Usability and Communications

As with any organisation, your website represents a key, and often first, point of contact with your stakeholders and the outside world. As one of the UK’s leading market research agencies, Ipsos MORI has a strong background in studying, evaluating, and providing assistance with improving the websites of a wide range of organisations. Our website development service, led by our eSociety research team, has been running since 1997.

Our experienced team of specialist researchers can help you:

• determine how effective your website is
• uncover the real needs and tasks of the user
• eliminate over-design
• identify barriers to completing transactions
• provide credible independent data for design decisions
• reduce costs by focusing functionality, design, and development
• ensure a better reputation for the website

Intuitive navigation of a website does not happen by chance. In order to create a truly effective website, we believe that everything on the website must focus on the user – in the end it is their site and their tools. Consequently, our approach to usability naturally involves the end user in as much of this process as possible, especially within the ‘fundamental’ aspects of content, functionality and usability.

But this doesn’t mean leaving you out of the process - our research also focuses on how well the site is meeting your objectives. We work with clients at all stages of their development programme, from exploring potential markets, through content testing and usability studies, to post-launch feedback and the on-going development of their websites.
We offer a range of methodologies, including:

• on-site surveys;
• online discussion groups;
• offline focus groups;
• usability labs; and
• one-on-one accompanied browsing sessions.

Ipsos MORI has helped a number of clients to move their websites from 1st to 4th generation sites, encompassing not just information, but also interaction, transaction and customer relationship management (CRM). Organisations in both the public and private sectors increasingly find their existing sites ‘overgrown’ by content added piece-meal over the years, and we have been able to bring the user perspective to bear on this problem through information architecture research. This addresses the issue of how large volumes of content can be organised, presented and navigated effectively from the perspective of a target user.

Our understanding of the issues citizens face when interacting with public sector organisations, drawn from our social research experience and combined with our knowledge of how individuals interact with technology, has meant that Ipsos MORI has a deep understanding of how they react to public sector websites. It is not just about assessing whether a design is attractive or usable, but whether users can access key services and complete a transaction. Ipsos MORI also advises on communications to help boost website usage, and has analysed quantitative data to target key customer groups.