New on UXmatters
Juicy Stories Sell Ideas
Published: September 6, 2010
Stories are hot. And why not? We all know how to tell a story. Stories are a lot more interesting than most other ways of sharing information. And they work. Stories are a great way to introduce a concept in an imaginative way or sell an idea to your team or management.
Storytelling fits into the design process in many places. You probably know that collecting stories is key to user research and ensuring your UX designs tell a clear story makes the resulting user experiences better. But in this column, we’ll focus on that big moment when you have something to share and want everyone on your team to pay attention.
Here’s an example of a case where a story is worth a thousand arguments. All of us have likely been there:
You’ve been testing some concepts for a new product design. Your team is excited about the ideas. Unfortunately, your users aren’t. When you take this disappointing news to your team, your report is met with skepticism. They might say, “You must have found the only people on the planet who don’t love this idea.” Or perhaps, “Your tasks must have been wrong.” Or, “You’ve just misunderstood them.” You know the design concepts won’t work as they are, but you just can’t convince the team.
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Topic: Columns | Communicating Design | Design Process
Three Reasons Why Persuasive Design Isn’t Enough to Influence Change
Published: September 6, 2010
Persuasive design is designing to change people’s behavior, or actions. This design movement fascinates me, and I’m jump-up-and-down thrilled to see it get more attention lately. Forbes recently ran an article about Jon Kolko, creative frontman at Frog Design, and his perspective on persuasive design. Kolko noted:
“Good design is design that changes behavior for the better. I think it needs to take into account the context of the environment, of the human condition, the culture, and then attempt to make the things you do—make us do them better, make us do better things. It encourages us to change the way that we live.”
—Jon Kolko [1]
While there is a lot to like about using design to improve our behavior and our world, achieving that is a tall order. If persuasive design is going to work on a large scale—and I want it to work—it needs to be complete. Here are three reasons why persuasive design is not enough to make all of its good intentions come to life.
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Topic: Columns | Content Strategy | UX Design
Recruiting Participants for Unmoderated, Remote User Research
Published: September 6, 2010
It seems new, online tools for conducting unmoderated, remote user research emerge every week. While this method of doing user research and these tools have generated a lot of interest and discussion, it is also important to consider how best to recruit participants for unmoderated studies. Though one might assume this would be similar to recruiting for moderated studies, very different methods of recruiting are necessary to find the large number of representative participants unmoderated studies require and convince them to participate.
This column explores the differences between recruiting for moderated and unmoderated user research. It discusses the three primary techniques for recruiting participants for unmoderated, remote user research and helps you decide which technique to choose, based on your study’s needs. For tips on how to recruit participants for moderated user research, please see my previous column, “Recruiting Better Research Participants.”
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Topic: Columns | Usability | User Research
Usability for Mobile Devices
Published: September 6, 2010
The mobile space is the new Wild West of technology. Much like the Web during the 1990s, mobile is the new domain at the forefront of innovation. Users are discovering new capabilities, integrating them with their daily lives, and experiencing new interaction models. The tech equivalent of indie bands, independent developers—working solo or in small teams—can create innovative new software in the form of mobile applications. These apps have the potential of launching a few software engineers from dorm rooms and garages into tech giants, in the tradition of Google or Facebook. Of course, accompanying this new era of innovation is a new set of usability concerns for software that runs on mobile devices small enough to fit in your pocket, which you can use while simultaneously walking around and interacting with the world around you.
Dealing with Physical Constraints
There are some well-known constraints we must take into consideration when designing and developing mobile apps—mostly surrounding a device’s form factor and physical user interface. Thus, the type of device on which a mobile app will run is a major design consideration. One nice aspect of designing apps for the iPhone is that the device’s form factor and physical user interface are standardized and well known. Plus, you can market your app and people can buy it using the familiar user interface of the iPhone app store.
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Topic: Columns | Usability | User Experience (UX)
Personas: Explorations in Developing a Deep and Dimensioned Character
Published: August 23, 2010
I started off a recent presentation by asking how many people in the room had used personas. About 85% of around 50 people raised their hands. Almost every one of these people also raised their hands to the question Who has been frustrated or had issues with trying to use personas effectively? When I asked what was causing these issues, people responded that personas are often emotionless, easily forgotten or dropped altogether, and difficult to share with others in a way that got them engaged. Not surprising really. These are the same issues I’ve been tackling when it comes personas, too. I have felt their pain.
In my column “What’s My Persona? Developing a Deep and Dimensioned Character,” I talked about developing believable characters for personas that are emotionally engaging to help overcome these issues and make personas more effective. To solve some of the pitfalls of developing and using personas, I proposed activities as simple as doing a dramatic reading of the personas, as well as more complicated character-development activities that have their basis in theatrical training.
If we are going to begin to address these issues, we need to get at the root of the problem—our empathetic understanding of our users. Having empathy for users and understanding their needs doesn’t come from reading words on a page. It doesn’t come from statistical analysis of demographics either. It comes from truly embodying and experiencing the character of a persona, so it becomes ingrained emotionally and physically in our memories. Actors understand this. From the time Stanislavski began teaching Method Acting—a process of transformation in which actors begin to take on the true nature of a character—actors have referred to this moment when they realize a character’s emotional memory and have truly become the character as the moment of embodiment. I’ve recently had the opportunity to explore these ideas in a real and practical setting and want to share my experience and the feedback I received with you.
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Topic: Columns | User-Centered Design (UCD)
On Freelance Hiring
Published: August 23, 2010
Meet Jim. He’s an information architect who has worked on award-winning designs and knows a thing or two about how to correctly identify the subtle nuances that make a purchase-path decision a no-brainer.
Meet Jane. She’s an information architect who has worked on award-winning designs and knows a thing or two about how to correctly identify the subtle nuances that make a purchase-path decision a no-brainer.
Which one is the freelancer?
Exactly.
Hiring freelance help is one of the many benefits—and sometimes one of the many pitfalls—we encounter in our industry. From copywriters to creatives, from user experience to usability testing professionals, we have myriad options when it comes to getting talent in the door on a specific project. And, as the entrepreneurial bug bites more and more of the talent pool, it’s getting harder to find full-time help to fill roles on a project roster or company team.
So, how can we evaluate the pros and cons of using freelancers based on more than just perfect pricing? Can you find a pattern that helps your company to grow organically without breaking the bank? What if a freelancer isn’t getting the job done? How about the intangible benefits you receive when hiring freelance help? How can you make hiring freelancers work for you?
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Topic: Business of UX | Columns | UX Management
Making the Deal: Supporting Product Demos with User Assistance
Published: August 23, 2010
Technical writers and product managers alike would love it if the quality of a product’s user assistance—that is, its manuals and online Help—were a major factor in customers’ deciding whether to purchase the product. But, while user assistance does have a positive impact on product acceptance and user satisfaction, it does not usually play a major role in influencing someone’s decision to buy a product. Typically, lack of usability and bad documentation are aftermarket issues. By the time users encounter difficulties using a product or its documentation, it is too late—they have already bought the product.
But there is one dramatic exception to this general rule: when you provide a demo version of an application as part of your sales and promotion strategy, its documentation can influence customers’ decision to purchase the product.
Demo software changes the rules. Customers purchase your product only after it has proven its usefulness. Usability barriers in demos often cause customers to decide not to purchase—after all, their commitment to your product is minimal at that point. Plus, product reviewers often use demos to evaluate products. They rate your product based on how well the demo performs for them. A poor review can discourage many potential customers from even trying your demo, let alone purchasing your product. In both of these scenarios, your product’s user assistance can affect how successful a user or reviewer is in getting your product to work for them, in the critical window during which they’re making their judgment about your product.
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Topic: Columns | User Assistance
Using Visuals in Presentations for a Technical Audience
Published: August 23, 2010
In this edition of Ask UXmatters, our experts discuss how to use visuals in presentations for a technical audience.
Ask UXmatters is a monthly column, in which our panel of experts answers our readers’ questions about user experience matters. To get answers to your own questions about UX strategy, design, user research, or any other topic of interest to UX professionals in an upcoming edition of Ask UXmatters, please send your questions to us at: ask.uxmatters@uxmatters.com.
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Topic: Columns | Communicating Design | Content Creation
