I also noticed that Zappos is using SurveyMonkey for user suveys about its new shopping engine and interface called Zeta. Way to do a beta test! There’s no use in letting the general public try a new version without attempting to get feedback about usability. This is also a great time to check out AlertBox, the definitive usability newsletter and blog. But then, that shouldn’t be confused with a new SaS tool called AlertFox, which runs daily tests for uptime on your site, and can handle iMacros to even test forms and login pages. (If you just need basic uptime monitoring, there’s the free AreMySitesUp and Pingdom.)

If you want to try out different content to generate different feedback, I’ve just begun the plunge into Google’s Website Optimizer, which is free, fast and fairly foolproof. It plugs some javascript into your pages and serves up the alternate content for A/B or multivariate testing. The possibilities are endless. On that note, I’ve also been reading Tim Ash’s excellent book, (worth reading!) called Landing Page Optimization: The Definitive Guide to Testing and Tuning for Conversions.