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Ask Your UsersRedesigning the Western site with User
Studies
Project OverviewNov 2010 – Sept 2011
Quick Project History
• Branding nearly finished by Marketing before we began
• Nov 2010 project proposal approved
• Features presented 2/11
• Page Flow (Architecture) presented 5/11
• Design presented 6/11; FAILS! Re-worked and presented 7/11
• Site delivered 8/29/11
Quick Project Structure
• Small volunteer committee from
different areas of campus
• (all volunteer design group)
• One full-time implementer!
• Reported to President’s Council at
end of each deadline
Quick Drupal Summary
• Drupal 7
• Hosted at WWU: 2 redundant servers
• 1.5M hits / month
• Using Zend for caching and back-end monitoring
• Integrated with Google Search Appliance
• Currently building multi-domain sites for colleges/depts across campus (different Drupal 7 instance)
Writing the Proposal• Define Audience (extranet / marketing)
• Define initial Requirements including:o Goals: create imagery for what this site is to be; why and what
o Platform (Drupal) and Performance requirements
o Define major content areas
o Define what’s NOT included
• Define Timelines & Resourceso Functionality and page flow BEFORE design
o How approval for each stage occurs; who-when-how
• Risk Management: Create a fall-back resourceo Contractor or extra human resources
o More schedule time (hah!)
o Create prioritized requirements – so some can be left out in a crunch
• Drupal theming ended up being done by contractor
User Studies And tools that might be useful
When to talk to Users
Participation From Our Users
Date Description Participants
January On-line Survey to determine Tasks 7600
April 1 Design concepts; Taxonomy testing 10
April 8 Layout and Taxonomy testing 5
April 15 Layout and Taxonomy; Card-sorting 21
April 29 Draft Designs 36
May 13 More Designs; Video Interviews 38
May 27 Refinements of Designs; DIY design 38+
July Hotspot Testing (on-line) 600+
August Test environments (comments by email) 30+
User Testing: What makes it Successful?
• Really decide what you’re testing• What do you need to know – frame it as concretely as possible
• Analytically figure out how to get at the question• If it doesn’t seem to work, change the test mid-stream – guerilla
testing is FAST and FLUID
• Attracting attention can be hard – be bold!• Give stuff away – it doesn’t have to be expensive
• Do some stuff that’s just fun – interactive and non-monitored is the
best
• White board magnets
• Video cameras
• Design-your-own page
• Come back and try it a different way another time
User Study: On-line Survey
• Question
o Who are our users; What tasks are they doing
• Study Format
o On-line survey of all users coming through home
page
o Responses: 7500+ in less than a week
• Tool / Cost / Strength
o KISSinsights.com
o free to $30/month (depends on # of
respondents)
o When large sample useful
On-line survey• Who are you?
o Prospective Student
o Current Faculty / Staff / Student
o Alumnus or Community
• What are you looking for?
• Optional- provide email address.
Survey Results
• 7700 responses
• 1100 external
audience
• Provided an in-
depth view of the
primary
destinations
Guerilla User Studies• Who to use as Subjects
o Best case – find your users
o Adequate – find users of similar demographics
• Attracting Subjects
o Give encouragement (sweets or coffee cards)
o We held 5 events, alternate Fridays, under a lime green umbrella
• Testing
o Keep exercises short and simple
o 5-8 subjects can reveal 80% of issues
User Study: Tasks and Taxonomy
• Question
o What tasks are they looking for; What do they
call the tasks
• Study Format
o Guerilla model; one-on-one interviews
o Screen mock-up provided
• Tool / Cost / Strength
o Paper and Recording device
o Livescribe.com Recording Pen ($79)
o Good for subjective interviews
Tasks & Taxonomy: Method 1
• Ask user to
mark up each
item and
explain
thinking
o Useful
oDon’t Need
oDon’t
Understand
Mock up Page
Livescribe Pen• Non-Obtrusive
Recording
• Tap on notes to
replay
conversation at
that point
• Uses special
paper but you
can print it
yourself
Tasks & Taxonomy: Method 2
• Card Sorting on
magnetic white board
o Leave some blank for
write-ins
o move them around
o Provide pens for
boxing, adding
buttons etc
Tasks & Taxonomy: Method 2
Biggest strength:
• Users enjoyed it
• Drew people in to our
testing station
Developing Page Flow
Big Subjects:
o Menu and
Taxonomy
o What
Content on
each page
User Study: Page Flow• Question
o What are the tasks; how do they proceed
• Study Format
o On-line, let users play and comment
• Tool / Cost / Strength
o iPlotz.com – online and desktop models together
o free to $99/year (depends on # of pages) and
$75 for desktop perpetual license (PC only)
o Good for modeling and demo-ing page flow
dynamically; also easy to create pages
Page Flow: WireframingTools
• Not just a drawing tool:
Dynamic linking
• Master pages (Templates)
• Online for best access / also
desktop for speed
• Good library of web objects
and graphic tools
• Can also put in photos
• Reasonable Price
Why we chose iplotz.com
User Study: Design Comments
• Show concepts
and designs to
users early and
often - take the hits
early!
• Menus placement
and design central
to success
• Don’t neglect
secondary pages
User Study: DIY
you see things a different way
users gain appreciation for design issues
Final Design: Live Testing before Coding
• Tool:
IntuitionHQ.como Email survey link to users
o Users are divided among
two designs
o Users perform tasks on-line
by clicking on images
• Results show hot-
spots of how
many clicked
where
• 600 responses
Other Tools for Teams• Dropbox or other cloud
storage to share files
• Grou.ps – CMS for wiki, chat, blogs, file storage/sharing, forums, $3/mo
• Unfuddle.com – During site building, provides ticketing, GIT repository, server log / notebook capability ($10/month)
• OneNote (online and desktop; great notebook/pg structure)
• Prezi.com – presentations, especially where you need excitement
Summary
• Survey - online surveys good for
gathering lots of responses
• Guerilla testing good for quickly
engaging the user: qualitative
testing, specific task testing,
functionality lists, specific
questions
• Hot-Spot testing good for testing
visual designs before you code
Summary: Tools
• KISSinsights.com (survey tool)
• Livescribe.com (recording pen)
• iPlotz.com (wireframing tool)
• IntuitionHQ.com (hot-spot tool)
• Team tools: dropbox, grou.ps,
unfuddle.com, prezi.com
• Always – your imagination!
