Visualising UX research
I’ve never seen clients stand around a written report gesturing at various pages discussing their implications… but when this happens with a drawing, I really feel like my job is done. A written report can be restrictive when working with rich, emotive material, so I often use visuals to communicate insights and what they mean [...]
Life or death usability
Over the last couple of years I’ve been lucky enough to be involved in the R&D programme for a ground-breaking medical device to help diabetics manage their insulin treatment. Part of the project was to reach a regulatory milestone, which has now been achieved. To reach this milestone we tested the usability of the device [...]
Getting a Grip. Prodesign Magazine showcases my approach to UX
This month I’m featured in Prodesign mag. The article harks back to my days designing surfboards and the moment I became ‘hooked on usability’ during a project for Sony Playstation. Read the Prodesign article ‘Getting a grip’ here as a PDF. It turns out this is the last issue of this magazine after 16 years. [...]
End to end customer experience for Swiftpoint
All too often, I’m working on one aspect of a product while valuable insights emerge relating to other areas of the broader customer experience. Classic example: A website usability study generates feedback around physical product, brand, delivery, billing or in-store interactions. In theory this offers double or triple whammy for the sponsor of the project. [...]
Explaining UX research to my mum just got easier
When I designed and made things for a living it was easy to explain what I did. People formed a mental model of what I did and pigeon-holed me instantly. … but when my design career was t-boned by research I became a hybrid. Finding the words to articulate my work became much more difficult. [...]
Swipe this way
You know you’ve overlooked basic design research when your customer can improve your product in a few seconds using a pen and some tape. This is the case with these three payment terminals. The design usually includes a discreet symbol to indicate which way the card should go through the slot, an interaction that occurs [...]
10 tips for usability studies with children
Children are some of the most demanding and discerning users of interactive products, making them difficult to design for and challenging to moderate in a usability or UX research situation. Whilst they can’t always articulate their thoughts and you can’t rely on what they say, with a careful approach you can generate incredibly useful design [...]
UX research. Making every minute count
Facilitating ‘face to face’ interviews with your clients’ customers is central to UX research. It’s also one of the most difficult of all UX skills to develop. Valuable insights can be generated and captured during each session but you’re often having to cover a lot of ground in the time allocated. After hundreds of these [...]
Skype takes the hassle out of remote usability
Remote research brings cultural relevance to usability findings, providing the kinds of insights which can only be gained by being there…virtually at least. I recently ran some remote website usability sessions for a Kiwi startup whose main customer is in the U.S.A. … sure, ‘isolation breeds innovation’ and all that, but when your customers are [...]
Keeping it ‘old school’ with Diary Studies
I’m always looking for better ways to understand customer behaviour and the experiences customers have in their own context, out in the wild. There are some interesting ‘digital ethnography’ tools on the market, using web and mobile channels to capture, collate and filter all this stuff as it occurs in the field. http://www.myservicefellow.com http://www.thethinkingshed.co.uk http://www.7daysinmylife.com [...]