An investigation into web site design complexity and usability metrics. Quarterly journal of electronic commerce, forthcoming

Abstract

Chumpa for their assistance with Web page modifications, data collection, and analysis. Carol Adams and Ergosoft are graciously acknowledged for allowing their ergoBrowser software to be used as part of this experiment. 1 This research investigates the use of Web site design complexity and usability metrics. An informational Web site was redesigned with regard to a set of complexity metrics, which measure quantitative aspects of Web site design, with the goal of increasing the site’s usability. An experiment was then performed to test the usability of the redesigned site against the original site. Usability was judged not only by traditional metrics such as task performance time and the number of errors, but also by more Web-specific measures such as the number of links clicked. Results show that the redesigned site is perceived as more useable than the current site and allows users to perform information retrieval tasks better. The research also illustrates how complexity metrics might be used early in the design phase to create a more usable Web site, and how the addition of more “Web specific ” metrics might contribute to better measurement of overall site usability