Findability on e-commerce websites in sport and exercise : A study of a usability aspect from a user perspective

The purpose of this study is to investigate the findability and search function, focusing on e-commerce sports and training websites. The competitive situation within sports and training e-commerce companies has grown through the years. Prices and convenience drive the customers. Many companies have focused on re-design and updating their websites, creating modern websites with a lot of pictures and functions. Some websites lack in “focusing on users” because the users do not know how to use the website or find it hard to navigate through. If the customer does not find what it is looking for it may choose another supplier. Using Fransson’s (2011) findability model as a theoretical framework, which is divided into four parts: information requirements, information competence, representation of object and findability. All four parts combine to what Fransson calls an information search process. The model was used to understand the findability aspects on sports and training websites. A comparative multi-method study with a qualitative approach by collecting data through interviews, card sorting and think aloud was performed. The method was used on five participants with varying internet habits, competences and ages. User involvement in development-processes within e-commerce is a vital factor to satisfy users and sell more products. However, it seems that e-commerce is ignoring user involvement since it is expensive and time-consuming. The results from this study emphasize the importance of user involvement and also show that layout, placement and labeling have a significant role to satisfy users from a usability design-perspective.