Are You Experienced Seeing the Digital World Through Users' Eyes

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Are You Experienced?Seeing the Digital World
Through Users' Eyes
Jeffrey Veen ltjeff_at_adaptivepath.comgt Partner,
Adaptive Path www.adaptivepath.com/presentations/n
prpbs/
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desirability
viability
feasibility
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Hi, I'm remodeling my kitchen and buying new
appliances. While researching my decisions, I
visited your site to see how your refrigerators
compared to other manufactures. One of the most
important factors in my decision is the amount of
energy the product uses -- but I couldn't find
this information listed on your site anywhere. Am
I not looking in the right place? -jeff
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Dear Jeff, Thank you for visiting the Maytag
Home Page. We welcome the opportunity to assist
you. Please forward your model number and we can
send the energy rating for the model. Eric Maytag
Customer Service
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Eric, I think you may be misunderstanding my
query. I'm interested in buying a new
refrigerator. One of my key decision-making
points is the energy rating of the product. I'd
like to be able to see the rating of all of your
models on their respective product description
pages. -jeff
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Dear Jeff, Unfortunately, the energy ratings are
not listed on the web page. Sorry for the
inconvenience. Jennifer Maytag Customer Service
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Jennifer, Right. I realize that. That's why I
mentioned it. It's a pretty crucial
decision-making point for a lot of people
(including me). You should consider having your
Web team add it to the standard product page.
-jeff
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Dear Jeff, Thank you for your comments regarding
the Maytag.com Home Page. In the future, please
include the model number of your Maytag appliance
so that we may assist you more efficiently. Scott
Maytag Customer Service
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Our goal...
To develop an experience based on the patterns
inherent in data that empowers users to
accomplish their goals.
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Its how we get a pile of stuff...
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...into a structured experience.
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This includes labeling...
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...and navigation systems...
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...that are intuitive to users.
Ah Ha!
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But! Not all users have the same goals.
Shapes!
Colors!
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So, good design lets many users...
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...access lots of content...
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...in many ways.
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But this isnt always as easy as it sounds...
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Ancient Chinese TaxonomyThe Celestial Emporium
of Benevolent Knowledge

• Belonging to the Emperor
• Embalmed
• Tame
• Suckling Pigs
• Sirens
• Fabulous
• Stray Dogs
• Included in the present classification

• Frenzied
• Innumerable
• Drawn with a very fine camelhair brush
• et cetera
• Having just broken the water pitcher
• That from a long way off look like flies

-- Jorge Luis Borges, The Analytical Language of
John Wilkins
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Design faces global issues...
Colors?
Colours?
De Colores?
? ? ? ? ? ? ?
? ?
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Design faces accessibility issues...
Colors
???
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Design suffers from jargon...
Shapes WebBeanstm
? ? ? ? ? ? ?
? ?
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Design suffers from politics...
Excellent!
???
User
CEO
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Design must be extensible...
!?!
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Successful design comes from two approaches...

• Top-down
• Figure out what users need
• Derive mental models
• Focus on user research

• Bottom-up
• Figure out what you have
• Develop content model
• Domain of traditional IA

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Top down Understanding your users

• User research may be a science, but formality
  isnt required.
• Ethnographic research methods sound impressively
  scary, but we all do it every day.
• Research is a way of life, not a special project
  you schedule and do.

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User Profiles, Personas, Scenarios

• Studies and stories of fictional members of
  audience segments
• Humanizes rigid task-based interaction
• Sells user centered design throughout the
  organization
• Depersonalizes product development debates

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Ethnographic Interviews, Task Analysis

• Engaging potential users in discussion of how
  they accomplish tasks in the real world.
• Interview transcripts are deconstructed into
  specific tasks that map to potential features
• Provides assurance of feature selection and
  nomenclature
• Provides an opportunity for innovation

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Usability Testing

• Validation of feature decisions and
  implementation choices.
• Measures not only ability to complete tasks,
  but user expectations as well
• No longer the domain of the lab coat and
  stopwatch crowd

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Finding Users

• For a simple test, find 3-4 people similar to
  your sites audience
• Friends, family, coworkers from other departments
• Determine target audience
• demographic/webographic/psychographic
• Seek them out
• Existing user base, customer support inquiries,
  advertise on existing site
• User groups, email discussion lists
• Traditional means classified ads, etc.
• Use a recruiter Charge per user based on how
  specialized your population needs to be

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Lessons Learned

• Plug-ins and Flash are two-edged swords
• Interactive features are desirable when seamless
• Most of our instructions are meaningless jargon
• Users do not read a lot on screen, regardless of
  the quality of the writing
• People scan pages looking for the next valuable
  link.
• They gravitate to different areas of the page for
  different tasks
• Keep it simple
• Many, many expectations are brought from the
  external Web
• Pop-up windows are instantly closed unless
  initiated
• Underlined words are always links

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User Expectations Shopping Cart

• http//psychology.wichita.edu/surl/usabilitynews/4
  1/web_object-ecom.htm

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Bottom Up Designing with patterns
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Abstract solutions to common problems in context
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Patterns are applicable not only to architecture,
but all kinds of design computer science,
corporate organization, traffic signage and (of
course) Web design
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Content
Item Detail
List
Input
Tabular Data
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Thank you!

• Write me
• jeff_at_adaptivepath.com
• Read about this stuff
• adaptivepath.com/readinglist/
• Download this presentation adaptivepath.com/prese
  ntations/nprpbs/