Recruiting Usability Test Participants
Every usability test requires test participants. These people can be recruited in a variety of different ways, including using recruiting firms, providing invitations on a website, using specialized web-based firms, etc. The ease or difficulty of finding representative users is usually dependent on the types of users needed for each test.
Ethnio
When you login to your Ethnio account for the first time, you'll be prompted to fill out a few simple forms and upload your logo. Then you just need to get a tiny snippet of javascript on your home page, and you'll have a slick popup screener for recruiting people from your site.
Professional recruiting firms aren't cheap (up to $200 a person!). Even then, you might not end up with the best crowd of users. Would they ever even really come to your site? With Ethnio you get the real users coming to your site for real reasons.
Once you're starting to get a flood of users, you can easily flag them or reduce the rate at which your screener displays. Then you can manage your incentives and get to the real work of gathering feedback.
EasyUsability
http://www.easyusability.com/content
EasyUsability.com is a cost effective way to find out how to improve your website. They find real people from a set of requirements you provide to them. The participants are gathered from a pool of over 100,000 people in over 100 countries. You specify what country your testers should come from, and are allowed to ask up to ten qualification questions.
Each participant reviews your website, and answers questions that you have provided. The printed results are provided as a PDF file within 24 hours. The final report provides summary of your test findings, and the detailed answers from each participant. The cost is $15 per participant.
Test Army
Test Army enables product developers to rapidly test their software in many different environments, by providing a large base of testers with different hardware and software configurations.
Usability Exchange
http://www.usabilityexchange.com/
Dedicated to improving website accessibility and usability
Want to test your website with disabled end users but don't know where to start?
Do you know what disabled end users actually think of your site?
Would you like to try out your web content with a range of different end users?
The Usability Exchange provides a straightforward way for organisations to test their content with disabled end users. Organisations set up their tests online and submit them directly to disabled testers in our database. Testers are then free to complete these tests in their own time, earning money for each test they complete. As tests are completed by users, organisations can view test results, web page logs and other information in real time.
UserFocus
http://www.userfocus.co.uk/panel/index.html
Sign up to join our usability testing panel and get paid to evaluate web sites from your home or office.
We email you the web address.
You use the site for 15 mins and tell us what you think.
We pay you money or enter you in a prize draw.
Mechanical Turk
Amazon’s ‘Mechanical Turk’ is a marketplace for work that requires human intelligence, e.g., being a test participant. The Mechanical Turk web service enables companies to access this diverse, on-demand workforce. Developers can use this service to recruit participants for certain types of usability tests.
