5 Reasons Why You Should Run User Testing When Building Products

Have you ever wondered how the most successful companies make their products so effective? How do they retain so many users? The answer is simple: they listen to customers. 

So now you're probably wondering: how do they listen to their customers? With a wiretap? There’s a far easier way to listen to customers - just simply talk with them! 

“Human Factors International says that the rules of thumb state that 10% of IT should be user experience (UX) professionals and 10% of your budget dedicated to UX.By putting a larger emphasis on User Centric Design principles and practices, you can make iterative improvements and avoid costly large scale rework that doesn’t fit your users or organizations goals.”  (Source)

How to get the goal? Run user testing.

What is user testing?

User testing is nothing more than meeting with your customers and showing them your product. It means getting to know them, their needs, and understanding the problems they may encounter when using your product. 

User testing provides the most accurate data for analyzing user experience, whether this analysis be of your entire product or simply for when it requires new features. When you bring your user’s needs and problems to the fore, there is no better approach you can adopt for building a profitable product. 

What are User Testing goals? 

User testing will give you quantitative and qualitative data about your users, enabling you to:

• Identify problems more quickly

• Understand your product's performance

• Better prioritize improvements to your product

• Get to know your users better for the future development considerations

Sound superfluous? Here are 5 points to illustrate how running user tests move your product into unicorn territory.  

5 reasons why you should implement user testing 

1. Save time 

Now you’re thinking “How is that possible? If I have to add more tasks to my work, I can’t save time”. In fact, here’s how you will save time: by thinking long-term when building products.

When you dedicate more time and effort to early-stage user testing, you ensure considerable future benefits. 

It’s worth considering the hours and days you will save on fixing errors and performance redesign for customers already using your product.

Sounds like a nightmare? Certainly, it does. One you can now avoid.

2. Save money 

As with all companies, time is money, and here you can also use the “user testing trick”. Talking with users will help you discover over 85% of user experience problems, meaning you can fix them before wasting more money on developers having to rewrite code or on designers redesigning the product.

3. Compel users stick with your product 

There’s no better way to ensure an optimum user experience than by understanding and responding to customer needs and problems. 

User testing is the best way to build the best possible product – one that will compel a customer to continue using it. 

When you talk to your users regularly, you gain much invaluable feedback on your product whilst engaging them further and building their trust. 

In doing so, you message your concern for them and not just for your product.

4. Increase sales 

Your customers are the best source for leads that can increase your revenue. 

So, knowing what experience your customers require will increase your conversion rate and thus directly affect your profitability.

To sum up: the more you invest in improving user experience, the better your chances of increasing sales.

5. Get a clearer future vision of your product

Testing your product with users not only represents a product at an early stage. It is also a great opportunity for product growth. Fresh perspectives on your users can bring you many new ideas on how to expand your product in future. 

Which again means you’re saving the time and money that you may otherwise be obliged to spend later on.

Conclusion 

If you want to build a product that performs like the greatest product in the world, you simply must employ user testing. 

With user testing, you will enjoy the heightened customer satisfaction that will increase your retention rate, thereby strengthening and securing your sources of revenue.

We can run user testing for your product

If you’re interested in implementing a user-centric approach to your product or company, we’re here to help. 

At Startup Development House, we have a highly experienced team that specializes in user testing for bringing the absolute best out of our customers’ products.  

Don’t hesitate to contact us if you’d like to find out more about what kinds of tests we can offer you: we’d love to show you how user testing makes magic happen!