Do It Yourself

Really, you don't need Slash Design.

You can start by finding your product's problems yourself. Take a real product, or a working prototype, or even a rival product if that's all you currently have, and:

1. Find half a dozen people representative of your normal users. No-one so close to you that they'll only say nice things; not so far away they won't feel obliged to do a reasonable job. Friends of friends, colleagues of friends, etc. No special connection to you or the product you're going to test.
2. One by one, sit them down with the product, with either a sound recorder or (ideally) camcorder recording this.
3. Reassure them that they're not being tested - it's the ease of use of the product that's under test, and they are helping you test it. Any problems are the product's fault. You want them to go wrong.
Stress this again: it's all about seeing how they go wrong.
4. Ask them to try various everyday things and speak aloud their thoughts as they try to do so.
5. Get your managers and developers to listen/watch. If they can watch live without bothering your people, then fine. Otherwise, use the recording.
6. Write the list of all the things your people got wrong, misunderstood, or failed to do, the thoughts they spoke that you don't want your users to have, and ask what you can do about each in your product.
7. Send your "testers" a tenner, or the best box of chocolates you can find.

We do this with every client nowadays. Save yourself some money and try it yourself.

We'll still be here, if you want a hand with it, or with finding creative solutions to the problems it identifies.