Hermes Website Test

Dayna Belmarez

September 24, 2023

U.S. Department of Health & Human Services - 200

1
Independence Avenue, S.W. - Washington, D.C. 20201
 Introduction
Hermes is a French luxury brand that has been making high-quality leather
goods, accessories, home furnishings, perfumes, jewelry, watches, and
clothing since the 1800s. The brand is known for its craftsmanship, timeless
designs, and use of the finest materials.

I am conducting a usability test to identify any problems that one person may
have when completing two tasks on the Hermes website.

A usability test is intended to determine the extent an interface facilitates a

user’s ability to complete routine tasks. Typically, the test is conducted with a
group of potential users either in a usability lab, remotely (using e-meeting
software and telephone connection), or on-site with portable equipment.
Users are asked to complete a series of routine tasks. Sessions are recorded
and analyzed to identify potential areas for improvement to the web site.

I had a peer to help me conduct a usability test of the Hermes website. I gave
her two tasks to complete: purchasing a white Hermes bag and subscribing to
email updates. I will be observing her performance and evaluating the level of
difficulty of each task. The session captured each participant navigational
choice, task completion rate, comments, overall satisfaction ratings, question,
and feedback

Executive Summary
The usability test of the Hermes website was conducted at a school with one
participant at 1:00 PM. The test lasted for 3 minutes and assessed the ease of
navigation of the website.

The participant was given two tasks: to purchase an all-white Hermes bag
and to sign up for emails. The test only identified a few minor problems.

The test identified only a few minor problems including:

 Did not have a variety of colors for handbags
 When she tried to edit her saved information on the checkout page,
the "save" button did not work.
 The address handle suggested her home address, but when she clicked
on it, the correct address did not appear in the address bar.

This document contains the participant feedback, satisfactions ratings, task

completion rates, ease or difficulty of completion ratings, time on task, errors,

U.S. Department of Health & Human Services - 200

2
Independence Avenue, S.W. - Washington, D.C. 20201
 and recommendations for improvements. A copy of the scenarios and
questionnaires are included in the Attachments’ section.

Methodology
Sessions

My friend was the participant in the usability test. In the first session, which
was to purchase an all-white Hermes handbag, she was able to navigate from
the home page to the checkout page without using the search engine. The
menu bar clearly listed the different categories, and she was able to easily
find the handbag section. However, she could not find a single white handbag,
but only a beige one. She then proceeded to checkout with the beige
handbag.

Her second task was to sign up for an email subscription. We noticed that
during the first task, before checking out, she was asked if she would like to
sign up for an email subscription. She was able to successfully sign up without
even having to look for the subscription button.

After each task, the I asked the participant to rate the questions on a 5-point
Likert Scale with measures ranging from Difficult to easy. Post-task scenario
subjective measures included:

 How easy it was to find the information from the home page?
 How easy it was to navigate overall?
 How easy was it to complete the checkout process on this website?

After the last task was completed, the test administrator asked the participant
to rate the website overall by using a 5-point Likert scale (difficult to easy) for
eight subjective measures including:
 Ease of use
 Frequency of use
 Difficulty to keep track of location in website
 Learn ability - how easy it would be for most users to learn to use
the website
 Information facilitation – how quickly participant could find
information
 Look & feel appeal – homepage’s content makes me want to explore
the site further
 Site content – site’s content would keep me coming back
 Site organization

U.S. Department of Health & Human Services - 200

3
Independence Avenue, S.W. - Washington, D.C. 20201
 In addition, the test I asked the participants the following overall website
questions:
 What the participant liked most.
 What the participant liked least.
 Recommendations for improvement.

Participants

The participant was a 20-year-old female. That is a banquet server who

spends at least 56 hours online. There was only one participant for each task.
The participant had heard about the brand Hermès but had never interacted
with the brand before. Their favorite websites are Google and Amazon.

Role
Federal State / Public Federal Medical Research * Other
Staff/Agency Health Department Grantee Institution Institution Organization

- - - - - 1

Evaluation Tasks/Scenarios

After going through the Hermes website, I observed some common

frustrations that one may have when buying a product. I provided two task
scenarios for the participant.

 Purchase an all-white Hermes handbag

 Follow the steps to checkout
 Sign up for an email subscription

Results
Task Completion Success Rate

I Dayna Belmarez, observed and recorded the participant's ability to complete

both tasks in under 3 minutes, with a 100% completion rate.

U.S. Department of Health & Human Services - 200

4
Independence Avenue, S.W. - Washington, D.C. 20201
 Task Completion Rates

Participant Task 1 Task 2

1 √ √

Completion
100% 100%
Rates

Task Ratings

After the completion of each task, participants rated the ease or difficult of
completing the task for three factors:
 It was easy to find my way to this information from the homepage.
 As I was searching for this information, I was able to keep track of
where I was on the website.
 I was able to accurately predict which section of the website
contained this information.

The 5-point rating scale ranged from 1 (difficult) to 5 (easy).

Ease in Finding Information

The participant quickly and efficiently completed all of her tasks. She rated
her experience with the purchasing process as 4.5 out of 5 for ease of use,
and her experience second task with subscribing to the email list rated 5 out
of 5 for ease of use.

Understanding the website

The participant found the website very easy to use and understand. The
navigation was clear and concise, and everything was categorized and well-
organized, making it easy to find what she needed. She had a positive overall
experience and rated the ease of use 5 out of 5.

Satisfaction from finding the task

The participant successfully completed all of the tasks and found the
information they needed on the website without any problems. They were
generally pleased with their experience and gave it a rating of 4.5 out of 5.

U.S. Department of Health & Human Services - 200

5
Independence Avenue, S.W. - Washington, D.C. 20201
 Test 1 – Mean Task Ratings & Percent Agree
Satisfaction
Ease – Understanding from
Task Overall
Finding Info the website finding the
tasks
1 – Purchase Handbag 5 5 4.5 4.83
2- Email subscription 5 5 5 5
*Percent Agree (%) = Agree & Strongly Agree Responses combined

Time on Task

The testing software recorded the time on task for each participant. Some
tasks were inherently more difficult to complete than others and is reflected
by the average time on task.

Task 1, which required the participant to purchase an all-white handbag, took

2.7 minutes to complete. The participant was able to quickly find the handbag
they were looking for and navigate the checkout process efficiently.

Task 2, which required the participant to sign up for an email subscription,

took 30 secs to complete. The participant was able to easily find the
subscription button and sign up without any difficulty.

Time on Task
P1 Avg. TOT*
Task 1 2.7 mins 2.7 mins

Task 2 30 secs 30 secs

Overall Metrics
Overall Ratings
After task session completion, participants rated the site for eight overall
measures. These measures include:
 Ease of use
 Frequency of use
 Difficulty of keeping track of where they were in the site
 How quickly most people would learn to use the site
 Getting information quickly
 Homepage’s content facilities exploration
 Relevancy of site content
 Site organization

U.S. Department of Health & Human Services - 200

6
Independence Avenue, S.W. - Washington, D.C. 20201
 Overall, the participants found the website to be easy to use. They were
happy with their experience, but they did have some trouble with the buying
process. She found it well organized which made it easy to navigate and find
information quickly. They found the website to plain and simple and had a few
suggestions for improvement.

Post-Task Overall Questionnaire

Strongly Strongly
Disagree Neutral Agree
Disagree Agree

Thought Website
1
was easy to use
Would use website
1
frequently
Found it difficult to
keep track of
1
where they were in
website
Thought most
people would learn
1
to use website
quickly
Can get
1
information quickly
Homepage’s
content makes me
1
want to explore
site
Site’s content
would keep me 1
coming back
Website is well
1
organized

4.6.2 Likes, Dislikes, Participant Recommendations

Upon completion of the tasks, participants provided feedback for what they
liked most and least about the website, and recommendations for improving
the website.

Liked Most
The following comments capture what the participants liked most:
 How easy and smooth everything was to navigate
 Liked how everything was in category’s easy to sort through

Liked Least
The following comments capture what the participants liked the least:
 Technologic difficulties with the address bar
 No variety of color of handbags

U.S. Department of Health & Human Services - 200

7
Independence Avenue, S.W. - Washington, D.C. 20201
 Recommendations for Improvement
 Need more selections from handbags and colors
 Home page needs to be engaging

Recommendations
The recommendations section provides recommended changes and
justifications driven by the participant success rate, behaviors, and
comments. Each recommendation includes a severity rating. The following
recommendations will improve the overall ease of use and address the areas
where participants experienced problems or found the interface/information
architecture unclear.

Buy an all-white Hermes handbag (Task 1)

Change Justification Severity

 Fix the address bar when The participant found it frustrating to High
checking out
click on their address in the address
 Fix the save button bar. The correct address was displayed,
but when they clicked on it, it
disappeared and did not fix itself.

The participant was unable to save her

checkout information, so she had to re-
enter it all over again.

Conclusion
Overall, the participants found the Hermes website to be well organized,
clean, unclutter, and easy to use. Implementing the recommendations and
continuing to work with users will ensure a continued user-centered website.

U.S. Department of Health & Human Services - 200

8
Independence Avenue, S.W. - Washington, D.C. 20201