization's stakeholders can give you insights into the values you intend to provide to your customers and their expectations on conversation types and goals. 

User Interviews

On the other side of the service, you have customers interacting on your site or app with certain goals. User interviews will tell you their experience and expectations from the service. Combining this with stakeholder interviews can generate valuable recommendations to improve customer interactions on your site or app.

These methods are also followed strictly in the UI UX design process and can be combined to form ideas on what is slowing down your conversions. The quality of recommendations will vary based on the effective use of these tools and your lateral thinking & reasoning skills.

The Process 

Step 1 - Prepare:

To start with an audit, you need to define your limits.

  • Goals – What are your expectations from the audit (conversions, ROI, etc.)
  • Time Limit – An audit can be a few days longer to a few months long. Deciding on a time limit will help to better plan the audit process.
  • Resources – How much workforce or money you are willing to dedicate to the audit.
  • ToolsSpreadsheets can accommodate most of your data collection needs. To save time during analysis, you can use specialized tools like Kissmetrics or UberSuggest.
  • Methods – Decide which methods will provide the best outcomes for your goals.

Step 2 – Evaluate

Conduct the evaluation:

  • Prepare documents/spreadsheets for your evaluation methods with action items and necessary tables to record data.
  • Assign evaluators to assess and evaluation managers to compile the assessed data.
  • Conduct the evaluation.
  • After evaluation, group the data into specific issues they address and prioritize them in order of severity. More evaluators mentioning an issue will increase its severity score for heuristic evaluation.

Step 3 - Analyze

From the results, pick out insights based on:

  • Relevance – Keeping the objectives of the stakeholders and customers.
  • Value Proposition – Offering better usability value than before.
  • Usability – Focusing on improving efficiency, effectiveness, and satisfaction.
  • Action – Recommendations should be practical and feasible to implement.

Step 4 – Create a Report

An audit report is the final product of the UX Audit process. A report can include:

  • A brief introduction on the purpose of the audit. 
  • Scope of the audit, including goals, resources, and methods.
  • Recorded metrics with sources.
  • Problem list with severity ratings.
  • Recommendations based on evidence.
  • Screenshots of the pages with relevant areas marked.
  • Strengths or positive findings.

Finally, you get a structured report with a prioritized list of recommendations. The suggested changes are implemented directly or by using A/B testing

Conclusion

By following a structured procedure and having great knowledge of standard design practices and design trends in the industry, a quality report can be produced. The benefits include increased business conversions, improved service quality and overall customer satisfaction. UX Audits must be conducted at least once a year to keep up with the usability trends in the ever-changing industry.AufaitUX is a UX agency focusing on delivering high-quality designs for digital products and services. Clutch named AufaitUX a Top Creative and Design Agency in India. If you are interested to know more about our UX Audit Services, click here.

Basil

Basil, a UX Analyst at Aufait UX, is known for his passion for research and analysis. His in-depth knowledge and expertise in the field are reflected in his informative and engaging writings, which provide readers with valuable insights and perspectives on UX design. Connect with Basil via www.linkedin.com/in/basil-m

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